Here are some of my thoughts after reading chapter 1.......I originally thought if we could just get rid of SOLS there would be a lot less stress when it comes to teaching, but as I was reading I realized that is definitely NOT the case. Our students do need to be prepared to take these types of standarized tests, so how do we balance providing purposeful instruction with the proper amount of test preparation without placing too much stress on ourselves as well as our students. This idea of "test talk" is a type of language that we may need to focus on through out our instruction. Liberty has solid instruction,but how do we weave this "test talk" in with our instruction almost as if it is seamless and part of the curriculum? What kind of plan can we create to help our students see the connection between reading and testing on a regular basis. I used to see these two items separtely, but as I continued to read the first chapter I see how it should be intertwined, not taught separately. Our Liberty students should first be effective readers before they can be effective test takers. They go hand in hand in my opinion, but before reading this I had never looked at it that way.
Hi Jennifer, I have not started the book yet but will be starting this this week. I will be joining the liberty team at 3rd grade this year from Hillside. I totally believe your statement about liberty students and all students need to be effective readers before they can be effective test takers. I find this to be a hard skill especially at the 3rd grade level where this students have just really begun to read fluently and are not decoding anymore. We have to teach them now in 3rd grade to read effectively. Two big things to accomplish in such a short period of time.
Hi Jenn I started reading the book this week. I agree that children need to be strong readers, but they also need to be taught test taking strategies. From the prospective of a parent, I saw my child struggle with standardized tests, but once he learned to recognize what the question (clues) was asking he had better results. As a kindergarten teacher, it is so important to begin to build reading skills for a strong foundation. Even at this young age, we can help develop these testing skills by working on listening and following directions. What is my teacher asking me to do with this activity? I believe my main goal in kindergarten is to develop and build their reading skills, but I am interested in reading about the different techniques to develop these important skills. Rhonda
Being new to LCPS I know I must have phrased some of my questions differently than the students' teachers as I found I had to often rephrase my questions. The students knew the answers, they did not recognize my terminology. Perhaps this was a good thing as they learned there is more than one way to ask the same question. I found the authors' discovery that test-talk is its own genre very interesting and do believe that students need to learn the art of taking a test by understanding the lingo. Focusing on "factoids" to prepare students for SOLs is only half the battle; they need to understand the question to provide the correct answer.
"How do we help our students show what they know on standardized tests?" "First, the reading test was hard-not necessarily because of the content being tested, but because of the language and format the test writers used."
In the first chapter these two main ideas really grabbed my attention. Connecting vocabulary and test-taking strategies seem to give students the tools they need to be successful at taking tests. As we know testing formats can be tricky for some students. For example, last year I decided to use true/false and matching as formative assessments in each science unit. I was amazed to see how many students had trouble with these assessments. The most trouble came with true/false. My students had trouble with the reasoning of true and false and the absolutes. They had not had much experience in highlighting key words like: never, always, all, some, etc. I needed to go back and teach mini lessns on the strategy to take true/false tests and constantly model and review it. On the matching assessments the kids knew that if they got one wrong they immediately got two wrong because I started without any extra choices. I had to go back and teach mini lessons on reading all of the definitions first and then answer the match that you absolutely know is correct first, then so on. This was harder and we did a lot of out loud thinking and reasoning because students are so used to multiple choice or essay assessments. It was very interesting to test the same material using different formats. At first, strong test takers did well on both because they were strong test takers. "Guesser" test takers really had to be shown how to break the test down and practice these strategies regularly.
I also liked the example: "The master carpenter brings the same toolbox to every job and skillfully chooses the proper tools for individual tasks." This inspires me as a teacher to connect what the students knows to confidently having a plan to take a test.
