Re: Criterion vs Norm reference test

["Arthur Hu" <arthurhu@attbi.com>]

pays $55,000 a year, a bit on the low side, but beats unemployment

-----Original Message-----
From: arn-l-owner@interversity.org
[mailto:arn-l-owner@interversity.org]On Behalf Of gerald w. bracey
Sent: Monday, May 26, 2003 7:11 PM
To: arn-l@interversity.org
Subject: Re: [arn-l] Criterion vs Norm reference test


It's still horseshit, Arthur and you know it. And you know better do wallow
in it.


----- Original Message -----
From: "Arthur Hu" <arthurhu@attbi.com>
To: <arn-l@interversity.org>
Sent: Monday, May 26, 2003 9:34 PM
Subject: Re: [arn-l] Criterion vs Norm reference test


> The criterion for any of the borg-developed group-think
> standards based tests is "what a well taught hard-working xth
> grader ought to know and be able to do". That's what the
> Washington state OSPI is going from, and those exact words can
> be found everywhere, just like
>
> "raising the bar"
> "a diploma that means something"
> "skills for the 20th century"
>
> btw, the Washington state OSPI has bit my resume for being
> the IT wizard for the WASL items database, and I'm actually going
> to waste a day on the slim chance they might actually give me a
> job.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: arn-l-owner@interversity.org
> [mailto:arn-l-owner@interversity.org]On Behalf Of gerald w. bracey
> Sent: Monday, May 26, 2003 5:10 PM
> To: arn-l@interversity.org
> Subject: Re: [arn-l] Criterion vs Norm reference test
>
>
> Art,
>
> The original meaning of "criterion referenced" was that it was referenced
to
> some observable behavioral criterion.  It had nothing at all to do with
> "stuff students actually need to know."
>
> Bob Glaser said that for achievement we could imagine a continuum from
> absence of skill to conspicuous excellence and we could reference any
actual
> performance to some point along that continuum.
>
> It didn't work because education cannot be reduced to the kind of
> behaviorist observations that Glaser thought possible.  It's one thing to
> say of a skater "cannot stand alone on ice" (absence of skill) to
"completes
> triple axel with perfect landing" (conspicuous excellence).  It's another
to
> try and specify this kind of behavorial criterion for education.  NAEP has
> tried--and failed.
>
> Badly failed.  I've just written a piece on the unethical use of NAEP
> achievement levels--which pretend to this sort of criterion referenced
> nature--which I will be sending out before the next NAEP assessment
release
> on June 19.
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Arthur Hu" <arthurhu@attbi.com>
> To: <arn-l@interversity.org>
> Cc: "Wa-Ed" <wa-ed-deform@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Monday, May 26, 2003 7:21 PM
> Subject: [arn-l] Criterion vs Norm reference test
>
>
> > The original meaning was that it was referenced to stuff students
actually
> > need to know instead of being compared against another, "obviously" a
> > more meaningful approach.
> >
> > Of course when expectations are set at a level
> > that 99% of schools are failing and 70% of students, the criterion are a
> > joke, and what parents really care about is whether their kids are best
> > or not, not whether they've mastered the same curriculum as 95% of other
> > kids. The punch line of standards based education is that they promise
> > standards everybody can pass, but deliver standards that everyone can
> fail.
> > The test that was so hard that "everyone was below average" is only
> > possible with a criterion based test.
> >
> > MIT and Stanford will always be admitting only students at the top end
> > of the curve, no matter how high standards are set for "all" students.
> >
> > All attempts to outlaw the bell curve will be as futile as trying to
> > outlaw gravity.
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: arn-l-owner@interversity.org
> > [mailto:arn-l-owner@interversity.org]On Behalf Of George K Cunningham
> > Sent: Friday, May 23, 2003 2:23 PM
> > To: arn-l@interversity.org
> > Subject: Re: [arn-l] question about tests in Louisiana
> >
> >
> > Km,
> >
> > At one time, calling a test "criterion-referenced" meant something.  It
> > was a distinctively different mode of assessing students.  Apparently
> > the term focus-grouped so well that every state wanted to call their
> > test criterion-referenced regardless of what kind of test it was.  The
> > definition has now been broadened to any test used to make a decision,
> > which includes just about  all test.  To call a test
> > "criterion-referenced" means almost nothing and could refer to virtually
> > any test.
> >
> > George K. Cunningham
> > University of Louisville
> >
> > >>> dancinglight@sbcglobal.net 05/23/03 09:51AM >>>
> > I was discussing testing issues on another board recently, and a parent
> > from Louisiana said that
> > their tests are criterion-referenced rather than norm-referenced.  Is
> > this right?  If so, how do they
> > rank kids/schools based on a criterion-referenced test?  Or do they?
> >
> > KM
> > ? ? ?
> >
> >
>
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>
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