Testing

I have written before about my students and letter writing. My students would write 500-600 letters a year. I have written about how it gave them a reason to write and had response built right in. I also used the letters to teach the importance of spelling and punctuation. The fact that letters have a specific format was another opportunity to teach and reinforce that format over time. We even stressed the importance of getting the envelope address right so it would get to the intended audience.

I used a U.S. Postal Service booklet that included all the rules for letter writing and addressing envelopes. The Postal Services recommend that envelopes be addressed with all capitol letters and no punctuation. That was contrary to the textbooks we were familiar with but I figured that since they were the ones delivering the mail they probably knew what worked best for them. With each new letter we wrote I made sure the students followed the recommended practice. It works perfect for the mail but there is a problem with it.

At that time the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills (ITBS) items related to letter writing followed the textbook model and not the Postal Services recommended model. Once a year during test time it presented a problem and students who wrote more letters in a year than most peole in their entire lives didn’t do well on that part of the test.

At the parent “Back to School Night” in September I asked the parents whether they thought I should teach addressing an envelope the right way or the ITBS way. To my surprise many said I should teach it the ITBS way because they wanted their kids to do well on the test. I got a similar response when I asked teachers during inservice sessions I led on letter writing.

Right or wrong the tests were consistent with the published textbooks. That was a startling revelation for me. I wondered how many other things were wrong? I wrote letters to ITBS and textbook publishers pointing out the discrepancy between what the test and their materials said should be taught and what the Postal Service recommends. I proudly addressed my envelopes to them in all capitols and used no punctuation. I got no response from anyone.

Fearing I was doing my students a disservice I showed them the textbook model and told them that was the way it would be on the test but urged them to stick with the Postal Service model when actually writing letters. That may have been teaching to the test but I was convinced that we should be teaching students the right way no matter what was on the test.

The troubling thing for me in all of this is that the test is more powerful than the truth and even knowing that people choose to teach the “test way” rather than the right way. Unfortunately, I would like to say that times have changed but they really haven’t when it comes to the power of tests. The good news is that textbooks and the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills now use the U.S. Postal Service model.