Passing Standardized Tests

Seventeen years ago I started an educational consulting company that was focused on computer hardware, software, programming and statistical work. At the same time as a very minor sideline I started my first preparation class for the NTE in South Carolina. Over the years the test preparation aspect of the company has eclipsed all the others. In providing this service I have learned a great deal about the people who have trouble with standardized tests as well as the tests themselves. Much that I have learned was unexpected.

Over the years I have taken a number of standardized tests and seem to have done quite well. In fact, if there was a tendency, it was to "overachieve" on these instruments. I just took the process for granted and thought there really wasn't much to them.

For many persons standardized exams are a very real roadblock standing in the way of their success. There are many professions that require some form of standardized instrument and of course most colleges require either the SAT or ACT as part of the admissions procedure. Scholarships are often partially or wholly based on test performance.

My experience is that if a poor test taker goes through a good workshop he or she can substantially improve performance.

A number of my students have even been able to improve their performance so much that they have considerable difficulty getting the high scores recognized. Quite a number of my NTE students have had to take extensive measures to get the scores released after an increase of between 100 and 300 points. I get a couple of students every year who fall in this category. They simply improve so much that the prediction equation in the computerized grading program "kicks-out" the results as possibly guestionable.

Let me discuss some of the factors that have been relevant to the thousands of students I have prepared.

Many students fail to realize the very significant negative effects their general health and condition will have on test performance. No one can perform well at anything who does not get regular, adequate sleep. Too many people KNOW they need this but simply don't take the trouble to change behavior. I remember a student in one of my classes who expected he could perform well every day when he seldom went to bed before 2 AM and got up at 6:30. His score improved when he rid himself of this simple bad habit and reorganized his life to get to bed earlier. I am NOT talking about just getting sleep the night before the test, but changing behavior so that a new pattern is set. Even more important than sleep is nutrition. You would be amazed the number of people who try to function on the strangest combination of skipped meals, snacks and rotten nutrition. Virtually everyone now KNOWS what good nutrition entails yet half or more of my students have the poorest nutritional habits. Women tend to be worse about nutrition than men. So many of them seem to combine diets and cutting calories with poor nutrition. I want my students to have three adequate meals every day. I also like them to supplement with a good multi-vitamin as insurance.

Several times I have had students turn around poor physical condition with adequate nutrition and sleep. I remember a student in South Carolina who was able to give up an extensive regimen of medicines when her symptoms of early arthritis cleared up completely with a concentrated effort to regularize nutrition and rest. Of course, the change benefited her scores also.

Lack of adequate exercise can have a detrimental effect on a person's health and test performance. This is especially evident when a person enters into a demanding educational program. I know when this happens to me my body actually cries out for more exercise.

Many people try to take exams without having their vision in top shape. People who have not had a vision exam for years and who are experiencing a degree of vision loss really need an exam to prepare adequately for a standardized test.

Do you remember back to that hypothetical call at the beginning of the article and how that person mentioned anxiety? This factor decreases the performance of many, many adult test takers. In my classes I try to do two things with regard to anxiety. First, I want a person to understand exactly how anxiety changes performance. Many don't understand that EITHER high or low anxiety will result in poor scores. Second, I want to give them the tools to consciously modify their own anxiety. For most people this means the ability to lower anxiety significantly. The first person who asked me to do an NTE workshop was severely hampered from passing because of extreme anxiety that evidenced itself in migraine headaches. She had taken the test regularly for ten years without success. When she learned how to consciously reduce anxiety, she passed.

Over the years I have found the most effective way to increase test performance is to increase reading speed and comprehension. When I started in test preparation I wasn't prepared for this factor to be as important as it has proven to be. Therefore a regular feature of my preparation is an elaborate diagnostic reading test followed by specific recommendations for each student. It also seems important to convince each and every person that he or she can improve and to provide the means to do so. I like my students to read between 250 and 300 words per minute with good comprehension before the test. It takes weeks of work but most can make really remarkable strides and reach their goals. Occasionally I have someone who needs more than remediation and in those cases I tend not to be successful. I remember an instance where the participant really couldn't read at all. Every answer was just a guess. Even though she had completed college and taught for years I was unable to increase her reading to an adequate level.

Many people need assistance in focusing on those strategies that are most productive while taking a test. For example, there are several ways that test-makers deal with guessing. The test-taker needs to know what method is employed on a particular test because this information can change how one deals with omits and guessing. At present I advise my NTE students NOT to omit any question because there is no penalty for guessing. Other students need to be encouraged to stick with a first choice. Some people just can't seem to help changing answers. For most people, changing answers in the long run does NOT increase a score. Another strategy that pays dividends is for the test takers to be aware of time passing and pace themselves so that time does not run out before a section is completed. Many poor test takers "get caught" by the clock again and again during a test. Each time items are omitted or randomly answered a person scores fewer points than he or she really deserves.

Another skill I emphasize is the ability to "look inside" a test question to see its structure. There are only a few item formats and understanding them can increase a score. Recently one of my students increased scores by 40% by learning and applying the test item formats. For example, relatively few people REALLY know what "except" means. The way I explain it is that on a question of this type you get credit for the "wrong" answer. In fact it is exactly the opposite of a normally formatted item.

Most people come to me with one fundamental misconception. They believe that passing a standardized test is merely a matter of knowing the information referenced by each item. My experience is that this is much less true than I ever expected. Surely a person has to know the vocabulary involved but UNDERSTANDING is more important than specific items of knowledge. Often students who have successfully completed college with great GPAs find tests like the NTE a great problem if they have made it a practice to know material instead of understanding it. Of course, very often knowing is all that is expected of them for courses.

A test like the NTE requires persons to demonstrate that they are current in a particular area. Right now the definition of current is about 18 months. Thus students must be familiar with material up to about 18 months before the date of the test. In my experience recent college graduates are not necessarily current in their fields and usually benefit from some concentrated work to become more current..

Sometimes a person's course work and experience does not correspond very well with the specific test content areas. Several months ago a student called me who was having trouble with the social studies specialty area of the NTE. Before long I discovered her undergraduate major was psychology. The problem is that the psychology portion of the social studies is relatively minor while other areas where she was weak like history were major. Before she could be successful on this test she had to conscientiously remediate those areas of systematic weakness like history and economics.

Test makers like to format questions using visuals such as tables and graphs to measure a student's understanding. All too many students have a significant weakness in this area and feel so insecure that they will omit any question that involves a table or graph. The solution is to convince students that these are often the easiest questions on a test but only if you know how to go about efficiently decoding the information to answer the questions. The basic assumption that I operate from is that students can improve performance by systematically working on underlying skills. Each student has a unique mix of strengths and weaknesses but that by careful attention most can achieve success. Probably the most rewarding example of this success is a student of mine who had taken the NTE fifty (50) times before coming to my class. We worked hard together and eight weeks later she was finally able to pass. Twelve years of struggling had reached a successful conclusion.