Are We Ready for Testing Under Common Core State Standards? (US)
September 16, 2010
There’s a bumpy road ahead on the way to a successful Common Core State Standards (CCSS) movement. Already states and districts are examining the match between current standards, what they currently teach at various grade levels, and the CCSS.
Of particular significance is that online tests will become the norm in the years ahead for many states. They will be developed by the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) and the Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC), both of which were awarded funds in September from the Race to the Top Assessment Program to create national online state standardized tests in mathematics and English language arts in line with CCSS (United States Secretary of Education Duncan, 2010). The first of those tests are expected in 2014.
Having been involved with technology integration in schools, I recognize that change occurs slowly in education. I have a particular concern for educators who will be preparing learners to take online tests and an even greater concern for both educators and students who have had limited use of technology for teaching and learning in school.
How will a rise in online testing in states that adopt the standards affect your own practice? Shou ld you be concerned?
SBAC and PARCC Testing
According to the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers (NGA-CCSSO, 2010), SBAC and PARCC share a common vision. New summative assessments would employ a mix of test questions and performance assessments with "sophisticated multiple-choice questions, constructed-response (or ‘fill-in-the-space’) questions, on-demand performance tasks, and–to the extent feasible–classroom-based performance assessments." Assessments would employ universal design principles (p. 2), which means that they would be "designed and developed from the outset to minimize the effects of disability, race, culture, gender or English language ability on testing" (CAST, 2010, p. 3). The common vision also includes that teachers will be provided support materials and tools such as curriculum frameworks, syllabi, and banks of curriculum-embedded performance tasks, and a reporting system for monitoring progress. SBAC will take an aggressive approach to including computerized adaptive testing; PARCC’s current plans call for a move to computerized testing in 2016 (NGA-CCSSO, 2010, pp. 3-4).
In additional details, SBAC recognized that scoring their test will involve a mix of objective machine-scored items and open-ended constructed responses scored by combinations of artificial intelligence and human teacher scoring. The common summative assessment would incorporate performance events of modest scope (one to five days) to evaluate the standards more fully. Tests could involve use of advanced computer-based simulations (NGA-CCSSO, 2010).