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Calkins, Lucy

Montgomery, Kate

Santman, Donna

English

ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst

Practical Assessment, Research, and Evaluation Volume 6 Volume 6, 1998-1999 Article 8 1998 Helping Children Master the Tricks and Avoid the Traps of Standardized Tests Lucy Calkins Kate Montgomery Donna Santman Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/pare Recommended Citation Calkins, Lucy; Montgomery, Kate; and Santman, Donna (1998) "Helping Children Master the Tricks and Avoid the Traps of Standardized Tests," Practical Assessment, Research, and Evaluation: Vol. 6 , Article 8. DOI: https://doi.org/10.7275/gh47-3428 Available at: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/pare/vol6/iss1/8 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. It has been accepted for inclusion in Practical Assessment, Research, and Evaluation by an authorized editor of ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. For more information, please contact scholarworks@library.umass.edu. A peer-reviewed electronic journal.Copyright is retained by the first or sole author, who grants right of first publication to Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation. Permission is granted to distribute this article fornonprofit, educational purposes if it is copied in its entirety and the journal is credited. PARE has the right to authorize third party reproduction of this article in print, electronic anddatabase forms.Volume 6, Number 8, November, 1999 ISSN=1531-7714Helping Children Master the Tricks and Avoid the Traps of Standardized TestsLucy Calkins, Kate Montgomery, and Donna SantmanAdapted  from A Teacher's Guide to Standardized Reading Tests. Knowledge is Power (1998) by Lucy Calkins, KateMontgomery, and Donna Santman, Portsmouth, New Hampshire: Heinemann.IntroductionChildren can improve and change their test-taking habits if they are taught about their misleading work patterns.Teaching children about the traps they tend to fall into may well be the most powerful, specific preparation teachers cangive them for the day of the test. By studying the habits of young test takers, we uncovered some of their commonmistakes. This Digest lists some of these mistakes and suggests several teaching strategies that may be useful toteachers who are preparing their class to take standardized tests.Use the Text to Pick Your AnswerWhen it comes to choosing an answer, many children are much more likely to turn to their own memories or experiencesthan to the hard-to-understand text for their answers. This issue becomes even more difficult when the passage is anexcerpt from a text with which the students are familiar. Many new reading tests use passages from well-knownchildren's literature, including those stories that have been made into movies. In this case, many students justify theiranswers by referring to these movies or their memory of hearing the story when they were younger.While these personal connections are helpful if the student is at a complete loss for an answer, it's essential for childrento understand that relying on opinions, memories, or personal experience is not a reliable strategy for finding answersthat a test maker has decided are correct. Clearly, many questions asked on the tests require prior knowledge to answer,but the problem comes when students rely exclusively on that prior knowledge and ignore the information presented inthe passage. Some things that teachers may wish to do in order to help their students avoid making this mistake includethe following:Teach students to underline parts of the passage that might be asked in the questionsHelp children develop scavenger-hunt-type lists of things to look for as they read the passages by having themread the questions firstTeach students to find out how many questions they can hold in their minds as they read the passageShow children how to fill in all the answers on each test booklet page before filling in the corresponding bubbles onthe answer sheetTeach children ways to mark the passage in order to make it easier to go back to find or check specific parts - theseinclude writing key words in the margins and circling or underliningShow students how to use an index card to block out distracting print or to act as a placeholderRetype familiar or easy text to look as daunting and dense as the test passages to give children confidence andexperience in the test format.Sometimes It's Helpful to Refer to Your Own Life ExperiencesIn the reading comprehension sections of a reading test, children must find evidence in the passages to support theiranswers. Yet, there are parts of many reading tests where the only things students can rely on are their own previousexperiences. In these sections, students are asked to choose the correct spelling of the underlined word or to choose theword whose meaning is closest to that of the underlined word.Often students prepare for these sections of the tests by taking practice tests and then going over the answers. However,it is highly unlikely that any of the same words would appear on the actual test. Therefore, teachers may wish to impressupon children the importance of creating a context for the variety of words that may be found on the test by relatingthose words to their own personal reading experiences. In order to facilitate that thinking process, teachers may wish tohelp children ask themselves such questions as "Have I seen this word before in a book?" "Where have I heard thatbefore?" or "What words or events usually happen around this word?" while they are answering vocabulary or spellingquestions.Page 1 of 3 1Calkins et al.: Helping Children Master the Tricks and Avoid the Traps of StandarPublished by ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst, 1998Learn to Read the QuestionIt is always assumed that if children have reading troubles, their wrong