Using Test Data for Student Achievement

Answers to No Child Left Behind

By (author) Nancy W. Sindelar

Publication date:

11 November 2011

Length of book:

184 pages

Publisher

R&L Education

Dimensions:

240x161mm
6x9"

ISBN-13: 9781607099604

Schools are drowning in test data, but many schools do little with test results other than sort students into various categories of proficiency or lack thereof. Some educators feel testing has taken the joy out of teaching. Others believe valuable instructional time has been lost as a result of testing. Yet, NCBL and other federal and state mandates have placed educators under increasing pressure to make certain all students meet standards on high-stakes tests.

Now, more than ever, teachers and administrators need to embrace testing as a valuable classroom tool to guide instruction, use efficient technological resources available for test scoring and analysis, and profit from the benefits of test analysis to increase learning and achievement.

Using Test Data for Student Achievement shows educators, step by step, how to use test data to facilitate student learning. The book combines research, technology and Sindelar's experience as a teacher and administrator to provide practical and efficient ways to use test data to increase learning, close achievement gaps and even raise test scores.
In Leadership and Sustainability Michael Fullan contends that a key to sustaining improvement in any organization is the development of 'system thinkers in action'—leaders who build professional learning communities by creating structures and cultures in which people engage in the daily habit of working together to deepen the learning of their craft. Nancy Sindelar is a wonderful example of Fullan's systems thinker in action. In Using Data for Student Achievement, she combines her knowledge of research and practice to offer wonderful examples of what schools can do to meet the challenge of learning for all students.