What are our educational administrators thinking???

It's May, and for most public schools, that means it's EOG (End of Grade) Test season. I'm currently volunteering at a great little elementary school about thirty minutes from my hometown, helping fifth- and third-graders get ready for their reading EOGs. I'm also helping a kindergartner with his phonics and letter recognition, but since he's not taking EOGs, I won't be talking as much about him in this post.

My question is, what are educational administrators thinking by insisting on standardized tests? Okay, so I understand the rationale behind them. Teachers need to know that their students have learned enough to be ready for the next grade level. Arguably, the best way to do this is to create curriculum objectives that all kids need to know. However, in my humble opinion, these tests are doing more harm than good. I even brought along a few examples to support my case.

First, you've got the teachers. I know a ton of great teachers from all levels (including college professors), and I also consider myself a teacher. I love being creative when I teach, and coming up with ways to make sure my students actually learn something new that will stick with them once they are out of my class. I'm also lucky, because my teaching experience has mostly been in college, which means I have some leeway to do this. But poor public school teachers...they have to teach directly to one test, and if the kids aren't learning anything, so what?

Then you have kids who learn differently from the "standard." I'm talking about smart kids who happen to have learning disabilities. I'm talking about kids with different learning styles than the norm. And I am talking about me. You see, I was a gifted kid, but I also had a physical disability that completely obliterated my depth perception. Therefore, math was a nightmare because of columns, coordinate graphs, algebraic formulas, and Heaven help me, geometric drawings. So if I failed an EOG or EOC (End of Course) exam, the idea that I was just dumb was considered. Hell-oooo?

And then you have the regular kids who are just trying to get through a school year in one piece. Prime example. I work one-on-one with an incredibly sweet third-grader. She's a good kid and a good student. But recently, when her teacher sent home a practice reading test, she didn't answer any questions on it, even though her work with me is wonderful. After probing, it was discovered that seeing a whole bunch of passages in a row like that just made her shut down.

The truth is that not even our first-graders and kindergartners are safe. I was in a beauty supply shop yesterday, looking for lip balm, and the clerk and I started chatting. I learned that her six-year-old first-grader is being subjected to pre-EOG testing four times a year. Part of these tests is a section called "Nonsense Words." The idea is that the child is given a nonsense word (such as "zet") and asked to sound it out so he can prove he knows the different sounds. Plus, it's timed. So this little boy is sitting there, trying to make a real word out of a nonsense word, while his teacher stands over him with a timer. Can we say "trauma?"

Honestly, I am completely disgusted about this. Is anybody else out there with me?

The PDLAM Game

PDLAM (pronounced Ped-Lam) stands for Please Don't Laugh at Me. It's also the title of a funny game created by Beth Moore, a dynamic Christian speaker and my very favorite Bible study leader. I played this game while on a retreat in South Carolina that involved Beth's speaking, and it is a riot. So today, I decided to play it with you, my gentle readers.

As I mentioned yesterday, I am completely different from most, if not all, 20-somethings I have ever met. I have many, many odd, funny PDLAMS, such as:

1. I hate cooked vegetables. It's true. I grew up in the South, home of fried okra, green beans, boiled carrots, and mashed potatoes, and yet, I willfully eschew this subgroup of vegetables. House salad, yes. Cooked peppers, zucchini, and other such vegetables in stir fry, yes. Creamed corn, no.
2. I would rather play Scrabble and Trivial Pursuit than sports. Of course, this might be because I have a mild form of CP that has made my coordination factor zilch, but still.
3. My TV diet consists of Touched by an Angel, Jeopardy, Hallmark films, and reruns of sitcoms like Full House or Family Matters, rather than MTV or American Idol or NCIS.
4. I would always much rather shop at a bookstore than a boutique.

So what about you, my gentle readers? Do you have any habit, like, or dislike that would make a good PDLAM? I promise not to laugh at you. Let's celebrate our quirks together. Who knows? Maybe one of them could become the germ of a story idea...

Until next time, I am,

-Stephanie, the Nutty Writer Lady

Yes, that's me...

I am the Nutty Writer. I don't mean that as a slam at writers. But as a creative writer myself (of fiction and the occasional poem or memoir piece), I know how nutty the writing life can sometimes be. Plus, compared to a lot of my contemporaries (twenty-somethings), I am a bit nuts. Not nuts as in "psychotic," but nuts as in "completely different," which might be partially why God chose to make me a writer.

About that--that's why I'm really here. You see, I love writing about fictional characters and their lives, but I haven't gotten up the guts yet to truly write about myself, unless you count two creative nonfiction classes. I don't know...I guess I've always thought that no one could ever possibly want to read about my life. But I enjoyed those CF classes, so...

So here I am. I have an MA in English. I am a devoted Christian (a nutty thing to be in itself in academia, or at least the academia I knew). I am searching for employment, searching for a way to get my writing out there, and searching for a way to be brave.

I'm not a risk-taker. I don't skydive, gamble, or even eat sushi. So this is my first big risk--the first time I'll be able to look at myself and say, "are you nuts?" And even if I am, maybe I'll learn something about myself as I go.

Until next time...
-Stephanie, the Nutty Writer Lady