Gil Valdez, Ph.D., Deputy Director, NCREL, and Director of the North Central Eisenhower Mathematics and Science Consortium, cautions against assessments that do not credit cultural nuances.
Gil Valdez:
Well, I'm a critic of assessment in general, okay? Especially the simple one -- multiple choice answer. And this comes not so much from language understanding -- it comes from complexity of the highly gifted, especially who oftentimes do poorly on tests. Because they find different solutions and different correct solutions of that than what the testmaker originally envisioned.
Now, you add the complexity of different languages and the cultural backgrounds, oftentimes easy to score multiple choice tests not only assess wrong, they miss the richness of the correct answers that could have been perceived from different one. Obviously, as a science person, I struggle when I have Native American children who were in the classes because their understanding of science and Mother Earth may be at times clash into what I would like to have as the scientific proof. And yet, it's a beauty of a different perception.