Standardized Tests

This week my boys are doing standardized tests. I am not much of a fan of these things, but I began doing them with the boys when we used STAA. I always like to call them my Grandparents' Tests. Because I would send copies of the results to the grandparents, just so they would not worry, though they never said they did.

I was always good at taking tests. I know it is partially my rather competitive personality, but also I had picked up along the way the strategy of a test and how to approach it as a challenge. I know some very intelligent people who never did well on them because of intimidation, didn't have the test-taking personality or had never picked up the strategies.

Anyway, I have tried to approach them with my boys just for what they are. De-mystify them. Try to explain why they exists.

John Holt had a nice word for tests and transcripts and the like. They are 'tickets'. He said sometimes you need a ticket of some sort to be able to get you to the next step of where you want to go, what you want to do. For example, a college may need an SAT score, an employer may need a certain resume'.

This openness and practice with the tests has worked well over the years. Especially with one of me dc who is NOT competitive at all and would have been a great candidate for test anxiety if he had begun his encounters with them in the way I did back in school. The tick tock of the clock, the 2 number 2 pencils, the world *riding* on this test. Instead we look at them for what they are. We started very slowly and the first years I didn't use the timer. Over the years, I have seen the confidence grow.

Number 2 son did a language part of the test today and asked, "Is this what schools use to measure kids' intelligence?"

No, I told him. This is just one measure to see if they are learning the basics.

Humm. He thought this was a very narrow way to measure. I think he is right and he gets what these tests really are.

Basics which we have covered very nicely with living books, reading and writing as hobbies and a smattering of grammar instruction here and there over the years.

But, I started this post to share one particular event that made this year's testing worthwhile to me.

My number 2 son was reclining on the couch, filling his the circles on a vocabulary portion of the test. He was unsure about an answer. Of course I could not tell him a definition he was missing from his repretiore. :)

But, he remembered the steps of test-taking strategy.

-He had skipped that hard question.
-He came back to it after finishing the others.
-He eliminated 2 of the answers he knew were incorrect.
-He tried to see which of the remaining choices made most sense from many angles.
-He finally used his gut feel and chose one.

After he was finished and the paper put away he asked if he was right.

I suggested we look the words in question up in the dictionary.

Was he right? Either way, he was! He knew how to approach the test and mastered it as best he could.

I don't want their whole world to revolve around these artifical things, but to be familiar enough with them so they can approach them with confidence.

De- mystify. I think that is right the word. And Tickets.