Testing: A Personal History

Our Commonplace Book: A Quotes Collection

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A highly idiosyncratic account of life as a series of tests exploring both their influence and infamy as instruments “by which the existence, quality, or genuineness of anything is or may be determined” — as Dr. Johnson described them. This blog contains the reflections and unresolved questions of a generalist still trying to understand how these mechanisms became so unpopular and what the world might do differently in educational and other types of personal measurement.

Glad to have others join the conversation.

But it’s not an argument.

Archives of posts

• October 2024
• July 2024
• April 2023
• March 2023
• December 2022
• November 2022
• October 2022
• August 2022
• July 2022
• February 2022
• January 2022
• November 2021
• October 2021
• September 2021
• May 2021

Blog posts are below in reverse chronological order:

• Postscript: The Reviews Are In, Don’t Be On The ‘Outs’
• Madelyn Blair Interviews Me on Reinvention
• A Poll Is A Lower Quality Type of Knowledge
• Six Steps Aiding Reinvention
• Hope = Crucial Reinvention Strategy

The January 31 in 31 Days Skein

1. Too Early for Apgar
2. Test Hatred
3. Just when I thought I was out…
4. We want the good tests
5. Polarity testing
6. The Adjustment of Claims Is Not Always about Geico
7. If Only the Associated Press Could Call All Our Races: Claims Part II
8. Claims Matter The Most For Those Deemed Different
9. Two Stories of Failed Testing — And Teaching
10. Nobody’s perfect and neither are tests
11. Aiming for Validity
12. When a bad test was good for me
13. Validity is an imperfect measurement
14. Validation is not just for parking tickets
15. Mailbox Monday: Our Faithful Correspondents Communicate
16. The Way To Bet or Predictive Validity Is Imperfect Too!
17. The Test-Taker’s Anxiety And The Limits Of Predictive Validity \
18. Eighty percent of life is… 4/5 of life
19. Hope IS a strategy
20. Read Freddie
21. The ‘people should judge people, not tests’ take ignores our biases
22. Mailbox Monday # 2 — and there’s a joke!
23. What do the SATs measure?
24. Do the SATs measure success?
25. My Blue Genes
26. Cognitive Gadgets Are Not Lego Toys
27. Mind Reading with My Granddaughter
28. Dog’s Breakfast or What My Algorithm Hath Wrought
29. Mailbox Monday #3: Tests, Time, Teachers, and Inertia
30. Myths of Meritocracy Are Entangled in Myths about Testing
31. The Baseball Hall Of Fame Is A Meritocracy; Our Society Is A Ganglion Of Oligarchies
32. Are Problems With Tests Really Problems With Authority?
33. Question Authority Because Authority Should Ask More Questions
34. NO tests but for learning
35. NO Tests But For Learning: The Provocation Proceeds
36. NO Tests But For Learning: Alphabet Soup and Irish Whiskey