Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on January 30, 2008 - 19:13.
It would take hours to explain all the ways that this act has actually pushed education backwards. Starting with not all children learn in the same way. This would take a very long time to qualify and quantify to people that are not in the classroom.
Then there is the testing of all children by grade. We are again in the middle of a large immigration. Many of these students are placed in a grade by their age rather than their academic ability.
A very important fact that surfaces is the diversion of huge amounts of money to test generating, analysis, and test preparation. Schools are spending large amount of curriculum time on test preparation. Students lose class time where learning experiences are replaced with cookie cutter activities to prepare the student for (in many cases) useless standardized tests.
What is needed is a new approach to education rather than trying to make everyone the same. We should understand that all types of people are needed to make our society. We need to make education something that people of all ages would choose rather than dread. Students need to have options about the direction of education. Will it take them in the direction they want to go? Yes we need more technical education.
No Child Left Behind
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on January 30, 2008 - 19:13.
It would take hours to explain all the ways that this act has actually pushed education backwards. Starting with not all children learn in the same way. This would take a very long time to qualify and quantify to people that are not in the classroom.
Then there is the testing of all children by grade. We are again in the middle of a large immigration. Many of these students are placed in a grade by their age rather than their academic ability.
A very important fact that surfaces is the diversion of huge amounts of money to test generating, analysis, and test preparation. Schools are spending large amount of curriculum time on test preparation. Students lose class time where learning experiences are replaced with cookie cutter activities to prepare the student for (in many cases) useless standardized tests.
What is needed is a new approach to education rather than trying to make everyone the same. We should understand that all types of people are needed to make our society. We need to make education something that people of all ages would choose rather than dread. Students need to have options about the direction of education. Will it take them in the direction they want to go? Yes we need more technical education.