The downfall of the American student

OK-as teachers we all know that the standards placed upon us are steadily increasing. The budget cuts are creating classrooms with more children and less help. We all know that this will be the downfall of education. Remember the good ole days when we were in school? I never thought about standardized testing until high school. We would come to school and our teachers would smile at us. They would spend as much time as they needed to patiently prepare us for the next grade. I never remember teachers preaching "test scores" to us. Teachers seemed less stressed (to me). The funny thing is...I think my generation turned out ok!

Fast forward 20 years...no one is smiling. Not teacher, not student, not parent. Let's take yesterday for example-I came into the classroom with my mind reeling about the amount of objectives to cover in the 9 weeks until the test. As I walk through the door, I look at the sea of 8 year olds laughing, walking around the room, talking to friends, definitely not doing what I ask them to do each morning. Immediately my blood begins to boil! "Don't they know that the test is so close and that they need to be in an attitude of learning?" Uh-no they don't. They're 8! As the morning progresses I must deal with a series of unFortunate events. Respond to angry letter from parent who does not think I do my job well-check. Count homework and discover 5 students did not complete. Have a serious talk with them about homework not being optional-check. (Apparantly ball games trump homework) Teach Language Arts-check. Check over discipline chart and announce who has earned lunch a movie for this week-check. Listen to students complain because they did not earn lunch and movie-check. Teach Math-check. Battle of Books team meeting-check. Birthday party for student-check. Handout grade folders-check. Listen to student say "I am so proud I made a D in reading"-check.....WHAT?

The downfall of American education. Education is becoming test-centered. Definitely not grade-centered. Definitely not student-centered. Students are not understanding the importance of knowledge. So does this mean that our system is working????