The Measure of a Teacher

What matters most?

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

This week, my students took a couple of standardized tests. The goal is to provide formative feedback for academic growth in mathematics and reading toward state standards. Students took the same tests in August, and will take these tests again at the end of the school year.

I usually glance at the progress data reports and then don’t look at them again until the Spring when I help students prepare their student-led conferences for parents. It is at these conferences that, together, we determine whether students have shown growth (and in what areas) throughout the school year, and co-create an action plan for the rest of the school year. I do not use test scores to rank my students or as a comparison to other students in the state. Instead, I want students to see their own academic growth. I want them to reflect on their classroom practices and see if the data matches with how they are performing in class. I want students to understand their data and use it to tell a story about their time spent in my classroom.

I have a complicated relationship with data. The word makes me flinch. When I first became a licensed teacher, No Child Left Behind (NCLB) was the education system. The No Child Left Behind Act reauthorized the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), scaling up the federal role in holding schools accountable for student outcomes. Administration expected that standardized testing be part of my pedagogical practice.

My entire teaching career has been under the watchful eyes of this federal oversight. It shaped my early experiences as a novice teacher as I learned new curricula and began to understand how standardized testing would be a part of our collective schooling experience. I’ve administered scantrons, booklets, and online question sets. I remember when the acronym for our state standardized test changed and my required role shifted from just passing out the test to walking around my classroom actively proctoring the exam. In those first few years, standardized test prep started as week-long practice sessions to get students ready for the state exam. Soon, test prep dominated my spring teaching: months of discussion of sample questions; coaching students on what to eat beforehand in order have enough energy to score well; covering up instructional posters on the walls; and reassuring crying students that it is just a test, and not the sole determining factor. Whereas I have yet to be called into a meeting about my standardized test scores, I would be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge its impact on me. I have always had the lowest standardized testing data on my grade-level team. I've never been reprimanded for my students' test scores, but within any team I've been a part of, test scores subtly create a hierarchy.

I run a classroom different from other teachers. Once we start collectively examining our data, teammates usually begin to question my pedagogy. I lose validation. What seemed like eccentricities before, now appears to my colleagues as poor teaching. Every time I center the humanity of my students, others view this as time away from teaching curriculum. My students may love being in my class, but are they growing?

Standardized tests were designed to measure student growth. Quickly, they became a measure of teachers instead of for teachers. Luckily, I have never had my pay tied to my test scores. I never teach to standardized tests and I place very little weight on the outcome of these tests. I know we test students too much. Our overemphasis on testing is ruining the experience of teaching and learning in schools. So many things are tied to standardized test scores because high test scores equates to more funding.

I’ve seen how Campbell’s Law takes quantitative data and creates inequitable and even harmful school policies. John Warner reminds us that we all need to pay attention to “the more any quantitative social indicator is used for social decision-making, the more subject it will be to corruption pressures and the more apt it will be to distort and corrupt the social processes it is intended to monitor.” When teachers are pressured to teach to the test, students internalize test scores as indicators of value.

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Students who work hard in class, despite their learning difficulties, may have low scores, despite showing academic growth. If a student comes to my fifth-grade classroom reading at a third-grade level, and leaves reading at a fourth (or even beginning-of-the-year fifth-grade level), I count this as a win. They may not be growing as quickly as the state would like; they may still be below grade level in reading or math, but they are growing. This is what I try to focus on in my classroom.

When I see recalcitrant students’ test scores, I’m not surprised. If they struggle to be engaged in their learning, then their test scores usually reflect this attitude. Afterall, students who exhibit behaviors that show academic apathy, are probably not going to try their best on any standardized test, no matter the classroom experience. Many of these students have given up on public education, and unfortunately, themselves.

However, when I see a student score lower than what I know of their capabilities, it stings. I always want to do right by my students, and if my students are not growing academically, I want to know so that I can course-correct in service to their learning.

So, when I looked at my student data this week, I was shocked that 65% of my students scored lower in reading than they did in the fall. Is this because I haven’t been teaching our new reading curriculum with fidelity? Or because I have been trying to teach my students to read and discuss and fall in love with novels? Or maybe it is because I have lost the impossible battle to convince students that reading has value.

I know that standardized test scores in reading have been dropping. I could blame the pandemic or my struggle with students’ misbehavior. Political talking heads will contribute it to a myriad of factors, such as an increase in school violence, student absenteeism, cyberbullying, struggles with mental health, and teacher and staff vacancies. It is all of these things and it still forces me to question myself as a teacher.

American students’ test scores plunge to levels unseen for decades

Teaching is an incredibly personal endeavor. Teachers put so much of themselves into their practice, that when data shows negative results, it can feel crushing. Lower test scores can push teachers to question every decision they make in service to their students. Maybe I’m not as great of a teacher as I thought? Perhaps I should focus more on the curriculum than my students’ agency. Do I need to go back to worksheets? But what about the student who began the year hating to read and is now reading A Wrinkle in Time with a small group, and loving it? Did I fail her because her scores are lower than the fall? Do these test scores even matter?

I’ll admit that when saw my students’ mid-year data, I panicked a bit. My insecurities as a teacher flared, and I began frantically looking for an explanation that didn’t point directly to me being a horrible teacher. And then, I remembered reading about Alex Shevrin Venet’s multiple streams of information in her book Becoming an Everyday Changemaker: Healing and Justice At School. She asks readers,

What if, instead, we asked ourselves: what are the many streams of information we could tune into in order to gain a full picture of the student experience?

