And how is it called “cramming” if they are going over the material all the time, every single week of the school year, without a second for all those other wonderful uplifting other subjects?
Yeah, I “crammed” the multiplication tables and the words on the spelling list for the week, etc. I can still multiply and I can still spell those words. The test is about the foundation — reading and math. You can’t learn much or do much in the world without those skills.
Sorry, but neither you or anyone else is going to convince me that NCLB is not a BAD idea. I know too much about it and I’ve seen too much. And every single teacher I’ve talked to, and I am friends with a dozen and know 3-4 more, most of them Republicans, say it’s a joke.
One of the main points here is that it is perfectly possible to teach the core subjects without being bound to a particular, rigid set of curricula and a particular, rigid set of federal-mandated tests. No one is arguing that these skills aren’t important. But a fed-controlled NCLB program isn’t the way.