Having been a victim of my own need for approval from others for my entire career, I strenuously suggest that we avoid using national scores on any kind of exam to evaluate our work in the classroom. Such exams are nothing but competitions, and competition has no place in language acquisition.
For one thing, the topic of accuracy of results is just too complex. Comparing methods based on scores made up by companies who are not fully aware of comprehensible input is statistical quicksand, and not something I advise.
Using the scores for personal use, jen, is probably an o.k. thing but, again, I advise against it. Without going into a long diatribe on this topic, I will make one point. Our children are just that, children. Even our level 4 kids, at 500 hours of CI, are still over 10,000 hours of instruction away from a time when they should be tested in this way.
Now, if you want to send your superstars into competition for the single reason of helping them have a fatter college portfolio or to be able to show off and impress parents and all that, fine, go for it. But to use the national exams or the AP exam as an accurate assessment instrument of language gains, one that is high in integrity and aligns well with CI instruction, I just don’t think that’s possible.
The testing truck has always been, is and will always be loaded with about 60% to 80% bullshit, so any results will smell badly and, worse, get us off balance as we begin to think about how good we are, and how with these results we will get the approval of people who don’t matter.
Only the kids matter, not our higher ups. We get fooled ono that point every day in our profession. With every step down the hallway of the building part of us is wondering how we are perceived by others. For what?
What are my credentials for saying these things? Thirty five years of thinking that I needed some administrator’s approval, or the adoration of some parents who largely only want the A for their child from me, in most cases.
I’m sad that I kicked myself so hard to get all those decades of top winners at the state and national levels of the National French Exam and on the AP exams. This year I did allow one child to take the exam, which she is taking this morning ironically. But she just needs to take it bc she studies French all the time, for her. I’m letting her take it for her, and not to prove something about CI, which needs no approval from anyone.
I wish I could have all that stress and worry and neediness and grabbiness back. That is not what teaching is about. I guess I won’t get the 200-300 years necessary to finally learn what this odd profession is really all about. But I know one thing – I will never let my need for approval from others – in the form of having my kids kick ass on standardized testing – hurt me again. I don’t need to do that anymore. I just need to relax.