They have special courses to train kids to take the SAT, and teachers spend a lot of time this time of year priming kids to do well on those horrible grammar school achievement tests (we have the ESPAs coming up in NJ next week). But does anybody pay much attention to training kids to do well on those boring day to day tests, the multiple choices and the fill-in-the-blanks and the short essay questions, the exams that torment them on a daily and weekly basis rather than yearly? I guess those are supposed to be self-explanatory. But I have a daughter for whom nothing is self-explanatory. And she could use some advice.

 

I guess that's not a normal thing to ask for, because nobody quite knows what I'm talking about when I ask about teaching test-taking skills. Early in the year I wondered if her aide couldn't advise her to, say, do all the easy test questions first, or cross off the multiple choices that were obviously wrong -- as opposed to just straight-out giving her the answers. This request sent everybody into a tizzy, because the aide just wasn't trained for that. Nobody, it seems, is trained for that, least of all the kiddies. So I went out and got me a book called, well, "Teaching Test-Taking Skills." And if it seems to make sense, I'll give it to the tutor I have lined up for the summer. And then maybe we can give my daughter the know-how to show what she knows -- and guess better about the things she doesn't.