Use What Is There  PRO

USE WHAT IS THERE

My son Omri is large, extremely smart and very active. He has not met a tree or roof that he has not at least mentally pondered climbing. Omri's teacher runs up to me the other day and says, "Your son almost made me lose my mind, my religion and my job." This is not unusual, so I listen as she is animated, jumping around telling her story:

"We were preparing for his Map Test (Measures of Academic Progress by NAWA), and we had been hyping the kids all day and week with the importance of doing well on the test, and Omri has been saying all day how well he wanted to do on the test. Well, we come in from lunch, and I grab Omri, my best student, and get him started on the test on the computer.

"He comes to the first question, which says "Take the P off of Pat and replace it with a (C) sound and select the picture." The little pictures make sound when you mash them. Several times he looked at "Cat" right in the middle and refused to mash the button. He was just sitting there ten to fourteen minutes. At that point I was pulling my hair out, asking myself, 'Did I not explain this test to my students? Lord, have I done something wrong? I mean, this is one of my best students and he is frozen. Am I a good teacher? Am I a good person?'"

She gives up and some would say even breaks the rules of this Testing system...