Standardized Testing for Assessments

After reading chapters two's about assessments and testing I decided I wanted to find out what the state thought testing was like in the classroom. I began searching the Indiana Department Of Education's website, I found The Truth About Testing. I was reading through a few different Myth's that they had and their responses. The one that caught my attention the most was the Myth "Indiana’s schoolchildren spend an enormous amount of time taking these tests." The fact IDOE had responded with was that you only spend 6 1/2 out of 900 hours. It makes it seem as if there is only 6.5 hours out of the whole school year that the ISTEP is addressed with the students.

In reality educators feel that they are being forced to teach the test. I feel that the IDOE is disregarding all of the time spent taking practice tests and preparing the students for the test. According to a recent survey by NEA , National Education Association, nearly half of teachers are considering leaving the profession due to standardized testing. To read more on this article click here. I found this article to be very interesting since it was coming from people who are actively dealing with the standardized testing problems first hand.  The image summarizes the biggest concern teachers have with standardized testing.

So now that we see the teachers and IDOE's view on standardized testing do we feel that standardized testing is the best way to asses our students? As discussed in Why Are Schools Only Using One Form of Assessment? I think that there are better ways to assess students as addressed in this blog and our textbook in Chapter two. So this makes me wonder, what do you feel the best form of assessment is?