"Test taking is a life skill." When I found out my assigned reading was a book on test taking I thought it might not apply to my first grade students. As I read the first chapter, I began to think about A to Z and DRA assessment questions. Linking reading strategy vocabulary to comprehension question vocabulary will help our students respond better to questions. This chapter also made me realize that helping students become comfortable with assessment vocabulary will help them prepare for adult life and their professional paths. Lora Davis
I was apprehensive about reading Test Talk, by title alone. Students have to be prepared to be skilled at test taking throughout their educational endeavors. Test taking is the only method that measures students and compares various educational backgrounds at a level playing fields. This chapter explains that assessment skills are easily incorporated into lessons and better prepare students for the skills they will need throughout their test taking years. While many are incorporated in lessons, it serves as a reminder as a teacher to continually reinforce these skills as we teach. Karen Levine
Not only do we need to be aware of various educational backgrounds, we need to understand how cultural backgrounds impact our students' background knowledge as well. I remember my daughter coming home from a cognitive test in second grade and asked what a card with a clover was. I realized that we had used kid oriented playing cards but never the actual playing cards; as a result my daughter did not know how to answer a question. I was reminded last week of how important background knowledge was when my family saw Discpicable Me 2; it referenced Cinco-de-Mayo and I was hoping the students' who have (or will see)this movie remember the nonfiction book about the holiday as well as the picture book I read in order to make a connection. We can't assume that all children are exposed to the same things and must make an effort to help them make those connections. As a librarian, I try to incorporate as much K-5 curriculum as I can as it provides background knowledge as well as reinforces what the student's are learning to make it more relavent to them.
Chapter 2-- I believe that children today are under a lot of stress. I even see it with my kinders. I agree with the statement "forget about it" and "move on". Helping children move through the tough questions on these tests as well as when they are engaged in learning new concepts in class, so that they will not become frustrated and give up. As teachers giving them plenty of options or strategies for success. Teaching them that learning should never stop through out your life. Rhonda
Chapter 2.....After reading Lora' comment I went back into this chapter and really looked at the strategies that would apply to ALL students no matter what grade.
I chose to focus on Rereading Saves the Day and building stamina. I focused on the rereading strategy because the authors stated it was the most important useful to readers of ALL ages. Rereading is not just when you are reading, but this can also be practiced in writing and of course for test taking. The idea that teachers need to teach this but also expect this to happen and make sure it is practiced consistently is important. This strategy is the most important one they will use when taking a test. The second strategy stamina ties back to the importance of having independent reading and the fact that we need to be doing this every day consistently from kindergarten on up. Building stamina takes time and modeling those high expectations will create a community of readers in our classrooms, but it will also help to pay off during testing time whether it is for summative or SOL type testing situations. These are just two tools that ALL our students can pull out of their toolbox and enable them to have the power and option to be successful!
Jennifer, the great thing is that we already activate schema, reread, locate verbs, work on stamina etc... in our everyday teaching through shared reading, read alouds, and small group instruction. In the past, my test taking instruction was limited to actual classroom tests like math, word study, science and social studies as well as Time for Kids. The trick now is to intertwine "test talk" in the everyday.
I agree with Jen about students needing to be prepared to take standardized tests, but overall students need to know how to read for all content areas and to be able to make sense of the world around them. The biggest thing students must be able to do is connect themselves to the things they read on these tests. How can we do that? The chapter says you can make it fun. Dialogue and inquiry are important tools to help make learning the art of taking tests fun. I think by incorporating authentic problems into lessons students be willing to participate without knowing they are actually "learning".
Chapter 2 I like the life examples used to help students understand the concepts being taught. I am excited to discover that several of the strategies described in this chapter are already being taught in our first grade classrooms. We focus on building stamina during independent reading. I would like to incorporate "note-taking" on strategies used during our read to self time and new information discovered while reading.
Chapter 1 gives a great introduction to what the book is about. I like how it does focus with a school in VA and 3rd grade, which is the grade I taught. Anyways, I like how they talk about a unit of study focusing on a specific skill with a genre. I did Literature circles at the end of year after SOL's. I think it would be good to use more throughout the year and even do two groups, I had four groups. In the literature circles students were applying all the skills they learned throughout the year but in a non threating way by just sharing and discussing the book. They had a final project where they had to create a book advertisement to have the other groups read the book for summer reading. Being the end of year I was so impressed with how well they worked together and were able to read for 30 to 40 minutes independently, so with that this might help build the stamina students need for the test.
