Кейс-задача 7

TEACHING TO THE TEST

1. Teaching to the test is an educational practice where curriculum is heavily focused on preparing for a standardized test. It consists in teaching information and then giving a test over the information at the end of the unit. It is frequently used for skill-based learning, like typing or athletics.

2. Teaching to the test forces teachers to limit curriculum to a set range of knowledge or skills in order to increase student performance on the mandated test. This produces an unhealthy focus on excessive repetition of simple, isolated skills and limits the teacher’s ability to focus on a holistic understanding of the subject matter.

3. Critics of the practice argue that students taught using this method lack a comprehensive understanding of subject matter; even if it raised test scores – which it fails to do – students may not truly grasp the key concepts of the domain. Teaching to the test activities emphasizes rote memorization and excludes creative and abstract-thinking skills.

1. Содержанию текста соответствует утверждение:

• Teaching to the test doesn’t worsen students’ ability to train creative and abstract-thinking skills.

• While teaching to the test teachers succeed in giving comprehensive knowledge of the subject being taught.

• Being taught to the test students experience difficulty in understanding of the subject matter as a whole.

• Repetition of simple, isolated skills enables students to improve and strengthen their knowledge faster.

2. Завершите утверждение согласно содержанию текста:

Teaching to tests calls attention to…

• development of rote memorization skills

• a holistic understanding of the subject matter

• improvement of creative and abstract-thinking skills

• development of testing techniques

3. Ответьте на вопрос:

What do teachers have to undertake to improve their students’ performance while teaching to certain tests?

• It makes them revise their tests.

• It makes them emphasize the role of education.

• It makes them limit curriculum.

• It makes them develop creative thinking.

4. Основной идеей текста является:

• Teaching to the test is an educational program of preparing students for successful executing standardized tests possessing more negative than positive sides.

• Teaching to the test has a lot of drawbacks preventing students a holistic understanding of the subject matter and development of creative and abstract-thinking skills.

• Teaching to the test is an educational practice frequently used for skill-based learning which consists in teaching information and then giving a test over the information.

• Teachers don’t support teaching to the test as they have to limit curriculum to certain range of knowledge or skills to improve their students’ performance on the tests.

Кейс-задача 8

INTELLECTUAL GIFTEDNESS

1. Intellectual giftedness is an intellectual ability significantly higher than average. It is different from a skill, in that skills are learned or acquired behaviors. Like a talent, intellectual giftedness is usually believed to be an innate, personal aptitude for intellectual activities that cannot be acquired through personal effort. Various ideas about the definition, development, and best ways of identifying intellectual giftedness have been put forward.

2. Intellectual giftedness may be general or specific. For example, an intellectually gifted person may have a striking talent for mathematics, but not have equally strong language skills. When combined with an adequately challenging curriculum and the diligence necessary to acquire and execute many learned skills, intellectual giftedness often produces academic success.

3. Gifted children may develop asynchronously: their minds are often ahead of their physical growth, and specific cognitive and emotional functions are often developed differently (or to differing extents) at different stages of development. One frequently cited example of asynchronicity in early cognitive development is Albert Einstein, who did not speak until the age of four, but whose later fluency and accomplishments belied this initial delay.