What will they think of next?

[Marcee]

My son in 4th grade just came home with a note stating that Next week will be "WASL" (Washington's Standardized test) pretest week....:So now we have regular yearly testing starting in 2nd grade plus pre-testing.....: To me this is over kill. What do you all think?

[zo's ma]

It makes my head spin as well. I live in WA, my kids go to a Waldorf school so it doesn't affect us, but I still think it's WAY too much and that it's time for a change.

[aniT]

We have lived in Oregon for three years. This is our fourth school year. They start testing these kids in like Jan. I think they test them like three times so they can "have a chance to better their scores." They make it sound like it is for the kids. But I am sure it is just so the schools can take the highest score and say they kids scored really high.

As a matter of fact, I believe my 9th grader already took and passed with high scores the 10th grade tests. Are they going to just leave her at that? Hell no. They will test her again and again and again so they can get the highest score possible out of her.

I wonder if I can forbid them from testing her anymore.

[CorasMama]

I hate, hate, HATE the WASL!!! Not only all the other problems, like the fact that it takes away like a whole month or more of instructional time over the course of the whole year, but it's not terribly accurate.

DD "failed" the reading portion of the WASL. DD read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in 3 weeks, only reading in the evenings, and recently finished the first Lord of the Rings book. But she "failed" the Reading portion of the WASL?!?!?! :

[CorasMama]

:

[Marcee]

See this is what I mean. They spend less time learning and more time being "instructed" for this silly test. Our Distrit also does MAP testing 2x per year to gauge progress. Pure silliness...

I have thought several times about opting out of the WASL but I dont want to cause issues for my son at school. But I am reconsidering again.