{"id":413,"date":"2008-01-30T06:30:07","date_gmt":"2008-01-30T11:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=413"},"modified":"2008-08-05T20:44:55","modified_gmt":"2008-08-06T00:44:55","slug":"dropping-the-curriculum-for-fcat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=413","title":{"rendered":"Dropping the curriculum for FCAT"},"content":{"rendered":"

And now for some non-evolution science education news … the FCAT is so dang important that regular science curriculum is being dropped<\/a> in some schools in order to do an intense FCAT prep. (The FCAT is the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test. It’s a high stakes test that determines if kids can advance to the next grade in some cases, and if they can can graduate from High School. The results of the test also determine whether schools are rewarded or punished based on their students’ performances. More info here <\/a>and here<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

When Priya Mistry returned from winter break, she expected to spend the next quarter in chemistry learning about Avogadro’s number and converting moles to mass. Instead, her teacher said he was throwing out the chemistry curriculum for the next seven weeks and teaching a review for the science FCAT.<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

The science FCAT is given in grades 5, 8 and 11. Students at all levels posted lackluster scores last year, but high schools were particularly hard hit. One reason, science teachers say, is that the test encompasses a broad range of science disciplines taught over several years.<\/span><\/p>\n

…<\/span><\/p>\n

Some advanced students taking honors classes who expected to ace the test have failed it because they haven’t seen earth and space science since eighth grade, Hicks said.<\/span><\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

Most students need a review to do well on the test, said Nicole Dougherty, a science teacher at Santaluces High School. Her students do a daily warm-up drill modeled after FCAT questions. When they struggle with a specific tested topic, she spends more time on it.<\/span><\/p>\n

But devoting seven weeks to review would be a “disservice” to her students who need to learn her courses’ intended content, she said.<\/p>\n

“They don’t come to FCAT school, they come to high<\/em> school to learn a topic,” she said. “If I was a teacher who only cared about scores, I could very well be wooed” to suspend the regular lessons. “We just feel like a good education for these kids will, in turn, give them good, positive scores on the FCAT.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

And now for some non-evolution science education news … the FCAT is so dang important that regular science curriculum is being dropped in some schools in order to do an intense FCAT prep. (The FCAT is the Florida Comprehensive Assessment … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcZNLl-6F","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":97,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=97","url_meta":{"origin":413,"position":0},"title":"Letter to the editor about science FCAT","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"November 15, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Here is an interesting letter to the editor about the science FCAT: As a science graduate and education specialist teaching science in high school, I find myself along with other teachers arresting our science curriculum in anatomy and physiology, physics, zoology, environmental science and chemistry to help our students either\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Analysis\/Commentary"","block_context":{"text":"Analysis\/Commentary","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=4"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":605,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=605","url_meta":{"origin":413,"position":1},"title":"2008 science FCAT scores","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 10, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Florida\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s science FCAT scores were released today. For those who don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know, the FCAT is the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test given annually to all Florida public school children in grades 3 through 11. The FCAT is supposed to measure what students have learned about reading, writing, mathematics and science. The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "FCAT"","block_context":{"text":"FCAT","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=22"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":891,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=891","url_meta":{"origin":413,"position":2},"title":"Insights into Florida science testing","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"February 5, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"David Campbell is a Florida Citizens for Science board member and was featured in a New York TImes article about the teaching of evolution. Here on this blog I've been posting about a movement to eliminate the 11th grade science FCAT and replace it with end-of-course tests. (see here, here\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 5 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 5 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=891#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":286,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=286","url_meta":{"origin":413,"position":3},"title":"Science FCAT prep soon to be just a click away","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"September 30, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"This news article announces that South Florida Science Museum has been awarded a grant to create science FCAT preparation materials available \"anywhere, anytime.\" The materials are to take advantage of the Internet and iPods. I had trouble finding any other website other than the news article that talks about this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "In the News"","block_context":{"text":"In the News","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=3"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1201,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1201","url_meta":{"origin":413,"position":4},"title":"2010 Science FCAT and beyond","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 29, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"The annual Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test results are finally released. These are exams that students across the state in specific grade levels must take in core subjects. These scores can influence students\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 promotion to the next grade, and dictate what the student can or cannot take the next school year,\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 3 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 3 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1201#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1061,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1061","url_meta":{"origin":413,"position":5},"title":"Op-ed noticed by Education Week","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 6, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"The Education Week blog Curriculum Matters picked up on my op-ed that appeared in the St. Petersburg Times. It's gratifying to see our issues getting attention! However, Curriculum Matters misunderstood one thing: Haught, whose organization was heavily involved in the evolution fight, argues that scores from Florida's science test, which\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/413"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=413"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/413\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}