I too am glad to be reading about problems facing VA schools. After reading Chapter 1, I agree with the authors that teaching test-taking is NOT a before the SOLs activity. It could/should be done during daily Reading Workshop. During this time, the teacher introduces and models application of the new skill. Gradually she/he releases responsibility until students are able to use the skill independently. The book explains that there are 3 types of lessons that start with a Target Question and indicate a skill that will make the test easier, building students' test-taking confidence. Sounds great!
Jennifer Heidary, Back to Chapter 1 (Sorry, but I have a question.) I liked the idea of having a parent panel to help teachers understand students' backgrounds. I am new to Liberty and wonder what the school population is like. Annadale Terrace had a school population representing 35 languages from 44 countries. How does this compare to Liberty?
Caroly I believe Annadale Terrace has more diversity than Liberty. We have a large population of Asian students that speak a variety of languages a Liberty, but I do not think we are as diverse as Annadale Terrace. This year our school will be one of the largest schools in Loudoun County and I do believe we will have even greater diversity and languages represented purely based on the fact that our numbers will have increased. In the past we have had a few parents speak about their culture and religion at a staff meeting. I agree the parent panel is a good idea and this might be something you would want to mention to Mr. Pack to see if he would be interested in setting up a panel of interested parents. The more knowledge we have about the students we teach the better we can meet their needs in the classroom.
Alright, so I finally cracked open the summer reading book! ;)
Anyway - I really enjoyed reading the background and getting to know Annandale Terrace school. I believe the authors of this book are very honest and up front about the reality behind standardized testing at the elementary level, especially with the NCLB in effect.
One comment really stuck with me as I read through this first chapter... "As a staff, we have realized several important points about our professional development. First, it is critical to stick with an instructional focus for more than a year. For the last five years, we have worked with the same language arts staff developer."
I think this is crucial for alignment between grade levels and completely agree with the statement that "students no longer need to reinvent themselves as readers and writers to meet different teachers' criteria."
I know Liberty is a large school and I feel as though we are on a path to something like this... but in my experience, it isn't there yet.
As a third grade teacher, my students walk into my classroom on the first day of school and are already anxious about the SOL's. As teachers, it is our job to create a learning environment so all of our students feel successful and confident in their learning. Having 27 children starting the year ALREADY defeated and worried about a test that happens in May is really hard for me. It breaks my heart.
If all teachers looked at what the SOL's are... because I don't see them leaving ANY time soon... then I think we'd be better prepared to guide our children to learning about the "test talk" and being able to decode the hyper-English that so often is found on the SOL's.
I am looking forward to reading on and finding new an inventive ways to teach these strategies during reading group.
I just want to say how much I agree with your comment about Chapter 1 and sticking with one thing as professional development. I connected with this school right away because of their drive to focus on the needs of their students. Everything they did had meaning and purpose and always came back to seeing where the holes were and what could be done to fill them. I look forward to Liberty moving in this direction and feel we are headed down the right path!!
Chapter 1 notes - Knowing how to translate test vocabulary to "test talk" would be beneficial for all involved. Reading Chapter 1 took me back to hearing my 6th grade teacher in the hallway talk about unfairness and bias in a test we had just taken. This was a private Catholic school in the Bronx where not everyone had the luxury of experiencing many things. I remember her vividly saying, "these kids don't know what a foal is! " My 7th grade year we moved to Virginia and I learned what a foal was :) My point is, the lack of command of the language or the limited vocabulary all plays in to how important it is to start early as someone posted above. In K-2, starting with the basic strategies like reading directions, underlining, rereading, looking for verbs, can fit in with what we already do. - JVD
I like that the authors of this book were from a neighboring school district and who face the same assessments we do. Their idea of helping to prepare students to translate the language of the tests is great! I like their method of teaching test-specific strategies and skills as units. From teaching third grade, I know this is something we do as teachers, but the structure they came up with that kids came to know like any other routine is key. Lynn Pickering
Like many of you, I too wasn't sure how I would feel about reading "Test Talk." I wasn't sure if it would relate to my first graders. I first connected with the book after learning that the authors are educators in Fairfax County.
The next connection that stands out in my mind was in Chapter 1 when the authors stated, "The good news was that our problem was not content related; our kids knew this stuff. There was more good news: we were very confident in our reading and writing workshops and the results they produced. The bad news was that our approach to teaching kids how to take a test different greatly form the rest of our thoughtful teaching."
