From Grade 7 Dean Liz Traub
At the Dwight-Englewood School there are many ways in which we assess students’ academic skills. Teachers are constantly assessing children in order to understand them better and to be able to adjust instruction to deepen the students’ learning experiences. We also administer one standardized test in the Middle School: the Comprehensive Testing Program 5 (CTP 5). Standardized tests provide a snapshot of your child, but only reflect your child’s performance on that day. This information allows us to look for patterns both within the cohort and for an individual student. We are also provided with normative data that allows us to compare our students with peers nationwide. Beginning on Tuesday, April 2nd, our seventh grade students will participate in two days of testing during the morning hours. The CTP 5 focuses on reading, vocabulary, and mathematical achievement, as well as verbal and quantitative reasoning. We make every effort to make the testing experience positive and refrain from putting pressure on students to perform well. Julie Luchs will provide students with some strategies for taking the test so that the format is familiar to them and they have a few strategies to approach different types of questions.
Students will be given the following advice:
- Don’t omit.
- Find the BEST answer:
- Read all choices before selecting
- Use process of elimination
- Don’t think too hard outside of the box
- Pace yourself!
- On Quantitative Reasoning, try more than one number to test your theory/answer.
- Pay attention to questions that have “NOT,” “OPPOSITE,” or “EXCEPT” in the directions.
The best ways you can help your child prepare for the CTP 5 are to encourage your child to get a good night’s sleep, to eat breakfast in the morning and to drink water. Fatigue has proven to lower students’ test performance and an empty stomach can interfere with concentration. Also, it is imperative that students arrive to school on time so that they can start the testing. Students should arrive at school each day with two number-2 pencils, a water bottle and a book to read in the event they finish a section early. No iPads will be allowed in the testing rooms. No calculators are necessary for any portion of the testing. The results arrive over the summer and will be mailed to families in the fall. If you have questions after you receive the results, feel free to phone your child’s dean. If you have questions about the testing process feel free to reach out to either Elizabeth Traub, the 7th Grade Dean, Julie Luchs, the Middle School Learning Specialist or me.