CEP 800 Podcast

I had a difficult time coming up with a topic to do for my interview. I kept debating on my topic. Finally I wanted to look at the differences from my students compared to an educator and a parent. There is such a push for MEAP testing and successfully MEAP testing due to AYP, I wanted to look at how much people really know about Michigan's History. I randomly chose one of my students to interview. She was fairly successful with her answering of my questions. She summarized to the best of her ability. When it comes time for her to take the 6th grade Social Studies MEAP test I'm still not sure how successful she will be.
My students will move onto the fourth grade and begin their social studies learning where the third grade teachers left off. There will be a little recalling, but not much due to the fact that those fourth grade teachers need to move forward to make sure that they finish their own standards. After fourth they move onto fifth grade and the process is still the same...a little recall and then moving on.
The students enter sixth grade and they are expected to take the Social Studies MEAP test and be able to recall that information that they learned from 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade. Questions are on the test dealing with important events that happened in early Michigan's History.
I interviewed a educator, one who has a history background. This failed miserably. Even though she had a history minor I had forgotten that she was from another state. She wasn't able to give me very much information and it wasn't as successful as I had thought that it had been.
My last interview was of a man that has lived in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and who is older. Based on the information that he had remember I doubt that he would be successful on the MEAP test. After the interview we talked for a very long time about Michigan's History. He didn't remember most of the information that I had told him about and he was a little surprised by that.
It makes me wonder how successful standardized tests are when the information that the students are learning is so spread out. If they miss one little piece of information then that could affect a lot of the answers to the MEAP questions. It also makes me wonder if the strategies that the teachers of Michigan are as successful as we all think they are. I definitely use operant conditioning in my classroom, I use fake money as positive reinforcements. My school is having problems with the success of the 6th grade students in the Social Studies aspect of the MEAP. In fact, we are making up a special class in the Kindergarten through 5th grade that is all about Social Studies to help shrink that failure rate in 6th grade.
I guess the question I was hoping to have answered was, "Is what students learn in social studies in 3rd grade vital for them to become functioning members of society?"