Instead of focusing on what Jamila Dugan and Shane Safir call satellite data (test scores), what street data could I examine? Street Data is “qualitative and experiential data that emerges at eye level and on lower frequencies.” For example, street data could include student interviews regarding their classroom experience, students’ social-emotional health, students’ abilities to regulate their emotions, and their overall feelings about school. I certainly don’t want to disregard quantitative data, but I can’t let test scores diminish the humanity of my classroom. As Margaret Wheatley states, I should start thinking of “information as nourishment”, not as judgement.¹

Instead of using this data to legitimize my pedagogy, I want to focus on listening to my students and what is happening within my classroom. I want to be curious, not evaluative. I could improve my pedagogical practice more. I could be better at direct instruction and following mandated curricula. I could have a more structured classroom. However, I am choosing to focus more on the qualitative information I receive daily from my students over the quantitative data I receive three times per year.

Evidence and Action

What evidence do I have that my students are becoming stronger readers? Here are a few street data points that I’m using to reevaluate my students’ success.

Listening to my students in their book clubs.

One thing I’ve learned from redesigning book clubs in my classroom is that my students love talking about what they are reading. They may not be talking about literary devices, theme, or characterization, or using traditional book club discussion questions to guide their conversation, but there are moments when I stand up from a group and hear them all engaged in some sort of discussion. It’s a wonderful sound!

It is so much fun to jump into a small group and read aloud with them. When I get to hear students read together, I learn so much about what they are attuning to in their books. When I read aloud with them, I can model how to pause to appreciate the beauty of a particular line or to ask a clarifying question. These moments are priceless.

Students meeting in their book clubs.

I’ve learned that having eight different book club groups makes it challenging to keep kids accountable to reading every day and staying on task. I was hoping that students would hold each other accountable, but this has proven difficult. In January, I am going to tweak book clubs by having everyone read the same novel as a class. Students will be in small groups, but instead of allowing students to structure their own club discussions, I am going to provide more direction. We will all read the first chapter of a novel together, and then allow students to meet in small groups for a more guided discussion. I think that having a bit more structure will help students have deeper and richer conversations about what they are reading. Then, I can slowly release control.

Students are talking about their writing.

This year, I’ve noticed that my students are slow drafters. They are so used to faux-writing assignments, that it has taken them a number of months to get used to more authentic writing experiences. Our latest writing experience is from John Warner’s The Writer’s Practice and is an essay on the most ethical course of action a student should take in a particular situation. They read this scenario with an attention to detail that made our discussion lively. I was blown away at our class discussion. Students were interested in the concept of forgiveness, which prompted me to show videos on How to Forgive and an interview with Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Students are finalizing their essays this week and I am very excited to read their ethical advice.

A one-page worksheet I created to guide students in writing their essays.

Weekly Reading Conferences

I have been conferencing with my students every few weeks, using this time to get to know my students as readers. Together in a corner of the room, we practiced talking about what book they were reading. So often, I see students check out a book from the school library on Monday and return it to the bin on Tuesday without cracking it open. If no one is asking them about what they are reading, they have little interest in reading for pleasure. This way, at least they were reading and talking to me. Based on Marcus Luther’s Two-Week Reading Reflection, I created a weekly Reading Reflection Google Form. Instead of just summarizing what they read each week, students have been reflecting on what they are learning from their book, how they connect to what they are reading, and their reading experiences throughout the week. Their answers help me prepare for upcoming reading conferences and guide our conversation.

Each week, I’m noticing better conversations. Students are having more to say about what they are reading than they did at the beginning of the year. This weekly reflection has become a routine in our classroom that I hope is helping students grow.

Sense of Belonging

Each week, we meet to discuss our classroom learning environment. I pose a few observations from the week, and we have a cogenerative dialogue to improve our teaching and learning experiences. Sometimes the conversations are tough because we have had a rough week, but no matter the topic, students feel comfortable coming together to improve. We give shout-outs to those who are exemplifying our classroom values, and discuss actions we can take to grow academically.

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I realize that not all of these examples are directly tied to reading instruction. In fact, I probably overly rely on qualitative data streams. I know that standardized tests do not adequately measure children, but that there is value in qualitative data. As I wrestle with my insecurities about my students’ low reading scores, I’m going to attune to these other streams of information about my classroom and my students’ experiences. I realize that at some point, I will need to come to terms with the qualitative formative data from this week, and make some decisions. What matters most to me is that my students are happy, healthy, and growing in more ways than can be measured on any standardized test. If my students are not growing as readers, I want to be humble enough to adjust my pedagogy to better meet their needs.

Have a great week!

— Adrian

Resources

• This keynote excerpt is from the 2023 Learning Forward Conference. As always, Dr. Emdin pushes me to reimagine the concept of teaching and learning.

How To (Finally) Make Class Tests Worth Your Time

• Jack Watson’s recent post from How to Be a Teacher was timely for me. He is discussing math tests, but there is value in using any test as an opportunity for academic growth. This is something I’m trying to improve in literacy instruction.

Overwhelmed by all the wrong data

• Again, a very timely piece written by Kelcey Ervick from The Habit of Art. What is the data I’d rather receive from my students? What data would help me improve my students learning experience in my classroom?

Is This the End of Reading?

• This is a fascinating article from The Chronicle of Higher Education. How can we design elementary learning experiences that start our youngest readers on the path to a lifelong love of reading? Standardized testing, boring basal readers, and standardized reading curricula cause harm to students that can take years to heal.

• This is an incredible video investigating the history (and flaws) of standardized testing. The classrooms showcased seem like a dream compared to public schools!

• I love listening to Alain de Botton narrate these School of Life videos! This particular video focuses on the modern education system, and whether it is actually preparing students for the real world.

Scores for Adults Are Dropping on Tests of Basic Skills

• A post from Natalie Wexler about the sobering decline of basic skills in adults. Maybe my decline in reading scores means something else?

1. A teacher who does this remarkably well is Marcus Luther in a recent post, What I Look For To Understand My Own Classroom.