High Stakes Assessments
High stakes assessments are the most
common test in China with a long history. From pre-schools to universities,
high stakes assessments are the most frequent ones used by teachers and
schools.
The school I am working in now is a private
school. The principal of our school has a pretty advanced education concept:
Let students learn the practical knowledge and skills in games. This is exactly
what I want to do as a teacher. Therefore, we don’t have many big tests
compared with the public schools. We have high stakes assessments twice every
semester at most. The most important of these is the one at the end of the term
which is going to determine whether students can move to the next level. Our
high stakes assessments are written tests which usually take 1 hour to 2 hours
in different subjects. Teachers always use the last week to help students to
review for the tests. There are no rewards and bonus for teachers after the tests,
but all teachers still try their best to help students get high scores because
of the face. High scores means the best. I think this concept is already buried
in their minds. It’s hard to change so quickly.
Different from our school, public
schools are still more typical Chinese style. One of my friends is working in a
public middle school. She told me even though education law requires schools to
remove burdens for students, schools and teachers are still teaching as before.
Teacher centered teaching style is still the main role in daily teaching. They
spend 50% of the time in high and low stakes assessments. Of course the target
is high stakes assessment. For her school, the big one is the National Entrance
Exam (Gaokao), which is the same as the SAT in America. Therefore, huge
pressure for both teachers and students. Teachers’ bonus will be determined by
this Gaokao. Students will be put in the order according to their scores in
every month’s assessments. The score of the last high stakes assessment (Gaokao)
will determine whether they can go to universities or not. If a student gets a
high score in Gaokao, he/she will get all the compliments from parents,
teachers, peers, neighbors and everyone around.
In my opinion, high stakes
assessments is a kind of fair test for students, but it shouldn’t be the only
benchmark to determine where students should go. If a school or education
system only uses high stakes assessments to put students in different levels, it
will make some students go in wrong directions. This is because a lot of reasons
may influence students’ results, such as pressure, sickness, etc. As well as
that, some students may not be really good at writing a quiz paper, but they
may good at something else. The purpose of our education is not to make all
students good at same thing, but to find their differences and help them become
better in themselves.
I completely agree with your assessment. In my research, I discovered that Taiwan has attempted to move away from that. Now the scores are also accompanied by teacher recommendations and consideration of extracurricular activities. But despite these changes, schools still fail to adapt and continue to promote direct teaching and rote memorization. And yet it would also not be practical for such a large scale test to be administered using say, a portfolio. I have yet to be able to find a balance.
回复删除How has the testing affected that way classes are taught in your school. In many schools in Taiwan, it affects the way textbooks are written and made. Unlike the US, which has many competing textbooks, or the option of not using textbooks at all, Taiwan, due to the exams, aren't able to do that at all. Textbooks are generally uniform, and teachers are forced to teach to the test. Have you observed this at all?
I really like the part that education is integrated with games and activities. I think learning should be fun and interesting. At least that's how I feel about education when I was a student, too. A high stakes assessment arranged at the end of the term serves an important role to determine whether or not students are ready for next level. I am disgusted by the schools or cram schools which spend 50% or more time targeting Gaokao. It trains students to become test machines. Like I mention in my blog, this "Theater Effect" will only get worse if nobody does something about it.
回复删除Leya,
回复删除We both experienced Gaokao, and understand how challenging it is for adolescents. Learning for test does not help students really learn things, and they forget about it after tests. Compared to Gaokao, I think although IB is also a high stakes assessment, it is designed to engage students in critical thinking and to be lifelong learners. During the recent decade, I have seen more and more families trying to avoid Gaokao by sending their kids to private schools or oversea, but with the limitation of the education resources, Gaokao is still the only choice of most students.