Testing fun... and rigor

It’s testing time again. 

My Indiana Writing Project colleagues and I have been holding workshops for teachers who are giving ISTEP, Indiana’s current version of high stakes testing.  My area of expertise is the English 10 End-of Course assessment or ECA because I taught sophomores for 16 years and through several incarnations of the graduation exam.  I'm proud to say we had some great success together.

Not much has changed in terms of how to prepare students over the years, even though the stakes and the content has evolved:  It really begins on the first day of class, when teachers build students’ confidence and create high expectations for their learning.

But in the short haul, in these days before the test, sometimes even the best teachers are tempted to cram one more fact or approach in hopes that students will score just a little higher.  It can get out of hand and burn out kids before they even see the test, despite teachers’ good intentions.

To maintain everyone’s equilibrium in the noxious atmosphere of education these days, I encourage you to balance fun and rigor.  Play a game for a few minutes during class.  Construct a healthy competition between teams of students as you review.  Encourage students to write questions for each other using satire from The Onion or some nonsense poetry.  Get students up moving as they bowl for literary terms or answer conventions questions.

And start planning now to set the tone for testing day.  Last year at my school, we created a PowerPoint presentation for students to view as they enjoyed their protein breakfast funded by local businesses.  The content was the generic test-taking tips that we hoped all students would remember to use when they opened the test booklet or turned on the computer.  But to up the engagement, we created some buzz beforehand. 
 

We elaborately staged photos of the student-testers themselves a week or so before the test and were sure that no one saw it before test day.  One student had climbed on a desk to point to the clock for the reminder about budgeting time in his photo shoot.  Another looked as if he were shivering on the slide with a reminder about wearing layers.  By featuring the students themselves, we were assured an attention factor of almost 100% on test morning.

So, insert a little fun in your test prep.  You'll see the payoff in more engaged students.

Find some of my fun and rigorous test prep materials at
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Second-Classroom-On-The-Left/Order:Most-Recently-Posted