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Running head: ETAA #3ETAA #3: Nation’s Report CardLindy KralicekSouthwestern College Professional StudiesDr. Jeni McRayEDUC 543March 15, 2013ETAA #3Testing is completed at each school, district, and states across America each year and each vary. These assessments provide information on how the school is performing as well as the district and state. When looking at state assessments they are completely different from state to state with no consistency. Thus, the state assessment makes it hard to see if the students across America are performing at the same rate and level. The Nation’s Report card completed through National Assessments of Education Progress (NAEP) allows the students all to have the same exam given and provides the ability to view how students are performing in content areas.Nation’s Report Card The Nation’s Report Card is compiled and created through NAEP. NAEP creates assessments which are given on multiple subjects to find out how the students are performing. The assessments are created off from a content area’s framework rather than standards which is completely different than state assessments. Participation in NAEP is completely voluntary; however, if Title I funding is given to a school they have a greater chance of being selected to participate. The student’s performance is what is measured to find out what they know compared to other students their age and grade level across the country. NAEP does provide many resources and information on their website. The content in this website is profound on the information NAEP details. NAEP has sample tests on where a person can see tests from previous years and a sampling of their questions. In addition, a person can see what type of test questions and level of difficulty for a student from the NAEP assessment last year. One area which is important for an educator is reviewing the content framework. The framework is developed by many professional educators; this framework identifies what a student should be able to do at each grade level. Once the grade level is identified and the items for which the student will be assess; the assessment is built then test the students through multiple areas of the identified items. NAEP assessments test whether the students know the content information at three different levels of basic, proficient, and advanced. NAEP Relates to KansasThe ever pressing needs to meet Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) schools have been working to meet the demands of high stakes testing. With NCLB schools are being held to standards of meeting AYP and leaving assessments with no consistency state to state except for the NAEP assessment. Each state has different tests for state assessments, different cut scores, and even process on who proctors the exam. The information can be viewed to see if the school is meeting AYP and making progress; however, the information the school tests on varies and testing varies so much from state to state a person cannot compare the information directly. NAEP does allow for all states to have a standard assessment which provides a little consistency to find trends on the students at specific grades and even long term trends as well. Koretz (2009) states, “The [NAEP] is in many ways ideal for this purpose—it is very carefully designed to measure trends, it reflects a degree of consensus about what students should know and its coverage is measured domains is unusually broad—but it is nonetheless risky to rely so much on a single source, no matter how good” (p. 92). NAEP does provide tests for uniformity across the states. But, the assessments come with differences from than that of the state assessments, which teachers are used to. The NAEP measure trends and does not compare to see if the student is meeting or has surpassed the benchmark. NAEP looks to see if the students are basic, proficient, or advanced in specific areas in which they should know the content information. NAEP testing is very specific on the way the tests are administered. NAEP often have someone trained and goes to the school to assist with testing. Kansas teachers proctor the exams if they have been trained on state assessments. This is very different than what NAEP expects. Kansas state assessments provides individual results and NAEP does not it only provides general information as a group. In addition, the amount of students taking the exam also represents large portion of the state’s student population. When a person looks at the Nation’s Report Card and then looks at the information for Kansas, the information tested are not the same. NAEP and Kansas cannot be viewed as the same information being tested. It can be viewed as two different assessment providing educator’s information about what stages and where the students are with the content area being tested. Kansas state assessments provide individual feedback on each student. NAEP looks at a sample of students for the state. The results and viewing of each content area as well as the information for each minority and special needs groups varies since the sampling is varied.ReflectionMany educators do not take the time to dive into understanding the information of the Nation’s Report Card nor gain a better understanding of Kansas Assessments or other states. It is profound each state has so many differences and no uniformity. Koretz (2009) states, “Even well designed tests will often provide substantially different views of trends because of differences in content and other aspects of the tests’ design” (p.92). More importantly, the Nation’s Report Card, many people would assume the information on it would be compiled from the state assessments. However, with no uniformity it would be impossible to ensure accuracy and the information would be accurate since the tests are so different from state to state.NAEP and state assessments are vastly different. Teachers across America work with students every day to prepare them for the state testing, which determines the schools AYP. The teachers prepare the students in many ways. Some schools do formative assessments and other states even use pretests and post assessment at the end of the year with state assessments in the middle. The teachers and students are working daily to ensure they are prepared. NAEP is completely different since no preparation is needed from the teachers. NAEP states not to spend time preparing the students for the assessment which is vastly different from what teachers are used to doing. This removes some of the high stakes testing piece for NAEP to gather the results needed to know how the students are truly performing at the grade level. NAEP allows for the Nation’s Report Card to have results from the assessment which give America and educators a baseline and a pulse on how children are making progress. Although NAEP is voluntary and the sampling size is varied, NAEP does provide consistency and uniformity which is needed to gain the necessary picture of how the students are making progress. Educators do have many resources available to them on the Nation’s Report card website. The information even shows how questions are viewed and the level of difficulty. The educators section allows a teacher the ability to go and find out how the NAEP assessment works; in addition, what information is needed for the assessment. This is not available during the state assessments with many states. ConclusionAlthough state assessments allow for the state to gather a full picture of each student within the state, NAEP assessment gives the country the opportunity to gather a sampling to find out how each state is performing. More importantly how the country is making progress with educating our children. The Nation’s Report Card allows for students to take the test without the high stakes testing which our children know is extremely important since they know they are reviewed on what they know. The students need to know to just do well on a test rather than the high stakes testing which they become familiar with at a young age today. Even though the state assessments and NAEP assessment tests different information, the information can still be compared at the state level to see if the sampling is close to what the state is showing as progress. The states can view this information to see where improvements with our students need to be made and if there is a trend which is not showing progress. Both assessments are very important to be able to see the big picture of the student’s educational progress at the state and national level.ReferencesKoretz, D. M. (2009). Measuring up: What educational testing really tells us. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Nation’s Report Card. In National Assessment of Educational Progress. Retrieved on March 15, 2013, from ................
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