Posted on 11/07/2006 12:15:26 AM PST by Antioch
Nine year-old Tyler Stoken, a student in the Aberdeen Public School District, didn't know how to answer an essay question on the Washington Assessment of Student Learning test. As punishment for leaving the question blank his principal suspended him for five days.
Tyler paraphrases the question saying, "You look out one day at school and see your principal flying by a window. In several paragraphs write what happens next." He's asked, "So why didn't you answer that question?" He says, "I couldn't think of what to write the essay without making fun of the principal."
He refused to answer the question even after his mother was called to the school. Tyler's mother Amy Wolfe says, "And he said he didn't know the answer. He just didn't know what to write. And they were telling me to make him answer the question."
He still didn't, so Tyler was given a 5-day suspension. In the letter that went home to mother, the principal writes, "The fact that Tyler chose to simply refuse to work on the WASL after many reasonable requests is none other than blatant defiance and insubordination." Shortly after receiving the suspension letter they received a phone call from Superintendent Marty Kay apologizing for the suspension.
"Because I think a mistake was made and over reacting to Tyler's refusal to complete the test," said Aberdeen school superintendent Marty Kay. ... The superintendent wants Tyler immediately re-instated at school. But Tyler’s mother says the damage has been done. Mom tells son, "Well, nobody will scream at you again. I promise you that." Tyler doesn't want to go to that school any more and you can't blame him. He was manipulated and then punished because he couldn't answer a test question.
WASL opponents also believe the principal and teachers broke the law by interfering with the WASL test. It had better have been a violation of the testing rules. If a teacher and principal browbeating a test taker into answering a question in any particular manner is not against the rules then the test is worse than useless.
why does this even bother you? there are now enough adults who were homeschooled, functioning quite well in the "real world." they are working side-by-side with adults who were "government schooled." there are no major issues...
what do you want from homeschoolers? how can they show they are not saying "to hell" with everyone else's kids?
One of my rules of the universe is that people have absolutely no idea what to do with power & influence once they have it. The average person goes completely nuts when they wield power.
Conservatives do no better than liberals in this observation, sorry to say.
This situation is a great example of that guiding principle.
I'm shocked at what teachers today do to give the kids the best possible grades on tests anyways. Opportunities for retakes, which isn't so bad I suppose. Another thing is, the kids get to take the graded test home, look up the correct answers, and mark the tests with the corrections, they can get partial credit added to their grade. While I don't have a problem with giving kids credit for work done, this artifically inflates grades and makes the school and teacher look better than they really are. I think the test grades should stand as they are and if the kid does bad, so be it.
He didn't answer one question on a test and was suspended for five days. Leaving one question blank on a test doesn't warrant immediate failure, nor a 5-day suspension. The penalty should be commiserate to the weight of the question on the exam, nothing more, nothing less.
That's what you missed. Like I said, most people have no idea what to do with power when they wield it. Your prescription, I'm sorry to tell you, illustrates that better than I could.
Oh, I didn't mean to correct *you*...it's wrong in the article, which made it a bit hard to run a search! I just posted it so anyone else that might be running a search will have it easier.
I'm pretty careful about correcting people...I don't think it's good manners if it's not absolutely nessessary.
:-)
petitfour, this post (172) says it all. You're obviously right, as are the others who are stating that it's about the $$$.
I wonder if the cracked down on other students who might have left a blank the the multiple choice section. After all, we can't have them making the rest of the class look bad.
Sheesh!
WASL is a state requirement now. Failure to pass WASL can ultimatly lead to failure to graduate, even if grades say otherwise. Failing a WASL in 3rd grade means the kid gets to retake the test again, every year, until he passes it. WASL is a disaster, because a good chunk of the school year is devoted to teaching kids to pass this test, rather than actually learning subject matter.
On a side note, the principal was probably reacting the way he/she did, because schools here are rated based on the percentage of students that pass/fail each subject. In fact, it is this obsession with getting kids to pass the WASL that leads to the behavior described in the first paragraph.