answers stem from difficulty reading thepassages. However, this is not always the case. Sometimes, reading the questions, a much less familiar task, can prove tobe the greatest reading challenge for the students. This is because questions such as "How was the central problemresolved?" or "Which statement is NOT true about the narrator?", are not the types of questions children are askingthemselves and each other about the books they read.Studying various types of questions can be a helpful practice to future test takers. This can be done by searchingthrough practice tests and making lists of the types of questions. Although the questions will be different on the day ofthe test, this exercise may familiarize students with the types of questions that are asked on standardized tests.Choose the Answer to the QuestionSometimes children choose their answer by finding the first answer choice that matches something in the text.Unfortunately, by not considering what the question was actually asking, they are tricked into choosing the wronganswer simply because it may state a fact that was included in the story.One teaching strategy that can help students avoid this mistake is to present a text with questions in a standardizedtest format. With a partner, the child should figure out what the different questions are asking, and write down theirparaphrased versions. Many times children will be surprised at how different their paraphrasing is from what thequestion is actually asking. It may be a good practice for teachers to look at the different paraphrasings with the classand discuss which interpretations would help the members of the class and which would lead them astray. This allowsstudents to strengthen their skills at finding the true meaning of the questions.Risk an Unfamiliar ChoiceFrequently, students avoid choosing an answer simply because it contains an unknown word even when they know theother choices are probably wrong. Thus, teachers should advise students not to overlook the possibility that the answerwhich contains the unfamiliar word may be the correct choice. Teachers often try to teach children a way of narrowingdown the answer choices through a process of elimination. Despite the fact that this process can be very helpful, manystudents eliminate two possibilities and then, from the last two, just sort of pick one. They don't, it seems, try to figureout a reason to choose one over the other. They seem to wrongly assume that the two choices left are equally possible.However, teachers should teach students that thoughtful elimination between the two last possibilities can lead to thecorrect choice.Check Your AnswersAfter the harrowing ordeal of taking a standardized test, the last thing that students usually want to hear coming fromtheir teacher is "Did you check your answers?" Frequently, the biggest reason kids hate checking answers is becausethey have only one strategy for doing so: opening their test booklets to the first passage and beginning again. To them,checking answers means taking the test again. However, that does not have to be the case. There are a variety ofdifferent strategies that students can use for selectively going back through the test and reconsidering answers. One ofthese strategies is teaching children to only check the problems of which they were unsure. It is unnecessary to return toquestions about which students feel fairly confident. Students can keep track of the troublesome questions while theyare actually taking the test. They can do this in several different ways: jotting down the numbers of the questions on aseparate sheet of paper, circling the numbers in the test booklet, etc. Students should also know that it is okay to take ashort break (stretching in their seats, bathroom/drink break) before going back and checking the answers. This will givethem a chance to clear their minds a little bit. Most importantly, students should be taught to attempt to check theanswers to the troublesome questions using a new strategy so that they may avoid reusing possibly faulty problem-solving methods.Setting the Tone for Test DayAlthough teachers may do their best to prepare their students for standardized tests, every teacher has stories ofchildren dissolving into tears on the day of tests. Even if their feelings aren't so obvious, all children feel the pressure ofdoing well. Be sure you don't add to the pressure by over reacting to small deeds of misbehavior or by over emphasizingthe fact that today is a testing day.Suggested ReadingsCalkins, L., Montgomery, K. and Santman, D. (1998). A Teacher's Guide to Standardized Tests. Knowledge Is Power.Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.Mitchell, R. (1992). Testing for learning: How new approaches to evaluation can improve American schools. New York:The Free Press.Perrone, V. (Ed.). (1991). Expanding student assessment. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.Page 2 of 3 2Practical Assessment, Research, and Evaluation, Vol. 6 [1998], Art. 8https://scholarworks.umass.edu/pare/vol6/iss1/8DOI: https://doi.org/10.7275/gh47-3428Shepard, L. (February, 1995). Using assessment to improve learning. Educational Leadership, 38-43. Descriptors: Standardized TestsCitation: Calkins, Lucy, Kate Montgomery & Donna Santman (1999). Helping children master the tricks and avoid the traps of standardizedtests. Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation, 6(8). Available online: http://PAREonline.net/getvn.asp?v=6&n=8.Page 3 of 3 3Calkins et al.: Helping Children Master the Tricks and Avoid the Traps of StandarPublished by ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst, 1998

Helping Children Master the Tricks and Avoid the Traps of Standardized Tests

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Helping Children Master the Tricks and Avoid the Traps of Standardized Tests

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