Your Students are More

At the beginning of every school year, I tell myself to be even better than I was the year before.  I am a firm believer that everyone has room for improvement.  For many years, my goal for getting better revolved around the idea of state test scores.  For most teachers, achieving higher and higher scores each year is the optimal goal.  I was one of those; but not anymore.  At some point, I started really taking notice that scores are simply scores.  Percentages that come from a two-hour reflection of what each individual child has learned since, in some cases, kindergarten.  I can assure you that there is no possible way those scores are a complete picture of any student.

What prompted this?  The other night, I sat and listened to my daughter's principal proudly state that the high school had the highest state scores in our conference and had for many years.  While I also think that is great, I wasn't overly impressed by the statement.  Let me explain further.

I think about the things I do in my classroom from three perspectives: teacher, administrator and parent.  I'm only going to talk about the parent perspective because it encompasses what I truly believe as a teacher and administrator.  My child is not a test score.  She is a full-fledged human being.  She is more than what a test shows her to be on paper. If a teacher judges her (and they do) by her prior scores on a state test, they will miss an incredible part of who she is.  In all honesty, my daughter scores very high on tests.  She's even been known to score what they call a perfect score a couple of years.  Even with high scores, she doesn't want to be remembered as only a number.

As a teacher, it was VERY hard for me to let go of the ingrained stigma that test scores told who I was as a teacher.  Let's be very honest; some districts and administrators still feel that scores are the only thing that matters in a child's education.  But they're not.  I was fortunate enough to have seen both types of administrators, the one who said get your scores up higher and the one who said that making strong productive members of society was more important.  While both wanted strong scores, only one actually made me believe that my students were more than a test score and it was alright if my scores were sometimes lower than before.  The latter administrator is the only one that I would follow over a cliff.

So, at the beginning of this year, DON'T immediately look at your students' scores from last year.  Put them away, get to know your students for who they are to YOU; then, if needed, take a look. Your students are more than a test score.  You a more than their scores.  No one will remember what score they got on a year-end test, but they will remember how hard you worked with them and the relationship you built. By the way, those relationships you built will drive your students to do their best on any work, including a standardized test!

Remember: YOUR STUDENTS ARE MORE!