Do you opt your children out of standardized testing (if your state allows this)?

[bluestateguy]

My fiance and I will do this when we have kids.

[sharp_stick]

1. Nope

My kids enjoy them for some reason.

[Agnosticsherbet]

2. I have no problem with standardized tests or

Common core, so no.

[GitRDun]

3. No

Standardized tests have no impact on a child's education.

[Ms. Toad]

6. The tests themselves may not, but the emphasis placed on them certainly does.

Until my daughter hit 4th grade, I never even knew when tests were coming up. They were just one of the things that made up part of her school life.

In 4th grade, she hit the statewide standardized tests which reflected in the school's statewide report card for the first time. I knew about those at least a month in advance from my all-of-a-sudden text anxious daughter. On the 6th grade version they made her so nervous about the test, performing well on it, and not cheating, that she skipped an entire set of essays because she misunderstood whether the stop was a question stop or a section stop - and she was so nervous about the perception of cheating that she didn't turn the page to see, didn't feel as if she could ask the teacher, and the teacher didn't check to see if she had completed everything (when she finished before the time).

There was nothing that I could do to counter the impact of the school/state hype - and that test anxiety (which she had never previously had) carried over to later non-standardized tests.

I don't know that I would opt her out of them, but is certainly not true that they had no impact on her education. They did, and it was negative

[Freethinker65]

4. No

[mwooldri]

5. Heck no.

Some testing is good. I think there might be too much testing at times but it's good to know how your kids are performing against the standard.

[Codeine]

7. My daughter tests astronomically well,

and my son above average, so it's obviously not a problem for us. My kids' school adopted an early variant of Commmon Core (Core Knowledge) several years ago and the results have been overwhelmingly positive.

I guess in this area I'm not in DU lockstep.