Measuring Up in Education

Stolz, Steven A.; Webster, Scott

doi:10.1080/00131857.2015.1084128

Cited by 2 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 215 publications

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“…These findings corroborate and extend those from other similar empirical studies on standardised testing, nationally and internationally (Au, 2011;Davies, 2008;Finnigan & Gross, 2007;Goldstein & Beutel, 2009;Nichols & Berliner, 2007;Polesel, Dulfer & Turnbull, 2012;Rubin, 2011;Stolz & Webster, 2017;Werler & Klepstad Faerevaag, 2017;Wyn, Turnbull & Grimshaw, 2014). In addition, this study highlights the commitment that a group of NSW English teachers demonstrate to their students' learning and to teaching to their best.…”

Section: Synthesis Of Findingssupporting

confidence: 87%

“…The findings of this research study are consistent with those of similar national and international studies that have offered compelling evidence of the wide-ranging deleterious consequences of narrowly-defined assessment and standardised testing programs. As Stolz and Webster (2017) argue, it is imperative that "objectified tendencies of assessment and measurement" (p. 314) are "recognised or challenged in a sustained or rigorous manner" (p. 314) in order to expose and ultimately redress their "dehumanising effects" (p. 314). Through reporting on the perspectives and judgements of NSW secondary English teachers, the present study offers additional empirical evidence to inform debate and policy reform.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Standardised testing, however, in the form of system-wide formal examinations and mass literacy and numeracy tests, continues to be controversial within both the educational realm and the wider community. Critics of mass testing point to high levels of stress and anxiety for students (Au, 2011;Jones, 2007;Wyn, Turnbull, & Grimshaw, 2014); the inappropriate use and detrimental impact of an over-reliance on statistics in education (Enslin & Tjiattas, 2017;Ozliņš, 2017;Stolz, 2017); the role of mass testing in diverting attention away from the important aims of education (Biesta, 2017;Ozliņš, 2017); the identification of a series of unintended negative outcomes of mass testing (Jones, 2007;Thompson & Harbaugh, 2013); and mass testing as an expression of neoliberal discourses (Biesta, 2017;Jones, 2007;PrØitz, Mausethagen & Skedsmo, 2017;Stolz & Webster, 2017;Werler & Klepstad Faerevaag, 2017).…”

Section: Background and Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

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How do secondary school English teachers score NAPLAN? A snapshot of English teachers’ views

Carter

Manuel

Dutton

2018

AJLL

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and measurable educational 'outcomes'" (Biesta, 2014, p. 354). Yet, as Biesta argues, education cannot be reduced to a 'technology' with "totally predictable outcomes" and "totally guaranteed" successes because the relationship between teaching and learning is not "physical", but "hermeneutic" (p. 354). The almost exclusive reliance on single measures of student achievement prompts the question: "are we measuring what we value, or … are we just measuring what we can easily measure and thus end up valuing what we (can) measure" such that "targets and indicators of quality become mistaken for quality itself" (Biesta, 2009a, p. 35).The dedication to standardised testing by successive Australian governments reflects similar priorities in other developed Western nations including the United States (US), the United Kingdom (UK), Singapore and China where a "strengthening commitment to … standardised testing", reveals an "insatiable appetite for data" (Wyatt-Smith & Jackson, 2016, p. 233). In an era characterised by educational accountability (Biesta, 2017;Lindgard, Thompson & Sellar, 2016;PrØitz, Mausethagen & Skedsmo, 2017;Werler & Klepstad Faerevaag, 2017), standardised testing is now the dominant mechanism for "educational reform" (Au, 2011, p. 29). In many countries, including Australia, standardised testing opens the classroom to external scrutiny and judgement, making teachers "accountable to and for student performance data" (Lindgard, Thompson & Sellar, 2016, p. 1). This commitment to standardised testing exemplifies a "modern reverence for quantitative evidence" (Porter, 2012, p. 594) whereby the data interpreted from tests are often thought to be "efficient, standardized, uniform and intuitive measures that are productive for use in a range

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Section: Synthesis Of Findingssupporting

confidence: 87%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Background and Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

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How do secondary school English teachers score NAPLAN? A snapshot of English teachers’ views

Carter

Manuel

Dutton

2018

AJLL

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Transmissive, "affirmative" teaching as telling is still pervasive today, not just in schools, but also in tertiary education. Educational policies support this affirmative mode when they are grounded in views of high-quality education that equate quality with that which is quantitatively measurable, and in turn construct teacher accountability on the basis of student achievement on standardised tests (Apple, 2007;Au, 2010;Biesta, 2015;D'agnese, 2018;Stoltz & Webster, 2020). It is not merely that such policies do not account for what is educative about any given situation designed for learning and thinking, but rather it is that they actually suppress it.…”

Section: Listening and Relationality: Towards Non-affirmative Democra...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Dewey, Existential Uncertainty and Non-affirmative Democratic Education

English

2023

Educational Governance Research

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In this chapter, I show how John Dewey’s understanding of the educational meaning of existential uncertainty lies at the heart of his idea of democratic education. Specifically, I argue that Dewey’s theory of democratic education is grounded in a concept of transformative learning that necessarily involves experiences of existential uncertainty, and, in a concept of teaching that necessarily involves supporting learners’ opportunities to have educative experiences of existential uncertainty. In doing so, I aim to bring this democratic aspect of Dewey’s notion of teaching into sharper relief by showing how it offers a productive extension of the tradition of non-affirmative educational theory. In section one, “Uncertainty and the beginning of learning”, I discuss the notion of existential uncertainty and its relation to what Dewey called “the indeterminate situation” as a realm of learning that we find ourselves in prior to searching for and finding a problem, and thus logically prior to solving it. In section two, “Existential uncertainty, teaching and democratic education”, I discuss Dewey’s notion of teaching within the context of his broader theory of democratic education, highlighting it as a form of teaching that is non-affirmative, by contrasting it to “traditional, transmissive” and, what I call, “reductive-progressive” forms of teaching. In the final section, “Listening and Relationality”, I build on and move beyond Dewey to formulate a notion of the teacher as a listener. I argue that this understanding of the teacher is vitally relevant for the theory and practice of democratic education as non-affirmative education, and yet is in danger of being lost in the current measurement culture in education.

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Measuring Up in Education

Cited by 2 publications

References 215 publications

How do secondary school English teachers score NAPLAN? A snapshot of English teachers’ views

How do secondary school English teachers score NAPLAN? A snapshot of English teachers’ views

Dewey, Existential Uncertainty and Non-affirmative Democratic Education

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