This made me think of the thoughts I had when I gave my first grade students the first content area assessment of the year. Although I don't remember the exact details of the assessment I do remember that there were a few questions that seemed to puzzle the majority of the class. I knew that the students knew the material and when I verbally asked the test question in a different way they immediately responded with the correct answer. I realized then that it wasn't that they didn't know the material, they simply were not familiar with the format of the question. I remember thinking of different ways that I could incorporate test taking strategies into my daily teaching.
Because it was my first year teaching first grade after two years of teaching Preschool, I also remember thinking about the similarities and differences between the two. In Preschool, I was constantly "assessing" my Special Ed. students by observing and taking data. This was how I determined their growth towards IEP goals. In first grade I could also take anecdotal notes on the students' knowledge of content but I would also have to give a paper and pencil assessment. It was then that I realized how true it is to say that test taking is a life skill.
I just want to say how awesome I think it is that this can start in even the youngest grades. I think using the same vocabulary, even without scaring them about a big test, is planting a seed that will reap great rewards down the road. It also makes all of us, across grade levels, feel like we are on the same page and working together!! :) Great perspective Kels!
I have been reading for the past few weeks...but am finally checking in!
I admit, I was not even wanting to THINK about SOLs...not during the precious, relaxing summer! Just the word TEST evokes stress (I admit, Abby, the kids are stressed walking in the door, first day, but so am I!)
Coming from NJ, we shut down our curriculum the week before NJASK testing to TEST PREP. The kids were mentally drained, and it was painful to watch them practicing lengthy writing tasks, reading passages and Math packets. Like this chapter discussed...it was AWFUL.
The quote I liked best was p. 9 "practice is not preparation; skills must be taught in a concrete, meaningful way before they can be practiced." Duh! Giving kids a test prep packet means nothing, without the proper reading skills...and being taught to be smart readers.
Here are some of my thoughts after reading chapter 1.......I originally thought if we could just get rid of SOLS there would be a lot less stress when it comes to teaching, but as I was reading I realized that is definitely NOT the case. Our students do need to be prepared to take these types of standarized tests, so how do we balance providing purposeful instruction with the proper amount of test preparation without placing too much stress on ourselves as well as our students. This idea of "test talk" is a type of language that we may need to focus on through out our instruction. Liberty has solid instruction,but how do we weave this "test talk" in with our instruction almost as if it is seamless and part of the curriculum? What kind of plan can we create to help our students see the connection between reading and testing on a regular basis. I used to see these two items separtely, but as I continued to read the first chapter I see how it should be intertwined, not taught separately. Our Liberty students should first be effective readers before they can be effective test takers. They go hand in hand in my opinion, but before reading this I had never looked at it that way.
ReplyDeleteHi Jennifer, I have not started the book yet but will be starting this this week. I will be joining the liberty team at 3rd grade this year from Hillside. I totally believe your statement about liberty students and all students need to be effective readers before they can be effective test takers. I find this to be a hard skill especially at the 3rd grade level where this students have just really begun to read fluently and are not decoding anymore. We have to teach them now in 3rd grade to read effectively. Two big things to accomplish in such a short period of time.
DeleteHi Jenn
DeleteI started reading the book this week. I agree that children need to be strong readers, but they also need to be taught test taking strategies. From the prospective of a parent, I saw my child struggle with standardized tests, but once he learned to recognize what the question (clues) was asking he had better results. As a kindergarten teacher, it is so important to begin to build reading skills for a strong foundation. Even at this young age, we can help develop these testing skills by working on listening and following directions. What is my teacher asking me to do with this activity? I believe my main goal in kindergarten is to develop and build their reading skills, but I am interested in reading about the different techniques to develop these important skills.
Rhonda
Being new to LCPS I know I must have phrased some of my questions differently than the students' teachers as I found I had to often rephrase my questions. The students knew the answers, they did not recognize my terminology. Perhaps this was a good thing as they learned there is more than one way to ask the same question. I found the authors' discovery that test-talk is its own genre very interesting and do believe that students need to learn the art of taking a test by understanding the lingo. Focusing on "factoids" to prepare students for SOLs is only half the battle; they need to understand the question to provide the correct answer.
