The 5-Minute Break
Last week, New York State Education Commission decided to give students a mandated 5-minute break in the first book of the English-Language Arts test. When I read about it, I laughed for reasons I rather expand on after the math test. However, I did receive a tape with some recorded dialogue from the closed room where some of these decisions were made. Here’s an excerpt from the dialogue:
Official A: What do you mean you’re going to give kids a five-minute break?
Official B: Well, we can’t give kids less time on test, less questions, less passages, less days of testing, or less testing period. If we’re going to race to the top, we might as well give them a shot of Gatorade during the race.
OA: You’re making no sense whatsoever. You’ll only do this on the first day, too. For what?
OB: Listen, we just put in a story about a pineapple with no sleeves, and that was the moral OK? Does anything
