Jago Ch. 7

     A national assessment test sounds promising, but the path to get there is a long on to say the least.  I'm not sure how important it is to have similar standards as long as they all have something in common and that is that they are high.  We must hold students to a higher level, challenge them and help them to succeed in whatever the future holds for them.  As far as where literature comes into play in all of this I pretty much agree with Jago, in that classic literature is still a very important part of the curriculum.  Teaching a student how to analyze a piece of writing well is necessary since this bit of knowledge can be used in almost every aspect of the students every day life.  Learning how to deal with certain situations and sympathizing with those who can't.  I don't know if a student should not be able to graduate if they don't know how to analyze something and express there own opinion in a productive way, but I do know that teachers need to impart as much as possible onto each student who passes through their room, because not all states do have a final graduation exam, so it's up to us to determine if they are ready or not and then to hope that we are right.