ReplyDelete"How do we help our students show what they know on standardized tests?"
ReplyDelete"First, the reading test was hard-not necessarily because of the content being tested, but because of the language and format the test writers used."
In the first chapter these two main ideas really grabbed my attention. Connecting vocabulary and test-taking strategies seem to give students the tools they need to be successful at taking tests. As we know testing formats can be tricky for some students. For example, last year I decided to use true/false and matching as formative assessments in each science unit. I was amazed to see how many students had trouble with these assessments. The most trouble came with true/false. My students had trouble with the reasoning of true and false and the absolutes. They had not had much experience in highlighting key words like: never, always, all, some, etc. I needed to go back and teach mini lessns on the strategy to take true/false tests and constantly model and review it. On the matching assessments the kids knew that if they got one wrong they immediately got two wrong because I started without any extra choices. I had to go back and teach mini lessons on reading all of the definitions first and then answer the match that you absolutely know is correct first, then so on. This was harder and we did a lot of out loud thinking and reasoning because students are so used to multiple choice or essay assessments. It was very interesting to test the same material using different formats. At first, strong test takers did well on both because they were strong test takers. "Guesser" test takers really had to be shown how to break the test down and practice these strategies regularly.
I also liked the example: "The master carpenter brings the same toolbox to every job and skillfully chooses the proper tools for individual tasks." This inspires me as a teacher to connect what the students knows to confidently having a plan to take a test.
"Test taking is a life skill." When I found out my assigned reading was a book on test taking I thought it might not apply to my first grade students. As I read the first chapter, I began to think about A to Z and DRA assessment questions. Linking reading strategy vocabulary to comprehension question vocabulary will help our students respond better to questions. This chapter also made me realize that helping students become comfortable with assessment vocabulary will help them prepare for adult life and their professional paths.
ReplyDeleteLora Davis
I was apprehensive about reading Test Talk, by title alone. Students have to be prepared to be skilled at test taking throughout their educational endeavors. Test taking is the only method that measures students and compares various educational backgrounds at a level playing fields. This chapter explains that assessment skills are easily incorporated into lessons and better prepare students for the skills they will need throughout their test taking years. While many are incorporated in lessons, it serves as a reminder as a teacher to continually reinforce these skills as we teach.
DeleteKaren Levine
Not only do we need to be aware of various educational backgrounds, we need to understand how cultural backgrounds impact our students' background knowledge as well. I remember my daughter coming home from a cognitive test in second grade and asked what a card with a clover was. I realized that we had used kid oriented playing cards but never the actual playing cards; as a result my daughter did not know how to answer a question. I was reminded last week of how important background knowledge was when my family saw Discpicable Me 2; it referenced Cinco-de-Mayo and I was hoping the students' who have (or will see)this movie remember the nonfiction book about the holiday as well as the picture book I read in order to make a connection. We can't assume that all children are exposed to the same things and must make an effort to help them make those connections. As a librarian, I try to incorporate as much K-5 curriculum as I can as it provides background knowledge as well as reinforces what the student's are learning to make it more relavent to them.
DeleteChapter 2-- I believe that children today are under a lot of stress. I even see it with my kinders. I agree with the statement "forget about it" and "move on". Helping children move through the tough questions on these tests as well as when they are engaged in learning new concepts in class, so that they will not become frustrated and give up. As teachers giving them plenty of options or strategies for success. Teaching them that learning should never stop through out your life.
DeleteRhonda
Chapter 2.....After reading Lora' comment I went back into this chapter and really looked at the strategies that would apply to ALL students no matter what grade.
ReplyDeleteI chose to focus on Rereading Saves the Day and building stamina. I focused on the rereading strategy because the authors stated it was the most important useful to readers of ALL ages. Rereading is not just when you are reading, but this can also be practiced in writing and of course for test taking. The idea that teachers need to teach this but also expect this to happen and make sure it is practiced consistently is important. This strategy is the most important one they will use when taking a test.
The second strategy stamina ties back to the importance of having independent reading and the fact that we need to be doing this every day consistently from kindergarten on up. Building stamina takes time and modeling those high expectations will create a community of readers in our classrooms, but it will also help to pay off during testing time whether it is for summative or SOL type testing situations.
