It seems like the easiest thing to do is download information because there's so much to get through that will end up on a yearly standardized test.

The thing is when you just bombard students with pile and piles of info they don't retain any. And if they are going to do well on the tests afterwards, you need to count on them to put the effort to study at home and internalize it on their own. And when they don't do it, you need to find time to explain the same things again when they are already scared and/or tired of them. Every proper lesson plan and curriculum has some time set aside for interactivity and what I'm saying is that if you put that interactivity in the beginning to open the topic, the rest of it goes over quicker and easier and the students grasp the concepts better and do better on later tests. It's much easier to remember something that you understand and have cared about even for a bit.

For instance, I recently met a former student on the street who is now a car mechanic and the reason I included the wood and metal example in the post is because he told me he still remembers that and gets reminded of it whenever touching "cold" metal at his job. And he used to be a pretty bad and careless student.

And we want all students to do equally well on the test so there's less time for exploration or working through a problem.

It might be counter-intuitive, but you don't. If you want them to do good on the tests, you want them to spend as much time as possible pondering the matter. When you just tell them the facts, they do very little thinking and very little understanding and when it comes time for the tests, they can't remember much and are easy to get confused. If they have spent time truly thinking about it and probing at the issue looking for an answer actively, the logic and solution tend to stick with them more and even if they have forgotten the detail, they have a higher chance of engaging in critical thinking on the test and allowing logic and understanding to lead them to the correct answer.

Did the tests actually measure the knowledge of the student, or the teaching ability of the teacher?

Well-written tests do measure some knowledge, but they also tend to measure "test-taking abilities". The same student would do much better on a test in a format they are familiar with rather than on a test that works in a brand new way. So part of the strategy to get your students to do well on a standardized exam is to teach them about the format. Sometimes simple test-taking tricks based on statistics could help a student raise their score more than a bunch of hours of studying at home. In that sense, having a teacher willing to explain that gives you an unfair advantage at the test. Additionally, there are students who have decent knowledge who simply don't do well with test because of other factors like not doing well under stress or simply having a test format that plays to their weaknesses.

Standardized test can give a lot of insight into the general state of education, but in places where the teachers are dependent on their student's scores, you see too much time being devoted to test-taking instead of proper understanding and retention. For instance, there might be important concepts that would be crucial to the continued education of the student, but that are hard to properly test at an exam. If the teacher cares about the scores now, they might simply skip the concept entirely and use the time for test-taking skills.

But my experience with standardized testing hasn't been too huge. Bulgaria doesn't have too many of those, but when my students have taken tests like that, they have done reasonably well. I'm not counting my English as a second language students as I tended to be given the more advanced classes to teach as they suited my teaching style better, so when those students aced their maturity exams at the end high school, it wouldn't be fair for me to claim much credit as they were already significantly above average at it to begin with. Of course I'm proud that none of them ever got a B, but still... ;)

As I've said before, it's a rare skill to be able to teach, especially youth, and I like how you tried to approach it.

I'm very glad to hear that! :)