S.A.T. APRIL 26-31,2010.
Dear Parents,
Please find attached information regarding the S.A.T.s.
What are they? - The Standardized Achievement Tests are designed to assess the child’s knowledge in each area of the curriculum. For First Grade this means reading comprehension and listening skills, spelling and phonics and math skills.
How - The tests will take place in the classroom. A few tests will be completed each morning over the 5 days we have to administer them. We aim to begin the tests promptly after school starts at 8:30am. This will last approximately one hour and a half, with breaks at intervals. We will then have a long snack and recess.
Dates -The S.A.Ts will be held from April 26th – April 30th.
Extra! In preparation for our upcoming S.A.T’s, please try to find any opportunity to revise the S.A.T. practice papers that were sent home. Please practice money and time with your child also. Perhaps they can play shopping by buying their own toys from you. A toy could cost 27c, 34c and 23c etc. They could tell you the time on the hour and half hour. Any practice in these areas will be helpful as money and time are difficult concepts to grasp and should be reinforced.
What do you need to know?
Perhaps the most important thing to remember is that these tests do not provide an absolute measure of your child’s understanding but are merely a statistical snapshot of your child’s performance on a particular day. There are many other ways to assess your child’s learning in the classroom and this combined with test scores should give you an overall picture.
In class we encouraged the children to try their very best on these tests, but to take away any stress and upset we have practiced the test format and skills as much as possible to give the children confidence in the area of test taking. We also impressed upon the children that there will questions they will not able to answer and this is expected. The tests have to cover huge spectrum and occasionally there will be some more difficult questions. We explained to them that we will be as prepared as we can by completing class work and by doing daily practice tests until the actual test commences April 26.
Please take time to read the attached information and discuss these with your child. We would be happy to discuss any concerns or questions you have, so please feel free to come in and talk with us.
Thank you for your support!
Kind regards,
Asynthia Lewis &
Tessa Suckoo
