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Recommended Reading
The Truth About Testing:An Educator's Call to Action
by W. James Popham
ASCD, 2001
ISBN: 0-87120-523-8W. James Popham is a former high school teacher and for 30 years a professor in the UCLA Graduate School of Education and Information Studies where he taught courses in instructional methods as well as courses in evaluation and measurement. His book reviews the history of testing practices in education and notes that "if all high-stakes tests were properly constructed, we'd find that a high-stakes testing program would typically have a positive effect on educational quality." He believes that in too many cases that is not true, and offers suggestions on what teachers and school administrators can do to create more effective ways of evaluating academic achievement.
At a time when teachers are pressured to raise test scores at all costs, he points out that the critical question of "How do we teach Tracy the things she needs to know" is forced aside by this far less important one, "How do we improve Tracy's scores on the high-stakes test she will be taking?"
He notes that the purpose of his book is to (1) understand the misuses of today's high-stakes tests and be able to explain to others what those misuses are and why they occur, and (2) recognize the distinguishing features of an instructionally illuminating test and be able to differentiate between tests that are and are not instructionally illuminating.
Popham presents effective ways of assessing whether specific tests are really testing what they purport to do and whether they are effective ways of measuring progress in learning. Then he describes characteristics of effective large-scale tests as well as the features of varied classroom assessments that should be part of any instructional process. He concludes with a call to action, suggesting what educators can do to remedy what he believes are serious current misunderstandings about the role of testing that are having disastrous effects on teaching and learning.
© January 2002 New Horizons for Learning, all rights reserved.
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