Bloomberg reports that a fourth grader in Washington State was suspended after refusing to answer a question on a standardized test. Read the article to find out more about the child's respectful reason for refusing to answer the question.

After refusing to answer, the child was humiliated by the school principal, who said to him, "Good job, bud, you've ruined it for everyone in the school, the teachers and the school," and later described his behavior to his parents as "blatant defiance and insubordination." The principal was claiming that the child was bringing down the school's average test score, which was apparently unfounded because state regulations show that the test is pass/fail and there is no averaging of writing scores. The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) uses test scores to measure a school's annual progress, and if schools fail to show progress, the principal can be fired.

This is what NCLB is doing to children in American schools. It's asinine to think that you can improve learning on a massive level by testing performance. What this act has done is rally principals around kids to make them test well, not to help them learn. And America's children get stuck with self-serving educators who need to care more about what they can do to save their jobs than to teach or allow kids to learn for the gratification that comes with becoming more knowledgeable and skillfull in the world.

Politicians need to stay the hell out of the education system. As with any kind of learning, you can't rush or force it for the sake of the outcome. Performing for rewards can be the root of many other problems, especially in this country. We so often perform for rewards of different kinds. Wage earners might perform for bonus money and raises. Kids might perform for stars or for grades. I fear that eventually, what might get lost in the picture is the personal rewards that come with accomplishment. To me, there's no greater reward than feeling good about what I'm doing or accomplishing -- feeling skilled and competent. Learning how to think for one's self, and understanding how to solve problems is all about the process, and not so much about the results.

I think NCLB has got it all wrong. I'm sure the outcome will be, unfortunately that we produce an ample supply of students that know how to answer test questions adequately, and much fewer that understand what to do with the all that information handed to them in years of learning how take tests.