Standardized Testing Essay Example for Free

Standardized Testing Essay The focus Ingernira pinpoints on in the article is recognizing that testing is required to gauge how much the student learned however, I feel that testing is needed to establish the financial solutions for each state and school to determine rather or not they will be able to receive a grant. Also the article elaborates that the student should be tested on what they’re good at and for the students who aren’t able to test well should be able to have incentives. Since testing has become a must in schools now it should be done at no harm to the student and the school should have guidelines and minimize the negative effects on test. I will use this article to help me elaborate more and give tips to different ways standardized testing should be done. This article will help my argument by giving a different view on ways students should be tested. McKinney, Brennan. â€Å"Standardized Tests: Support, Criticism, and How it Affects Teachers and Children.† Yahoo Voices, Web. 17 Dec. 2010. McKinney Brennan looks at how teachers feel about standardized testing and how it affects their voices in order to be able to teach the students there way. Throughout the summary standardized testing is pretty clear that the goals for the teacher and students are that the student needs to learn and the teacher is supposed to be teaching. However, this method has backlash because the teachers and the school have little to say about what content is put on the test and it’s up to the government to decide and there not with the students every day. Also, the teacher’s feel the test is too difficult, broad, and not age appropriate which causes the students to fail and make the state and school look bad. I will use this article to illustrate the teacher’s point of view behind standardized testing. This article will help my argument by proving that teacher plays a major role in student’s lives and if they feel a certain way about the test then there voice should b e heard too. The Engines for Education Team. Engines for Education. EFE, n.d. Web. 11 March. 2013. Engines for Education explain the problems for standardized testing. The group says that we need to cut out the competiveness in the test and focus more on the student’s performance. Also the test kills the type of education that matters most because teachers are more focused on teaching what will likely be on the test instead of teaching at a comfortable style there able to choose. Also, the site in tells how it effects the students in the near future on test- taking and how it mobilizes there brain into I need to get a high score, I need to remember the information, and have all this anxiety before the test is even here. I will use this article to help me explain the people’s point of view on testing and the anxieties kids have when testing. This article will help my argument because it points out valid points that students go thru every day. Testing anxieties and the test has blocked the important things in education and now it’s all about rank and who can hav e the highest score.

Animal Emotions Essay -- essays papers

Animal Emotions Do animals feel joy, love, fear, anguish or despair? What ere emotions, and perhaps more importantly, how do scientists prove animals are capable of emotion? Sea lion mothers have often been seen wailing painfully and squealing eerily as they watch their babies being eaten by killer whales. Buffaloes have also been observed sliding playfully across ice, excitedly screaming â€Å"Gwaaa.† Emotions are defined broadly as psychological phenomena that help in behavioral management and control. This is a challenging question to researchers who are trying to determine the answer to this question. Through current research by close observation combined with neurobiological research, evidence that animals exhibit fear, joy happiness, shame, embarrassment, resentment, jealousy, rage, anger, love, pleasure, compassion, respect, relief, disgust, sadness, despair, and grief is likely. Charles Darwin said, â€Å"The lower animals, like man, manifestly feel pleasure and pain, happines s, and misery.† I agree with Darwin. I believe animals do exhibit emotions, and denying that animals have emotions because the subject cannot be studied directly is not a reasonable explanation. One recent headline in the news showed an extraordinary event on film. When a three-year-old boy fell into a gorilla enclosure at the zoo, and was knocked unconscious. A female Gorilla named Binti Jua picked up the boy, and cradled him in her arms as if he was her own. The gorilla then gently carried the boy over to the caretaker’s door and set him down. Did the gorilla feel empathy for the boy? By watching the film alone the gorilla seemed to show emotions for the boy, but without studying the animal neurobiologically scientists cannot understand how her emotions and cognitions were linked. One scientist, Damasio, provided an explanation how emotions can be felt in humans biologically. Damasio suggested, â€Å"Various brain structures map both the organism and external objects to create what he calls a second order representation. This mapping of the organism and the object most likely occurs in the thalamus and cingulate cortices. A sense of self in the act of knowing is created, and the individual knows â€Å"to whom this is happening.† The â€Å"seer† and the â€Å"seen,† the â€Å"thought† and the â€Å"thinker† are one in the same.† By mapping the brain scientists can have a better understandi... ...ung children. He said â€Å"A greylag goose that has lost its partner shows all the symptoms that John Bowlby has described in young human children in his famous book Infant Grief. . . the eyes sink deep into their sockets, and the individual has an overall drooping experience, literally letting their head hang.† Elephants stand guard over a stillborn baby for days with their head and their ears hanging down like they were sad. The experiments and other data show that animals are not just driven by instincts alone. There is more to them than that. It is hard to watch dogs play and believe that they derive no fun or pleasure from it at all. Animals have shown that they are sensitive to their social surroundings. They punish one another and alleviate other’s pain. Some monkeys in established communities attack those that find food and don’t share. These studies are important. A better understanding of how animals are feeling could create a whole new guideline of rules on the way animals should be treated. Humans should not be so arrogant to believe they are the only animals capable of emotion. How are we capable of seeing from their viewpoint and assume they feel no emotion.

