May 2, 2008
I rarely read the paper, but yesterday I picked it up while eating
lunch at Subway. The big story in the Metro section was how to relieve
your child's anxiety over the TAKS test. I'm still shaking my head over
it and will probably write a letter to the editor just to vent. Here's
a link to the article to give you some context:
Read Dallas Morning New Article
Could the writer, not to mention our schools, be any more clueless about the real issue here?
My
first realization about how out of control this is was several years
ago. When my son was in 4th grade he took the writing TAKS test, which
took him over 6 hours to complete. That's longer than most of us took
on our SAT's when we were 17 or 18 years old. He was confused about the
writing prompt, but couldn't ask any questions, so he agonized over it
all day, even asking to stay after school to finish. When he finally
came out of the testing room (at 4:30 in the afternoon) he was sobbing.
The writer suggests that parents should teach their children to:
1) Do breathing exercises to calm down
2) Visualize and meditate to lower their blood pressure and stress level
3) Focus on their hard work rather than worrying about the outcome
Blah,
blah, blah! Why in the world should any child have this much pressure?
And who in their right mind thinks children as early as 3rd grade have
the capacity to do breathing and visualization exercises to combat this
stress when their little bodies are quite naturally jumping out of
their seats after 30 minutes at best! These kind of stress relieving
techniques are a stretch even with the maturity of a teenager.
The
schools are doing their best to make TAKS testing week calm - soothing
music, "Don't Worry Be Happy" themes, quiet hallways, etc. etc. Take a
look at all of this through the eyes of our kids. It screams loud and
clear that this is a week like no other week of the school year. There
has already been so much focus on preparation for these tests all year
long that the pressure starts long before pencils are sharpened for the
big day.
As a parent, I agonize over this regularly. It's not
just the TAKS test, but the amount of pressure we are putting on our
kids in school throughout the year. They need time to just be KIDS! If
we don't protect that, who will?
I don't know what the answer
is, but it has forced me to make choices I'm sure educators would frown
upon. When my kids come home with hours of homework, I feel no guilt in
coloring maps for them while I send them outside for some much needed
fresh air. I'm sure their teachers feel this is an important part of
their learning, but at what expense? There are nights that with
tutorials after school or just one sporting event they are hard pressed
to finish their homework and get to bed by 10pm.
I try to
protect my kids from the pressure. This year I coached my 8th grader
write the worst paper he's ever written....just finish in a reasonable
amount of time and it'll be fine. He was so relaxed about taking his
TAKS tests this year. So far, both of the scores that he's gotten back
have been commended scores. (Well above the state average)
So,
my point is. Let's chill out with all this pressure. Our kids are
getting a great education here in Plano and would do better with a
little more balance!
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