These are just two tools that ALL our students can pull out of their toolbox and enable them to have the power and option to be successful!
Jennifer, the great thing is that we already activate schema, reread, locate verbs, work on stamina etc... in our everyday teaching through shared reading, read alouds, and small group instruction. In the past, my test taking instruction was limited to actual classroom tests like math, word study, science and social studies as well as Time for Kids. The trick now is to intertwine "test talk" in the everyday.
DeleteI agree with Jen about students needing to be prepared to take standardized tests, but overall students need to know how to read for all content areas and to be able to make sense of the world around them. The biggest thing students must be able to do is connect themselves to the things they read on these tests. How can we do that? The chapter says you can make it fun. Dialogue and inquiry are important tools to help make learning the art of taking tests fun. I think by incorporating authentic problems into lessons students be willing to participate without knowing they are actually "learning".
ReplyDeleteChapter 2
ReplyDeleteI like the life examples used to help students understand the concepts being taught. I am excited to discover that several of the strategies described in this chapter are already being taught in our first grade classrooms. We focus on building stamina during independent reading. I would like to incorporate "note-taking" on strategies used during our read to self time and new information discovered while reading.
Chapter 1
ReplyDeleteChapter 1 gives a great introduction to what the book is about. I like how it does focus with a school in VA and 3rd grade, which is the grade I taught. Anyways, I like how they talk about a unit of study focusing on a specific skill with a genre. I did Literature circles at the end of year after SOL's. I think it would be good to use more throughout the year and even do two groups, I had four groups. In the literature circles students were applying all the skills they learned throughout the year but in a non threating way by just sharing and discussing the book. They had a final project where they had to create a book advertisement to have the other groups read the book for summer reading. Being the end of year I was so impressed with how well they worked together and were able to read for 30 to 40 minutes independently, so with that this might help build the stamina students need for the test.
I too am glad to be reading about problems facing VA schools. After reading Chapter 1, I agree with the authors that teaching test-taking is NOT a before the SOLs activity. It could/should be done during daily Reading Workshop. During this time, the teacher introduces and models application of the new skill. Gradually she/he releases responsibility until students are able to use the skill independently. The book explains that there are 3 types of lessons that start with a Target Question and indicate a skill that will make the test easier, building students' test-taking confidence. Sounds great!
DeleteJennifer Heidary,
ReplyDeleteBack to Chapter 1 (Sorry, but I have a question.)
I liked the idea of having a parent panel to help teachers understand students' backgrounds. I am new to Liberty and wonder what the school population is like. Annadale Terrace had a school population representing 35 languages from 44 countries. How does this compare to Liberty?
Caroly
DeleteI believe Annadale Terrace has more diversity than Liberty. We have a large population of Asian students that speak a variety of languages a Liberty, but I do not think we are as diverse as Annadale Terrace. This year our school will be one of the largest schools in Loudoun County and I do believe we will have even greater diversity and languages represented purely based on the fact that our numbers will have increased. In the past we have had a few parents speak about their culture and religion at a staff meeting. I agree the parent panel is a good idea and this might be something you would want to mention to Mr. Pack to see if he would be interested in setting up a panel of interested parents. The more knowledge we have about the students we teach the better we can meet their needs in the classroom.
Chapter 1: Beyond Hope and Honeybuns
ReplyDeleteAlright, so I finally cracked open the summer reading book! ;)
Anyway - I really enjoyed reading the background and getting to know Annandale Terrace school. I believe the authors of this book are very honest and up front about the reality behind standardized testing at the elementary level, especially with the NCLB in effect.
One comment really stuck with me as I read through this first chapter... "As a staff, we have realized several important points about our professional development. First, it is critical to stick with an instructional focus for more than a year. For the last five years, we have worked with the same language arts staff developer."
I think this is crucial for alignment between grade levels and completely agree with the statement that "students no longer need to reinvent themselves as readers and writers to meet different teachers' criteria."
I know Liberty is a large school and I feel as though we are on a path to something like this... but in my experience, it isn't there yet.
As a third grade teacher, my students walk into my classroom on the first day of school and are already anxious about the SOL's. As teachers, it is our job to create a learning environment so all of our students feel successful and confident in their learning. Having 27 children starting the year ALREADY defeated and worried about a test that happens in May is really hard for me. It breaks my heart.
