Readings for our Jan. 26 class: thinking about high-stakes, standardized testing

1) Lane: Validity of High-Stakes Assessment: Are Students Engaged in Complex Thinking?


2) Arbuthnot: Effect of stereotype threat...


3) Boaler: Standardized testing

All three of these articles reference US high-stakes standardized testing (since pressure for this kind of testing originates largely in the US). "NCLB" is the No Child Left Behind educational policy of the George W. Bush administration in the US http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act. The Obama administration has introduced the Race to the Top policy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_to_the_Top, which has not met with favourable reaction from US progressive educators (and which continues to rely on standardized high-stakes testing as its main measure of student achievement and teacher success).