A Warm Welcome

     I welcome all of my peers and Dr. Kien from my newest class from Walden University: Foundations 6005. I look forward to reading your posts, hearing your points of view and learning from your experiences.

                                                                          Thank You

     I would like to extend a sincere thank you to both my Early Childhood peers and Professor. This week
completes my first class here at Walden. I really have enjoyed reading Blogs and posts from my peers and having the chance to hear your views. I would expect that I will continue to see some of you in future classes and for those where this is our only class together, I wish you well in your future and support you in your advocacy for young children. I would like to leave you with a quote that I recently saw posted on Face Book, "The best teachers are those who show you where to look, but don't tell you what to see." (Trenfor)

Trenfor, A. K. Retrieved from www.social.consciousness.com

The Whole Child

     Even though I see the flaws in standard testing I do believe that it is a necessary evil. I believe that if educators, parents and administration are able to keep in mind that the results are not perfect but a guide of the typical knowledge of the children it would be helpful. Just as with medical testing for example, we need a place to start, a range of typical numbers that will indicate if there is a problem or not. For me, I compare standard testing to the developmental guidelines that we use for children; it should be used as a guideline in conjunction with many other factors and each child viewed as an individual.

     In Italy they have moved away from a number scale testing and each teacher gives a written observation of the students abilities at the end of the year and the board decides whether they move on or not. Personally I think assessments should be designed to accommodate all of the multiple intelligences. I feel that we would have a truer insight on what children really understand. I have included a link to a multiple intelligence quiz that will help a person determine which of the intelligences are their strongest (Assessment).

Assessments: You’re your Strengths, Retrieved from:

      http://www.literacyworks.org/mi/assessment/findyourstrengths.html