My Personal Belief

Alisha Eaton

There are several responsibilities that Nitko and Brookhart provide that I strongly agree with. In fact there were not any selections that I completely disagreed with. One particular responsibility that I fully agree with is providing students with special needs the appropriate accommodations and modifications. Being dual – certified in English and students with disabilities, I have a great passion for helping those with extra needs lean along side general education students. I understand first hand that it is imperative to provide the support recommended on a student's IEP or 504 plan. Another responsibility I agree with is that of checking assessments over for errors, mechanical or factional. Assessments that contain errors can negatively impact students’ results. A simple misplacement of a comma can change the entire meaning of a question, leading to wrong answers. Also, the simplest error in facts can confuse a student, leading to an incorrect answer, which may effect the results of further questions. There are two responsibilities I do not completely agree with. One is that of providing students with certain information about the assessment. The second is that of scoring students fairly. In particular I do not agree with removing student names and having a college score papers, even a sample.

It is extremely important and a "legal responsibility" that teachers provide all test accommodations and modifications provided on a student’s IEP or 504 plan (Nitko 89). Providing accommodations and or modifications can be a difficult task because not only do these needs need to be fulfilled, but it needs to be done discreetly. Many students with disabilities are in general education classrooms where they may feel uncomfortable or embarrassed for receiving different treatment or special services that the other do not have. General education students may feel that students receiving such assistance are given an advantage. What many students do not realize is that the accommodations and modifications are providing lover achieving students a "more fair and more valid" playing field by "leveling the field" (Nitko 89). With this said it is important to remember that these accommodations and modifications will not "lead to a higher test score" when really such accommodations and modifications will help students to earn average grades, even grades that are still substantially lower than their peers. IEPs and 504 plans may be a good start but teachers should also watch students and begin to figure out if there are any other accommodations he or she could benefit from. For example, a student may only have test directions, questions, answers read, but could really benefit from taking an assessment in a separate location for fewer distractions.

Assessments should be free of error and be accurate in content. Students experience enough hardships with performing successfully on exams and other assessments; they do not need errors to hang them up. Spelling, punctuation and syntax can influence the way a questions or answers are read. A question that does not read smoothly can lead to confusion for the reader. There was one unit exam that I gave for The Giver and while taking the exam a student raised his hand saying he did not understand the question. After rereading it for myself I realized that I had left a word out therefore making the questions almost impossible for him to answer it. Immediately I stopped the class to fix the error. I should have waited until everyone was done with the test but I did not want 15 hands to go up asking me the same question.
Grading an assessment can have errors as well. After grading several assessments, one may begin to rethink the answer to a short answer or essay question therefore grading differently on the remaining assessments. This is where having an answer key or sample responses comes in handy, for it limits the rethinking because one goes off of their original thought. These, along with rubrics, allow for grades to be accurate and consistent. It is possible that the rubrics and keys being used may contain error so it is important to check over keys to make sure that the answers that are present are the ones that the teacher wants. Readministering a test, in my opinion, will not always benefit a student. Many students may become frustrated and randomly answer questions or just try to remember what they had put the first time and focus on it so much, even if in a different order, that they do not focus on the question and answer selections. In my opinion the best choices a teacher has is to omit a question in grading or after making then correction, retype the question/questions and use them as an anticipatory set and then include the grade onto the assessment.

The section I agreed the least with is having to provide "sufficient information" about the assessment (Nitko 88). It seems natural to me that students should know when the assessment. In fact a timeline that shows important dates and assessments coming up, like a syllabus. The rest provided by Nitko and Brookhardt, I do not completely agree with. In regards to the content, students should know the topic of the unit therefore know what will be on the assessment. Other than that the content should just be the material covered in class. A teacher should not come out and say what specifics will be on a test. I believe that being too specific will lead to a narrow the studying field therefore not studying all of the information taught. The point of teaching is for students to learn all of the material not just a small chunk of what is covered in class. For the performance level expected, isn’t any teacher’s expectation that students do their best? Who does not want students to earn a 100 on the assessment? When it comes to informing students about how their teacher will use their results, I do not think it is necessary. Not all students care, its an assessment, they pretty much know what the teacher will use the results for. Let them complete the assessment and one you have their results solidify how you will use their results. Telling a student too much may make them more nervous. Overall, there is a lot of information that students do not need to know.

The second responsibility that I do not completely agree with is under the "To score students fairly" (Nitko 90). I believe in scoring students fairly, but I do not agree with everything Nitko and Brookhardt have included within the description. As a teacher, I would use an accurate scoring key or rubric when appropriate. I am unsure of how I feel about students putting their names on the back of their essays or any assessments. I really feel like there are some students who work really hard and may deserve a little boost of confidence. It has been my experience that when students try very had, but never see the improvement, they become frustrated and eventually may give up. Another part of the responsibility or suggestion was to have a colleague rescore or score all/some assessments. I completely disagree with this. I feel as though another teacher would be too blind to do this, meaning he or she does not know what was taught in the classroom and does know the style of the students’ work. I do not feel as though another teacher would be able to accurately score or "judge" one of my students’ assessments. The only time I would consider this is when students are preparing for the regents so that they can get a feel for how their essays will be evaluated.

Nitko and Brookhardt’s list of responsibilities are interesting. Two of the responsibilities that I most agreed with are providing accommodations and modifications for students with special needs along with ensuring that assessments are free of error and that the facts are accurate. Providing a student with special needs is a legal duty of the teacher. A teacher should also always make sure that his or her materials, especially assessments are accurate a free of mistakes. I do not completely agree with their views of what I should inform students about the assessment before they take it. Students should be aware of when the test is, after that they should just know what the overall topic of the assessment is and that’s it. They do not really need to know what I am going to use the results for, because I do not think that any teacher really knows until after the assessment has been given. Another responsibility that I am not completely convinced of is what they consider to be fair evaluating of assessments. To me, the scoring of an assessment is fair as long as each students is given the same advantages and scoring is not more lenient or harsh than another student. Teaching is a career heavy with responsibility and although we may not agree with all of them, it is out duty to given each student the best learning environment and learning opportunity possible.