Excessive Standardized Testing in New York City is No Fairy Tale – Living in Dialogue

On 2/21/15, Anthony Cody published my latest post on his new blog, Living in Dialogue. In it, I detailed the mid-term GO Math! and ReadyGEN ELA benchmark assessments that I reluctantly and heavy-heartedly had to administer to my first grade students the week of February 9, 2015.  Not only are our youngest learners being subjected to excessive standardized testing, but they are also missing out on meaningful learning experiences.

Please read the piece here:

http://www.livingindialogue.com/excessive-standardized-testing-first-grade-fairy-tale/

Thank you,

Katie

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Recognition for Teachers’ Letters to Bill Gates

Dear all,

Susan and I so appreciate Valerie Strauss’ Washington Post profile of our website as well as Diane Ravitch’s strong endorsement on her blog. We also appreciate Anthony Cody’s recognition on his blog.

We recognize the healing powers of providing teachers with a space where they can share with one another stories about their struggles. Corporate education reform has been devastating to our profession, and it is our hope that teachers will find insight and inspiration through these pages.

Mr. Gates – we also hope you read our letters with an open mind and will respond to us in an authentic, meaningful way. We strongly urge you to spend as much time as possible in the “trenches,” in public schools, working directly with kids and dialoguing with educators. It’s the only way you’ll truly understand and appreciate what we dedicated, caring teachers are up against. We are teachers to the core – we feel it in every fiber of our being – but the Common Core together with its assessment, curriculum and teacher evaluation plans, are gutting us and our students.

Diane’s endorsement: http://dianeravitch.net/2013/06/19/an-amazing-website-teachers-letters-to-bill-gates/

Valerie’s article in the Washington Post:
http://m.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/06/14/teachers-letters-to-bill-gates/

Anthony’s blog:
http://mobile.edweek.org/c.jsp?DISPATCHED=true&cid=25983841&item=http%3A%2F%2Fblogs.edweek.org%2Fteachers%2Fliving-in-dialogue%2F2013%2F06%2Fbill_gates_discovers_money_can.html