Test Taking Strategies and Student Achievement

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Test Taking Strategies and Student Achievement

• Kris R. Sweetnam
• Churchill Elementary School
• Cloquet, Minnesota

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Standardized Achievement Tests

• Hold Schools Accountable
• High Stakes
• Clash with Performance Based Learning
• Track Students

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Taylor Walton, 1997, p. 67

• When test scores become the most important
  factor determining who gets included in and
  excluded from educational opportunities, scores
  that accurately reflect students knowledge and
  skills become imperative.

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My Literature Review Questions

• How could I get my low test achievers to perform
  their best on standardized tests?
• What factors were contributing to poor
  performance at test time?
• What test taking strategies could I teach all my
  students?

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High Test Anxiety

• Causes
• High achieving students with high test anxiety
• Ways to cope with test anxiety

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Three ways to overcome test anxiety

• 1. Teach students test strategies
• 2. Use cooperative groups at learning and
  practice time
• 3. Teachers create positive environment

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Test Preparation

• Ethics in Test Preparation
• Test Preparation
• Test Taking Strategies
• All Students Benefit

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Test Taking Strategies

• How to understand test directions and test format
• How to deal with unnecessary information
• Comprehension strategies for reading
• Multiple choice questions
• Budget time wisely
• Educated guesses
• Check the test

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All Students Benefit

• Test strategies benefit all students but
  especially
• 20 who are high test anxious
• Helps low achieving students from low
  socio-economic backgrounds
• Minorities
• ESL students
• Learning disabled students

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Student Reflection

• After each test students reflected on their
  results on the back of their tests
• Completed feedback survey after each test 14
  questions
• Student 1 I think I could do better by reading
  better and not hurrying. I was nervous when I
  took this test. I am always, well sometimes
  nervous when I take tests. I also dont like
  taking them.

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Interventions

• Anxiety
• Strategies Unit
• P.I.R.A.T.E.S.
• Actual ITBS Week

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Anxiety

• Relaxation techniques deep breathing and tensing
  and relaxing muscles
• Peaceful place
• Stress balls
• Visualization
• Mozart music
• Positive affirmation

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Strategies Unit

• Weekly test strategy lesson
• Test taking strategy journal
• Learning partners, small groups, whole class
• Practiced on each classroom test

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P.I.R.A.T.E.S.

• P. Prepare to succeed (P.A.S.S.)
• I. Inspect the instructions (R.U.N.)
• R. Read, remember, reduce
• A. Answer or abandon
• T. Turn back
• E. Estimate or guess (A.C.E.)
• S. Survey or look back

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Actual ITBS Week

• Designed thinkers caps
• Created PIRATES posters for hall
• Read Dr. Seuss Hooray for Diffendoofer Day
• Ate brunch every day before testing
• Test folder
• Celebration cake at end of week This was a
  piece of cake

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ITBS Test Results
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ITBS Read All 4th Grade/My 4th Grade
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ITBS Math all 4th grade/my 4th grade
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My Class ITBS Results as Compared to their Third
Grade ITBS Results
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ITBS Reading 3rd Grade/4th Grade
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ITBS Math 3rd Grade/ 4th Grade
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My Subgroups

• Significant gains in ITBS scores for no label
  group, Title One, GT and ADHD subgroups
• No significant change in scores for Native,
  Counseled, and Special Ed student subgroups

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Whole Class Pre and Post Test Strategies

• Next slide shows student response to survey test
  strategy question
• Of interest to note, student 3 has the most
  strategies listed on her survey

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• Improving test taking skills and knowledge of
  students is one of the quickest ways to improve
  test scores, (Weller Weller, 1998).