Why Do We Treat the Tests As Scientific Instruments?
I posted a blog called “A Reader Wants to Know,” in which a teacher asked how he could be evaluated on test scores when the students were in the middle of the second semester. How were the scores affected by the teacher of the previous years? Other teachers have asked how they can be evaluated by scores when so many other factors affect test scores.
A reader commented on this blog with the most pertinent question of all. Why do we (and state legislatures and the U.S. Department of Education and the media) treat these tests and the scores they produce as accurate measures of what students know and can do? The reader, who clearly is a teacher, reminds us that the tests can’t do what everyone assumes they can do. They are subject to statistical error, measurement error, and
A reader commented on this blog with the most pertinent question of all. Why do we (and state legislatures and the U.S. Department of Education and the media) treat these tests and the scores they produce as accurate measures of what students know and can do? The reader, who clearly is a teacher, reminds us that the tests can’t do what everyone assumes they can do. They are subject to statistical error, measurement error, and