The point about moving out of state therefore, is not a hollow threat. There is no place you can go ... even to home school ... in the state of Washington, and advance if you do not take, and pass, the WASL.
I would have written that the principal's office should be moved down from the fourth floor and he should be forced to stay away from the chemistry classroom for the reast of his tenure.
Children expect that people in authority i.e. teachers and principles, are adults and will act like adults. They DON'T expect gibberish such as this.
Take it from someone who HAD a teacher like this in the second grade. I am now 58 years and in many ways illiterate. It confused me and traumatized me so bad that all I learned was to HATE school and LEARNING.
Get the kid into private school or home school. You have SOME chance of the kid getting an education this way.
Children expect that people in authority i.e. teachers and principles, are adults and will act like adults. They DON'T expect gibberish such as this.
Take it from someone who HAD a teacher like this in the second grade. I am now 58 years and in many ways illiterate. It confused me and traumatized me so bad that I all I learned was to HATE school and LEARNING.
My advise is GET THE KID INTO PRIVATE SCHOOL or homeschool FAST.
UNREAL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
how does such a stupid, open-ended question evaluate a students readiness in anything for the STate of Washington? assessment of their gift for fantasy?
You might check this out:
http://www.beverlye.com/BookSynopsis.html
CLONING OF THE AMERICAN MIND
CLONING OF THE AMERICAN MIND focuses on America's "illiteracy cartel" which, the author maintains, is built around an out-of-control psychographic consulting industry. The book details how student and family records have assumed a "commodity" status under new education mandates coupled to rapid advances in "predictive" computer technology.
As unethical behavioral scientists team up with school testing companies, computer specialists, and information brokers to produce polls and predict workforce needs, a political weapon is being created that holds a youngster's future employment prospects hostage to a set of quasi-political, psychological criteria . . . while the nation's cognitive and cultural knowledge base is systematically eradicated.
Eakman argues that psychology has assumed a messianic political mission. An unwary public and its distracted elected representatives have bought in to the education reform movement's bogus agenda, which is being sold under the dual umbrellas of "mental health" and "testing standards." The book traces the contributions of two distinct factions within the behavioral science community -- one that emerged from the old Hitlerian Right and one on the Marxist Left -- and shows how their two disparate agendas eventually merged for the purpose of introducing psychological screening instruments and experimental therapies into the schools. The author demonstrates how this screening process takes on new meaning as students and their families are unknowingly assessed for supposed "markers" of psychological disorders, the most recent example being to label Attention-Deficit Disorder (ADD) as a "marker" for schizophrenia. The results of the various tests, analyses, and therapies designed to locate ADD students are placed into sophisticated, cross-referenceable electronic transfer systems, such as the SPEEDE/ExPRESS.
The book describes how information thus collected can be overlaid with other public and private records, and downloaded at any time by "research groups" and underground information brokers for a small fee. A mathematical, computer model enables experts to predict probable future behavior and reactions. Psychological assessments masquerading as academic tests and curriculum, maintains the author, have frightening implications for both individual privacy and learning.
Punk? I don't think so.
Since when does not answering a question (which wasn't even a question) cause a suspension? Things are not filled in all the time on all tests.
And your attack on this kid is beyond the pale.
If anyone thinks this was an appropriate exercise for a 9 year old I would like to hear it.
Had a school attempted to punish my boys for something like this it would have quickly realized that it made a huge mistake.
This was a ridiculous exercise for a 9 yr old. It shows NOTHING and should NOT be on any future tests.
Had the kid, NOT PUNK, written that the principle was flying over to greet President Bush he would have flunked that part. You can bet the house on that.
So will they reduce the student in rank?
I gotta hand it to you you have posted some of the stupidest posts ever on FR on this story. They are classics of jumping to conclusions, wildeyed hysterics, crazy attacks on a child, everything but a little common sense.
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