Standardized Tests

[speed]

Do Standardized tests adequately gauge ones intellectual capacity? Or instead, do Standardized tests mandate and reinforce the grooming of systematic and unimaginative students?

Obviously from the way I phrased the question, I personally think Standardized testing does measure ones systematic intellectual capacity, however, I do not feel it measures or encourages creative and individual thought, but instead encourages sameness. One only has to hang around graduate programs to realize how unimaginative these supposedly intelligent people are. And from personal experience on the standardized testing front, I find the SAT, GRE, LSAT to be absolutely useless exercises in academic tedium, but the IQ and AP tests to be of some interest and value-even when one is taking them.

 

[unknown]

I agree with you in some aspects...

I do..feel it.. encourages sameness

definitely. The schools are given a strict set of standards, and if they do not meet these standards, they are reprimanded. Therefore, teachers have to teach a given curriculum rather than focus on a wider range of issues, teachers have to stick to a confining set of lessons for only one purpose: Making sure the kids do well on the tests and the school does not get taken over by the government.

I, however, am against standardized tests. They do not measure a student's intelligence. A kid could have a really fucked up cold and be required to take said test and may fail as a result of this cold and not being able to think straight...a condition that has nothing to do with the teacher or the school, and yet both may be reprimanded for this. Secondly, for some of the smarter kids in school, these tests are a waste of their time. I remember frequently finishing the tests with an hour to spare and having to sit with nothing to do in complete boredom.

IQ and AP tests are highly interesting and much more difficult. They do require a great deal of "outside of the box" thinking (especially regarding open ended questions). I remember on the AP English tests, if you simply responded to the prompt you would only receive a 5 or 6 on the essay, whereas if you went "beyond" the prompt ("thought outside the box") you would be rewarded with a higher grade. Also, AP tests and classes allow for much more creativity. While taking the AP Music Theory test, I had to compose music for a certain amount of measures or give my opinions on what notes fit where and why. Also, in AP Literature, I did a paper titled "Psycho: An Analysis of Hamlet's Psychopathic Tendencies"...you would be hard pressed to find something like that in a regular english class where the curriculum is meant to pass the standardized tests.

 

[NeverIsForever]

I did pretty well on most of the standardized tests I've taken, but I never really liked them. They left me no room for creativity, and (with the exception of math) I always finished them early. So then I'd be staring at the ceiling until the exam proctors said it was okay for the people who were done to leave.

Then you have the issue of teachers "teaching to the test," in other words focusing only on information that will appear on the test. IMO there's a lot of useful practical knowledge that you won't find anywhere on a standardized test, so if teachers base their curricula on what will be tested then many valuable concepts will be passed over and ignored.

I agree with what has been said so far regarding AP tests, however I'd like to point out not all of them allow the same extent of creativity in free response. I've taken my fair share of these and in general, the languages, art and literature seem to give one the largest amount of creative expression, because of the essays. History, math, and the sciences were more rote memorization, for example timelines, equations, and how many moles of silver nitrate you get when three moles of silver ions react with two and a half moles of nitrate ions. Etc. When a question has only one "correct" answer then creativity is essentially thrown out. Even the Spanish Language AP involved a lot of verb-tense memorization...

 

[Silver Incubus]

i would say any test where the answers only have to be remembered are pointless, because it is biased against those who remember in a specific way. For me, I can always remember the concepts, symbols and meaningful events in a story, but I have a hard time remembering the names of some of the characters, because I don't find the names all to relevent to the actual meaning of the story. 2 years ago in a contempory short stories class, I did an essay on how "A country doctor" by Kafka was really just an unconscious awakening of his homosexuality, and got an A on it, and the teacher said it was one of the best essays on kafka she had seen. No one in that story had a name, so it was just the important stuff, the stuff that matters.

 

[milkman]

Ap tests are scored from 1-5. I'm assuming it was different when you took them?

Oh, and since we're on that topic here are my ap scores.. I litereally just read them tonight.

Apcomsci = 1
ap physcis b = 2
ap lit = 4
ap bio = 5 (took last year though)

Needless to say I kind of screwed up senior year, but I wasn't expected much from the fist two classes - horrible teachers : /

 

[NeverIsForever]

No, I think unknown was talking about the essays--which are, I believe, scored from 1-9? And then that score becomes part of a composite (along with the score from multiple-choice)...which in turn determines the overall score? Guess I should have paid more attention, my teachers only went over the scoring process about 400 million times and now I don't remember the specifics!