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The Montgomery Bus Boycott was a socio-political protest against the policy of racial segregation and discrimination campaign in the public transport service of Montgomery city, Alabama in 1955. It lasted for one whole year starting at December 5, 1955 and ending at Decenmer21, 1956. The sentiments of the Afro-American community were cooled down by a United States Supreme decision that declared segregation in public transport as unconstitutional. The main cause of the protest and boycott of transport system was racial discrimination. This segregation was a source of bitterness and pathos for the Afro-Americans community for a long period of time. The city bus service was making a mockery of Afro-American as they were harassed by white drivers. They had top pay the fare at the front door whereas they had to reboard from the rear-door.   They used to sit behind a barrier that segregated the white community from the black one. This barrier was always moved toward the rear end to accommodate more white customers. On the bus, blacks sat behind a mobile barrier dividing the races, and as the bus filled, the barrier was pushed back to make room for white passengers. This stated resentments of the black residents of Montgomery city got an impetus in the arrest of Rosa Parks. She was taken into custody on December 1, 1955 on the charges that she refused vacate her seat to a white passenger. She was penalized 10$ in addition to $ 4 court charges. This decision flamed the feelings of the Afro-American community who had already planned to set a protest against this uncivilized practice. So the same day, on December 05, 1955, almost forty two thousands Black residents of the city started the boycott of city bus transport in order to protest racial segregation and racially discriminatory law of Alabama state. Rosa Parks was also an enthusiastic adherent of the protest campaign. The first occurrence of protest was a one day boycott by a local women’s rights organization, Women's Political Council to show solidarity with Rosa Parks. The council’s president JoAnn published and distributed 52,000 fliers that prompted Montgomery‘s Afro-American community to stay off public buses on the day of the Rosa Park’s trial. National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s (NAACP) local section, that was hankering after an issue to involve the court into a legal and constitutional debate over the issue of racial segregation took advantage of the situation, started preparing for the legal challenge. After the conviction of Rosa Parks, the local black leaders congregated to arrange a mass protest and an extension of the bus boycott. They further established Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA) to forward the interest of the Afro-American community at the national level and elected Luther King Jr. as its president. This protest continued for 381 days during which Black community used other mean of conveyance like taxis, carpooling, and walking through miles. Their efforts and sacrifices bore fruit when they ultimately succeeded in their struggle to desegregate seating on public buses, not only in Montgomery, but throughout the United States through a decision made by Supreme Court. As it is stated earlier that Black organizations like NAACP and other community leader started thinking on various legal measures to challenge the Alabama bus segregation laws and to eradicate the segregation. For his purpose, they based their case on Fourth Amendments that declares equal laws for every citizen of America and  Ã‚   wanted a clear judgment in this regards over the discriminatory laws of Alabama State. But real solace came through another case Browder v. Gayle that was filed on February 1, 1956, in the U.S. District Court. Browder was a Montgomery housewife who was denied the equal right of bus service under the discriminatory law and Gayle was the mayor of Montgomery. In June, 1956 ruling, federal court declared the segregated seating as unconstitutional but an appeal was forwarded to the United States Supreme Court. However, on November 13, 1956, the superior court endorsed the lower court's ruling. This was a great triumph for the Afro-American community as they won the struggle for their rights. The Montgomery Bus Boycott cast deep imprints U.S. history and equipped the Black leadership with an impetus to carry on their civil rights struggle. It had implications that reached far beyond the desegregation of public buses. Luther King established himself as the leader of a national stature. The protest boosted the Civil Rights Movement and created a mass awareness about the struggle of Afro-American community and highlighted their pathos and miseries. It further provided confidence to the Black people that they can win their rights by constant struggle. In the words of King: â€Å"We have gained a new sense of dignity and destiny. We have discovered a new and powerful weapon—non-violent resistance.† Reference Burns, Stewart. (1997) Daybreak of Freedom: The Montgomery Bus Boycott. The University of North Carolina Press.

Machu Picchu Wonder of the World

At an altitude of about 8000 feet, Machu Picchu, now one of the 7 wonders of the world, is a small city in the Andes, about 44 miles northwest of Cuzco, Peru, which was once the political heart of the Inca Empire.. and about 3000 feet above the Urubamba Valley. It covers 80,000 acres and means Old Peak in the indigenous Quechua. History of the Lost City Inca ruler Pachacuti Inca Yupanqui (or Sapa Inca Pachacuti) built Machu Picchu in the mid-15th century. It appears to have been a royal estate or sacred, ceremonial city with an  astronomical observatory. The largest peak in Machu Picchu, called Huayna Picchu, is known as hitching post of the sun. The city was probably occupied for fewer than 150 years. Smallpox devastated Machu Picchu before the conqueror of the Inca, the Spaniard Francisco Pizarro, arrived. Yale archaeologist Hiram Bingham discovered the ruins of the city in 1911. Most of the roughly 150 buildings in Machu Picchu were built of granite so their ruins look like part of the mountains. The Inca made regular blocks of granite fit so tightly together (without mortar) that there are areas where a knife cannot fit between the stones. Many buildings had trapezoidal doors and thatched roofs. They used irrigation to grow corn and potatoes. Today, Machu Picchu is an iconic mountain top tourist destination.