If all teachers looked at what the SOL's are... because I don't see them leaving ANY time soon... then I think we'd be better prepared to guide our children to learning about the "test talk" and being able to decode the hyper-English that so often is found on the SOL's.
I am looking forward to reading on and finding new an inventive ways to teach these strategies during reading group.
I just want to say how much I agree with your comment about Chapter 1 and sticking with one thing as professional development. I connected with this school right away because of their drive to focus on the needs of their students. Everything they did had meaning and purpose and always came back to seeing where the holes were and what could be done to fill them. I look forward to Liberty moving in this direction and feel we are headed down the right path!!
DeleteChapter 1 notes - Knowing how to translate test vocabulary to "test talk" would be beneficial for all involved. Reading Chapter 1 took me back to hearing my 6th grade teacher in the hallway talk about unfairness and bias in a test we had just taken. This was a private Catholic school in the Bronx where not everyone had the luxury of experiencing many things. I remember her vividly saying, "these kids don't know what a foal is! " My 7th grade year we moved to Virginia and I learned what a foal was :) My point is, the lack of command of the language or the limited vocabulary all plays in to how important it is to start early as someone posted above. In K-2, starting with the basic strategies like reading directions, underlining, rereading, looking for verbs, can fit in with what we already do. - JVD
ReplyDeleteI like that the authors of this book were from a neighboring school district and who face the same assessments we do. Their idea of helping to prepare students to translate the language of the tests is great! I like their method of teaching test-specific strategies and skills as units. From teaching third grade, I know this is something we do as teachers, but the structure they came up with that kids came to know like any other routine is key.
ReplyDeleteLynn Pickering
Like many of you, I too wasn't sure how I would feel about reading "Test Talk." I wasn't sure if it would relate to my first graders. I first connected with the book after learning that the authors are educators in Fairfax County.
ReplyDeleteThe next connection that stands out in my mind was in Chapter 1 when the authors stated, "The good news was that our problem was not content related; our kids knew this stuff. There was more good news: we were very confident in our reading and writing workshops and the results they produced. The bad news was that our approach to teaching kids how to take a test different greatly form the rest of our thoughtful teaching."
This made me think of the thoughts I had when I gave my first grade students the first content area assessment of the year. Although I don't remember the exact details of the assessment I do remember that there were a few questions that seemed to puzzle the majority of the class. I knew that the students knew the material and when I verbally asked the test question in a different way they immediately responded with the correct answer. I realized then that it wasn't that they didn't know the material, they simply were not familiar with the format of the question. I remember thinking of different ways that I could incorporate test taking strategies into my daily teaching.
Because it was my first year teaching first grade after two years of teaching Preschool, I also remember thinking about the similarities and differences between the two. In Preschool, I was constantly "assessing" my Special Ed. students by observing and taking data. This was how I determined their growth towards IEP goals. In first grade I could also take anecdotal notes on the students' knowledge of content but I would also have to give a paper and pencil assessment. It was then that I realized how true it is to say that test taking is a life skill.
I just want to say how awesome I think it is that this can start in even the youngest grades. I think using the same vocabulary, even without scaring them about a big test, is planting a seed that will reap great rewards down the road. It also makes all of us, across grade levels, feel like we are on the same page and working together!! :) Great perspective Kels!
DeleteHello!
ReplyDeleteI have been reading for the past few weeks...but am finally checking in!
I admit, I was not even wanting to THINK about SOLs...not during the precious, relaxing summer! Just the word TEST evokes stress (I admit, Abby, the kids are stressed walking in the door, first day, but so am I!)
Coming from NJ, we shut down our curriculum the week before NJASK testing to TEST PREP. The kids were mentally drained, and it was painful to watch them practicing lengthy writing tasks, reading passages and Math packets. Like this chapter discussed...it was AWFUL.
The quote I liked best was p. 9 "practice is not preparation; skills must be taught in a concrete, meaningful way before they can be practiced." Duh! Giving kids a test prep packet means nothing, without the proper reading skills...and being taught to be smart readers.
I really like where this book is going!