Testing is a type of lens, and may be useful in some contexts. Consider, as an analogy, this description of the attributes of one type of lens: binoculars. “Binocular vision is a peculiarly exclusive form of looking,” explains Robert Macfarlane. “It draws a circle around the focused-on object and shuts out the world’s generous remainder. What binoculars grant you in focus and reach, they deny you in periphery. To view an object through them is to see it in crisp isolation, encircled by blackness – as though at the end of a tunnel. They permit a lucidity of view but enforce a denial of context.” All lenses have a type of distortion. The lens we are using will alter and shape the resulting image. Any measurement depends on the tool’s accuracy and the tool’s fitness for the job. Testing denies context to the whole picture of the child and the timeline of their learning.