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Home : 2008 : March : 30

johabella
By Lizmo

We do look at our common assessments...not as often as we should though. We did it better at the beginning of the year.

The common assessments are actually written by our district, and they are horrid. They are
full of typos. Some of them are pretty random...no rhyme or reason to the questions. We actually have complained to quite a few people about how horrible the common assessments are. Occasionally we will come up with our own--and when I say "come up with" I mean someone will find a sheet out of a workbook to copy.

I feel like I was a much better teacher when I was able to:

Teach at my own pace--I find that we, as a team, spend too much time on things my kids get, and not enough time on things I feel my kids need more work on.
Teach in a way/order that makes logical sense to me. I feel like we are teaching to the tests that we give (common assessments) and not teaching them to learn. We are teaching to know/memorize info we want them to have.
Use my own activities/ways that I have used that I know work. Many times we all want to do different things.

So what happens is that we still waste our planning time two days a week, we discuss, we plan, we put it on paper...then we all go do our own thing anyways. So why bother?

It does sound great, and I'm happy it works in your school. However, I feel like it actually restricts me. :(