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Jim Tiffin Jr

A convenient untruth | Learning with 'e's blog - 11 views

steve-wheeler.blogspot.com/...convenient-untruth.html

blog Gardner learning styles education teaching learning research best practices

shared by Jim Tiffin Jr on 01 Jun 12 - No Cached
  • we should realize that the value of the video or audio will be determined by how it suits the content that we are asking students to learn
  • Jim Tiffin Jr on 01 Jun 12
     
    Blog post talking about the false idea of learning styles. Many resources linking claims to research-based studies and experts pertaining to the lack of evidence supporting the idea of learning styles.
Jessica DAgostino

"Pineapples Don't Have Sleeves": On Assessing Absurdity | Ploughshares - 10 views

blog.pshares.org/...sleeves-on-assessing-absurdity

shared by Jessica DAgostino on 24 May 12 - No Cached
  • 1) the story is absurd, and therefore nonsensical, and so it has no business being on a test, and 2) standardized testing itself is useless because it presumes the existence of an “objective reading,” and “The Hare and the Pineapple” is simply an obvious and exaggerated example of how all stories are open to multiple interpretations
    • Rita Gupta
      Rita Gupta on 26 May 12
       
      I tend to agree with both of these camps, and I am wondering what the people who wrote the test were thinking.
    • Meghan Hynes
      Meghan Hynes on 30 May 12
       
      I believe that if a story is open to multiple interpretations it should not be tested based on multiple choice questions with correct answers. Just because a student interprets a story differently than another student does not make that student wrong. I believe questions for these types of stories should be short answer or essay, where students are able to defend their answers with facts and quotes from the text. This way, even if students have differing opinions...they both may be right.
    • Michelle Ginett
      Michelle Ginett on 30 May 12
       
      It looks like Meghan beat me to my response. I agree completely. If a story is open to multiple interpretations, it has no business being in a Multuple Choice exam. If anything, this story may have served as a starter for a response paper. Otherwise, it is pointless to attach such a controversial piece to a mutliple choice exam.
  • Any number of fairy tales and fables have equally implausible premises,
    • Rita Gupta
      Rita Gupta on 26 May 12
       
      I think the difference with these examples is that most people are familiar with some sort of fairy tale type story, but nobody is familiar with a pinapple story. We already know how to interpret a fairy tale, but when faced with something like a talking pineapple, we don't really know what to think.
    • Jessica DAgostino
      Jessica DAgostino on 29 May 12
       
      I completely agree with you! I also think as the students listened to or began reading this story the story was so abstract and did not follow the fairy tale that it was based off of that the students may have been confused. The moral of this story is the exact opposite of the tortus and the hare, but the story follows the same plot. This is just confusing!
    • Michelle Ginett
      Michelle Ginett on 30 May 12
       
      Not to mention, the questions asked on the exam did not match what occurred in the story. By the time students finished reading the story, I'm sure the last thing on their mind was "why the animals ate the pinapple." Again, I'm not sure how they came up with these questions. The questions are more abstract and out of place than the story.
    • Jessica DAgostino
      Jessica DAgostino on 31 May 12
       
      I completely agree with you Michelle, why would the students be thinking about the pineapple being eaten. The story is based on the tortus and the hare, but no one gets eaten in that story, so where is the relivance?
  • A reader properly trained to evaluate a story by its own internal logic—even an eighth grader—would be able to puzzle this out.
    • Rita Gupta
      Rita Gupta on 26 May 12
       
      But since this is on a test, I wonder if the students were thinking that there were trick questions. If I was faced with this on a standardized test, I would think that a trick question might be a possibility.
    • Michelle Ginett
      Michelle Ginett on 30 May 12
       
      Same here. I would have definitely fallen for the "second-guessing" mistake like the forest creatures in the story.
  • ...9 more annotations...
  • I agree with this reaction, for the most part. But I’m also a pragmatist
    • Rita Gupta
      Rita Gupta on 26 May 12
       
      Interesting that he has two views on standardized testing, both of which are complete opposites.
  • we do not have to buy into the idea that anything not-right is “wrong”
    • Rita Gupta
      Rita Gupta on 26 May 12
       
      Could you do this with math???
    • Jessica DAgostino
      Jessica DAgostino on 29 May 12
       
      I think so, especially when you consider doing a math problem in multiple ways. The student may not do the exact method the teacher wants for the problem and may or may not get the right answer. However if they can show their logic and process, they at least deserve partial to full credit depending on the correct or incorrect answer.
    • Michelle Ginett
      Michelle Ginett on 30 May 12
       
      This highlighted sentence is what I was thinking while reading this article. This story cannot be subject to answers that are right or wrong. I think if the test allowed for students to answer and then explain, there would not have been so many complaints on the test. If a student who chose the crow instead of the owl for the wisest animal and could propose a descent expanation, then I think its worthy of being a "correct" answer
  • Any story with clear-cut answers regarding its “themes” or its characters’ motivations is one that probably isn’t worth reading in the first place,
    • Rita Gupta
      Rita Gupta on 26 May 12
       
      I don't know if I agree with this statement. A story that is worth reading is up to the reader. Having something clear and spelled out might be what some people enjoy.
  • “the test-makers had turned a nonsensical story into a nonsensical question for what he believed was a nonsensical test.”
    • Jessica DAgostino
      Jessica DAgostino on 29 May 12
       
