Essays --

The author of the article â€Å"Why I changed my mind† captured the true picture of the monstrous shadow that stalks teachers in public schools. The NCLB might have been conceived initially with good intentions but had spawned into a creeping threat creating nightmares to educators. Like what Diane Ravitch said, accountability became the stick that is used to punish schools. I think it also created resentment; and this resentment has taken away the joy of teaching and learning. The non-stop assessment to measure if standards have been taught left teachers always on their toes. In effort to cover all concepts included in the test, teachers are left with no choice but scratching on the surface without getting deeper on the content. Not only this leaves students with no mastery, it also resulted in the widening of learning gaps. Teachers, year after year, inherit students who are unprepared and lacking grade level skills. This is evident to some 5th graders in my school who are in still struggling to subtract with regrouping, much more across zeroes. Subtraction with regrouping is first taught in second grade. In addition, with assessments used as a measure of teachers’ performance and determinant of incentives to teachers created inequality. Teachers with students scoring high and receiving monetary incentive may feel elated. While in contrary, teachers who somehow got a group of students who did not perform well are left demoralized. Teachers cannot c hoose their students. With all the factors stated in the article that determines students’ performance, there are other aspects that are beyond the teachers’ control. I personally know a teacher who teaches at a regular public high school, he is very dedicated and almost yearly trained at ... ...w the concepts based from observation and work samples. In several occasions, during benchmarks or in the real test, her scores were one or two questions away from passing. I saw how her morale and self esteem deteriorate. She became so unsure of herself becoming anxious each time a test. Her mother even considered transferring her to a private school so she will not be subjected to state testing. With her morale destroyed, the more she became unfocused during testing. To help her cope, I tried to appease her dismay with encouragement, highlighting her strengths and stressing that her scores are not reflective of whom she is. She seemed to have understood. However, I knew that as she move up to middle school, her test scores will be the first data being looked at. It is a sad reality that all the learning and effort of this student are summarized to her test scores.