AP Physics? Never took that. Sounds painful. :Spin: I took AP Bio and AP Chem though...in the same year (my junior year) and got eaten alive by Chem...not fun

my scores for this past year:

US Gov. - 4
Calc AB - 4 (shocking, I thought I pretty well bombed it)
Lit (English) - 5
Lit (Spanish) - 5

 

[unknown]

Yeah the AP Lit essays are scored from 1-9 and then balanced from there. it's supposed to be that you can fail (rather horribly) on the multiple choice part, but if you get 6s on all of your essays, you'll pass.

I got a 2 on my music theory test...better than I thought I would get!

but I definitely agree with what's been said

 

[Thanatopsis123]

Standardized tests only show how well one can take standardized tests.

 

[speed]

Standardized tests only show how well one can take standardized tests.

If one ever has the unfortunate occasion to take the LSAT, one realizes that this statement is entirely true. If one "gets" the structure and logic of the exam, one will do excellent on the test. Literally they teach classes at Kaplan on how to grasp the logic and design of each question: understand what the testmakers are looking for, and one does quite well. I know as I took the damn thing twice, and did much better the second time after Kaplan.

Now the next question pertains to universities using basically only standardized testing scores to select their students. I know Harvard and Yale require a interview or a large "wink wink" donation to get in, but I know of no other school that doesnt just rely on either the ACT or SAT. Sad isnt it?

 

[Kenneth R.]

i am of the opinion that such tests only measure how "standard" one is. they often ignore creativity, individuality, (as some have said). further, i severely doubt the results of such tests being used as any sort of intellectual or intelligence guage. one does not know how intellectually capable or intelligent someone is by testing if they can do basic algebra and match words together.

my own experiences:

PreSAT - extremely low score
SAT - extremely high score, almost perfect
AP Physics - 4
AP Calc - 3
AP English - 4

personally i'd say that all this above info is wack.

 

[ZmrazenyVlk]

The tests should have more essay questions and less of those fill-in-the-bubble questions.

I think that before that's carried out, grammar/writing classes should focus more on free, creative writing than saying, "I want you to write 4 pages, double-spaced comparing item A to item B" If the writing is going to be prompted like this, then a fairly flexible list should be given so that students can write about something they feel strongly enough about to do their best writing. There have been times where I've been told to write about something that I have no interest in whatsoever, and the writing is very...dry and boring.

 

[MasterOLightning]

Standardized tests do a good job for what they are. I've always done quite well, usually in the 99th percentile. The math sections adequately measure your math skills, the english section adequately measures your grasp of grammar and proper usage, same for reading comprehension and science comprehension. Anyone with a strong enough grasp of the subjects should do very well, since the questions are always easy.
I had:
ACT=32
AP English lit=4
AP US Gov=5
AP US Hist=4
AP Calc AB=3

The US Gov test was a joke. I had a good teacher, and the test does a good job of making you critically analyze the workings of the government. Anyone who moderately followed current events and did the work in class got a 4 or 5.

It would make sense to have more essay questions and stuff on other tests, but that's too time consuming to grade really.

I know Harvard and Yale require a interview or a large "wink wink" donation to get in, but I know of no other school that doesnt just rely on either the ACT or SAT. Sad isnt it?

This is just not true. Many, many schools strongly weigh creative essays, extra curriculars, and legacy over test scores. Music schools at universities obviously require auditions. State schools value test scores way more than private schools.

 

[Kenneth R.]

i don't think the english portions accurately test your concepts of english thought. they only really test your grammatical skill. the essay questions (few as they are) rarely do more than test if you can write compare-contrast 5 paragraph essays, intro body conclusion. hardly difficult, and hardly testworthy for proving english mastery.

the math is a bit better, but still lacking.

most of all, i find the issue with many of these tests is that they fail to test more than grammar, algebra, chem/physics, and history...

 

[ZoMb!M@N]

i am of the opinion that such tests only measure how "standard" one is. they often ignore creativity, individuality, (as some have said). further, i severely doubt the results of such tests being used as any sort of intellectual or intelligence guage. one does not know how intellectually capable or intelligent someone is by testing if they can do basic algebra and match words together.

Agreed. The thing i think should be tested is intuition. If you can study for it, is it really an intelligence test?