      I think this is a great quote defining the mistakes made by the test makers. The story was not meant to make sense. It was meant to have many different opinions and different explinaitions from each reader. How could the test makers create questions that have single answers when the reader can form so many different opinions about the story. Does this show an example of how rediculuous standardized testing has become? How can they expect students to read this nonsensical story without biases and come up with the same answers?
    • Meghan Hynes
      Meghan Hynes on 30 May 12
       
      I completely agree! It's sad that even the author states that his stories are not meant to make sense, and yet this story was still put on a standardized test and students were graded on it.
    • Michelle Ginett
      Michelle Ginett on 30 May 12
       
      I find it strange that the test makers did not do their "research" on the story before putting it in a state test. Did they not know what the story maker was doing? Did they just make up answers to their multiple choice questions? This makes me believe that the test makers do not take their jobs seriously and therefore, teachers and students must suffer. This may sound a bit dramatic, but I would assume that the person making these tests would have a bit more common sense.
    • Jessica DAgostino
      Jessica DAgostino on 31 May 12
       
      Michelle, I really like what your saying. The test makers should have done their research before putting such an odd story on the test! I feel like if they are going to make the test they should put more time into ensuring the test and its questions are reliable and valid. (It is their job!)
  • And then the owl was able not only to predict the winner, but also to explain why the hare would win, succinctly: “pineapples don’t have sleeves.” The owl is the most wise; “the owl” is the most-right answer.
    • Jessica DAgostino
      Jessica DAgostino on 29 May 12
       
      I think this is a good explination for the answer to this question. It make sense that the students could have deduced this answer from the story and not from their own personal experiences with owls. This test is meant to judge how well students can pull information from a text and not how well they can relate their previous experiences. Even though I do not agree with using this story on the test, this statement gives a good explination of how students may have determined this answer.
  • you don’t have to be right all the time to be smart, you just shouldn’t be totally wrong all the time, and your line of reasoning should follow one form of logic or another.
    • Jessica DAgostino
      Jessica DAgostino on 29 May 12
       
      This statement makes a good argument on why the state tests are not a good form of assessment when it comes to questions of oppinion. Every student is different and has different experiences, which they bring to the table. With a nonsesical story each student is going to interpret it differently. However, with mulitple choice they can not express their reasoning and logic. Some of these students may not be correct in choosing the right choice, but their logic might make sense to the point where they deserve credit.
    • Michelle Ginett
      Michelle Ginett on 30 May 12
       
      I like what you said, Jessica, and I agree with it completely.
  • Are the two contested questions above really so opaque, or were the students simply thrown off by a story with which they were not already familiar, and which followed a logic of its own devising
    • Michelle Ginett
      Michelle Ginett on 30 May 12
       
      I think Rita said this earlier but I believe that these are important questions to consider. Maybe the students were just unfamiliar with the story they were presented. As mentioned in the article, other fairy tales contain abstract ideas, but are not questioned due to their familiarity. The author makes an interesting arguement suggesting that students were simply not familiar with the story.
  • A) hungry B) excited C) annoyed D) amused
    • Michelle Ginett
      Michelle Ginett on 30 May 12
       
      My question is . . .why these answers? Why is annoyed even a chosen answer? why not angry or bored or even to show loyalty to the hare? I understand how a student may use deductive reasoning to get close to the right answer, but who's to say one of these is "right?"
  • Actually, if the implicit moral is “sometimes things are exactly what they seem.,” then “hungry” seems the best answer. Who would win in a race between a pineapple and a hare? A hare, obviously. Why do animals eat things? They are hungry, obviously.
    • Michelle Ginett
      Michelle Ginett on 30 May 12
       
      So, I know this isn't part of the article, but I really like what this person said and I actually agree with it. In fact, I was thinking the same idea when the author stated that annoyed was the better answer.
    • Michelle Ginett
      Michelle Ginett on 30 May 12
       
      I think that part of the problem with the questions was that there was no consistency or logic. Which essentially made all the answers wrong and all the answers potentially correct.
  • Jim Tiffin Jr on 24 May 12
     
    A blog post in regards the literary question on the NYS exam. Author points out both the weaknesses and the strengths of using these types of questions on a standardized test.
  • Jim Tiffin Jr on 24 May 12
     
    This post contains links to the original exam question, as well as other useful information.
megevona

Do Standards Kill Creativity? - 4 views

www.edutopia.org/...s-support-creativity-classroom

shared by megevona on 18 Jun 14 - Cached
  • megevona on 18 Jun 14
     
    NO. Finally someone in support of the standards!
  • angelaandrese on 19 Jun 14
     
    I actually really enjoyed this website! I do not think standards are necessarily a bad thing as long as they are specific enough for teachers to understand what is expected. I think like we have talked about, PLC are a great way to determine what exactly the standards mean to teachers in a particular school and to teach based around that. I see the standards as guidelines for lessons. Although I am not quite teaching yet and may be missing something, I do not see the standards as THAT bad. The only bad thing is that the standards dictate what is on the state exams and those are bad. This article was interesting to read to see how specfic schools are using their standards to do good in the school.
  • nickik314 on 21 Jun 14
     
    I am not actually teaching yet either and I often wonder if I am missing something because I also do not feel negatively about the standards. I feel like standards are helpful and it is what we do with those standards as teachers that really make a difference.
Scott Hudson

Paideia Seminars' connection to UDL - 0 views

www.teachingchannel.org/...d-student-collaboration-skills

Education Learning udl resources instruction teaching

shared by Scott Hudson on 20 Jun 14 - No Cached
  • Scott Hudson on 20 Jun 14
     
    An interesting perspective on UDL, these seminars align with CCSS and UDL!
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