Educators and students in Arkansas are preparing for yet another change in statewide student testing.
Annual testing is changing for the third time in as many years, this time to the ACT Aspire and ACT exam.
ACT Aspire
• Required for all students in third through 10th grade
• Testing in literacy, math and science
• Up to 4½ hours of testing time per grade
• Students in ninth and 10th grades will receive a predicted score for ACT
• Schools set testing schedules between April 11 and May 13
Source: Arkansas Department of Education
Hope Allen, who oversees testing for the Arkansas Department of Education, and staff members visited some school districts last week to discuss the testing changes with superintendents and administrators and to train educators who oversee testing.
With the ACT Aspire, students in grades three through 10 will be tested online in reading, writing, math and science, Allen said. The state also will pay for 11th-graders to take the ACT college entrance exam, but that test is optional.
Questions have been raised nationally in recent years by some parents and educators over whether students spend too much of their time preparing to take mandated standardized tests. State officials are encouraging teachers to emphasize thinking and problem-solving in the classroom, rather than a test, Allen said.
"If you are teaching and teaching well, your kids can face any test you can give them and fare well," Allen said. "It's really about what's going on in that classroom."
Schools had anticipated changes in testing with the statewide implementation of the Common Core State Standards, from the state's Benchmark and End-of-Course exams in 2014 to online exams from the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers in 2015.
But educators began preparing for another change when the Arkansas Board of Education in July approved switching from PARCC to ACT Aspire this year.
That change followed a recommendation from Gov. Asa Hutchinson that reflected conclusions reached by the Governor's Council on Common Core Review, a 16-member group composed of administrators, teachers, students and business leaders and led by Lt. Gov. Tim Griffin.
"It's just a lot of change," Siloam Springs Superintendent Ken Ramey said. "It's on short notice."
While directors of testing and curriculum want teachers to focus on teaching the state's math and literacy standards, each new test requires teachers, building administrators and counselors to spend a lot of time learning how to give that test, said Tamara Gibson, who oversees curriculum from pre-kindergarten through middle school in the Bentonville School District.
Staff members overseeing technology have to understand what is necessary for giving an online test to large groups of students, Gibson said. Teachers have to be certain that students have the technical skills to take an online test.
"We spent an enormous amount of time training last year to give this new [PARCC] assessment," Gibson said. "Changing tests two years in a row -- it's tough."
Lessons learned from taking the PARCC exams online will carry over this year, said Karen Compton, who oversees testing for the Bentonville School District. And ACT has published information about the kinds of questions that will be asked, the number of questions and the level of understanding, Compton said.
But the ACT Aspire comes with some changes from past state testing, Allen said.
Students will test by grade level, resulting in changes for the testing for eighth-grade math students, Allen said.
In 2014, eighth-graders in Algebra I took the Algebra End-of-Course exam and the eighth-grade Benchmark exam. That changed under PARCC, with eighth-grade Algebra I students taking the Algebra I PARCC exam only.
With ACT Aspire, eighth-graders in Algebra I will take the eighth-grade math test, not the test given to high school students taking Algebra I.
Teachers will need to make sure eighth-graders in Algebra I have a firm understanding of the skills taught in eighth grade, Allen said.
Ninth- and 10th-graders will take the same ACT Aspire exam for early high school, Allen said. The early high school test will have some algebra and geometry, even though most ninth-graders only take algebra. The change has led to discussions about how ninth-grade math scores will count in school evaluations that are based on test scores.
Allen said her office has provided districts with access to resources, including training videos, to prepare for the new tests, which will be given between April 11 and May 13.
Metro on 01/17/2016