It's Not About The Test

Due to unprecedented large scale national initiatives, the only constant in education is change. While no one argues that education should have a system of accountability, teachers are struggling to find the balance between accountability practices required by the state and their districts and what they know about good teaching in their classrooms. This book is designed to help teachers leverage big data and high quality classroom data to improve student engagement and success. It's Not About the Test builds on the data cycle and processes detailed in Tap Dancing to Work, a book that has been used nationally by teacher teams to guide their data discussions. This updated version expands the tools and strategies beyond "big data" to help teachers apply the same principles and establish a classroom level data cycle based on high quality assessments. We offer strategies to help teachers build formative and summative classroom assessments that not only measure student growth, but also provide valuable data to inform lesson planning and differentiation. Teachers have a lot on their plates, and this book is designed to help them integrate accountability, big tests, data, and classroom practice, so they can work smarter, not harder.