When I read chapter 1 in the textbook, the concept that
stood out the most to me, was how important assessments really are. The textbook said that even medical doctors
do a form of assessment or diagnosis when they are examining a patient for an
illness. As an educator, we need to be able to evaluate
whether our curriculum is meeting the needs of all students. I need
to be sure that my students are developing skills in language and mathematics
and not just assessing at the end of a lesson but before, during and after a
lesson. Assessment allows educators to
help diagnose a developmental delay or identify causes for poor performance in
learning. In reading this chapter I did not realize that standardized testing had been around since the 1900's. I guess that goes to show you that assessment
really has been around for a long time.
I learned from my reading that without our
scientist, and child behavior studies we would not know the importance of
assessing what the students are learning.
Also, without early assessment in
day cares and preschools we would not be able to help our students overcome or
even diagnose the issues they have to be a successful learner. I guess I did not realize that Charles Darwin
was a leader in the development of the child movement. To be honest, I did not realize he studied
children at all. I remember Darwin in science or evolution, but not the child
study movement.
When I was reading about the NCLB, I wandered if they have
plans to change the act after they have seen that penalizing districts for the
performance does not fix the problem. I
know a lot of teachers have pretty strong opinions against the act.
I liked the stories
of Head Start and the little boy who did not have regular checkups as a
baby. Without early childhood
intervention, may it be just regular checkups or early educational programs,
our children’s learning disabilities might not be detected so early and easily
corrected.
In the textbook, Wortham also conveyed that
without the laws for children with handicap, our children would not be
mainstreamed into the regular classroom.
I believe that all students, no matter what disability they have,
deserve the right to an education within the regular classroom.
