Wednesday, December 12

test bias

How's this for a classic example of tests written to favor middle class suburban students:

"The city council is considering an ordinance banning cycling on all sidewalks. Consider the effects such an ordinance would have, and decide whether you support or oppose the measure. Then, write an essay in which you express and support your opinion on the issue."


What??? Some of my students have probably never SEEN a sidewalk! And kids around here to not have/ride bikes. This is strait out of our brand new language arts text books. You'd think they'd be getting better about this by now. Something else that kills me about these books is that is comes with a separate soft cover book called a "Multicultural Reader". As in, "we think literature from other cultures is so important that instead of putting it in the text book we put it in a flimsy little separate workbook." jeez. What worries me is that the text books are written by the same company that writes the test.

1 comment:

Mark said...

A lot of the kids down here don't know what a reservation is. I'd say there's a good deal of bias all around, and it's the "multi-cultural" kids that get screwed out of other cultures. You probably have nothing in your texts about quinceaneras, but my kids could tell you ALL about that.