(This post was originally shared on blog.cue.org)

Dear CAASPP,

I get it. I really do. But…

As I sit in my classroom, watching my students struggle to concentrate, scrolling through page after page of reading, responding to multiple choice questions, highlighting parts of the text, (zoning out) and typing, typing, typing, my heart just aches. I see the turmoil in their faces. The exhaustion. They HATE this. HATE. And so do I.

But I get why we do it.

As an educational system, we must see how our students are mastering the skills they will need. Data needs to be gathered. Strengths and weaknesses of our pedagogy have to be measured. I get it. One of my students even convinced me of it in her recent essay. She wrote, “For me personally, I had scored not so high on a certain part of my CAASPP test in my 6th grade year. The next year I focused on that certain area of my test. When my results came back it gave me a great deal of happiness to see that my hard work had paid back.”

Yeah. I get it.

Yet…

Glancing around the room, I see

• the child with furrowed brow
• the child staring back at me
• the child staring at the clock
• the child picking at his fingernails
• the child who is grasping his forehead
• the child with his head down on the desk
• the child who is thinking faster than she can type
• the child who keeps getting up to
  • blow her nose
  • get a drink of water

They all look so tired. So deflated.

I know. It’s valuable information.

Just maybe, though, there can be a better way. Just maybe these children will want to come to school everyday. To learn. To create. Just maybe there is a way to measure progress without torture.

Just maybe.

Sincerely emotionally exhausted,

Mrs. Allison

P.S. Don’t worry, CAASPP police. I didn’t draft this on my unauthorized electronic device while I spent hours observing student testing. I wrote it in my composition book with a number two pencil, OG style.

P.P.S. During testing, a student fell asleep in my colleague’s classroom: “Yo. Ms. V. I just fell asleep and had a dream I farted. Did I really fart?” Yeah, we work with children. Even testing is an adventure.