Testing - Does one size fit all?

How frustrated some students are when they sit down in front of an assessment and immediately draw a blank!  It is difficult as a teacher to know that they know the information and concepts but that they have difficulty demonstrating that on our standardized one-size-fits-all tests.  It is this image that stays with me as I think about the readings from Chapter 7 of Teaching Every Student in the Digital Age.  Rose and Meyer state that "most current assessments are not designed to accommodate individual differences."  Clarification is made throughout the chapter as examples are used to show that different students have strengths in differing areas and that standardized testing does nothing to address these differences.  What is difficult though is, from a teacher stand point, how can one develop authentic assessments that allow students to demonstrate knowledge gained about a topic or concept.  While much time was spent on discussing how different learning styles benefit from different testing approaches, there was not as much time spent detailing ideas on how a teacher could accomplish that mission.  While I do agree that, "test formats (e.g. multiple choices, essay, short answer) and administration circumstances (e.g. timed/untimed, individual/group, administration, in-class/take home) all impact student performance differently, depending on the individual test-takers affective makeup. Inevitably, a single test, given in a single way, will affect some students positively and some students negatively," it is difficult to envision a different assessment for each child that addresses each individual's needs. A perfect world for students, but a logistics nightmare for teachers. I feel that I'm making strides in addressing student needs when it comes to learning styles, but I've got miles to go when it comes to differentiating assessments.

Rose, D., & Meyer, A. (2002). Teaching every student in the digital age: Universal design for learning. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Chapter 7. Available online at the Center for Applied Special Technology Web site. Retrieved from http://www.cast.org/teachingeverystudent/ideas/tes/