My sweet Chicky, who is two semesters away from graduating with a degree in Elementary Ed, had to take a big test today.
It was her final state test…the subject area test for elementary school.
If you want to teach, you have to take three tests: the General Knowledge test, the Professional Ed test, and the subject area test for the subject you want to teach.
I have taken (and passed) two subject area tests – English 6-12 and Social Sciences 6-12.
The English was easy. The Social Sciences test was the hardest test I’ve ever taken in my life.
You can imagine what it must be like to take a test that covers everything you’d have to know to teach children in grades Kindergarten through fifth grade.
Poor Chicky was nervous. She had to pass this test before she could register for her Spring internship. She’s taking six classes this semester in addition to fitting in at least 60 observation hours. She’s also got Spring training for soccer.
There’s no pressure whatsoever…said tongue-in-cheek.
She only had a week and a half’s notice about having to take this test before registering for the internship, so she had to cram, let me tell you.
Poor girl.
She was worried.
The test is about $200, and if she didn’t pass, she’d have to wait thirty days to take it again.
My friends, Barb and Lisa, whom I sat at a basketball game with last night, helped me reassure her, via text messages, that she would do fine…that the test wasn’t that difficult.
Still, Chicky stressed.
I understood.
I cried for DAYS before I took my General Knowledge test…all because of the math section. I even cried between sections of the test when I took a potty break.
I was a mess.
I texted Chicky first thing this morning. She had an 8am appointment.
I was eager to find out the results.
She finally texted me back.
My sweet girl had PASSED!!
I called her, and she told me that the test had asked some of the most random questions she could have expected. There was stuff on that test that she either had not learned since elementary school or had never learned at all.
As teachers, we do have to have some sort of foundation of knowledge but, in all honesty, we study our material before we teach it. It’s impossible to be completely sure about every detail of the curriculum. We have so much to cover in a year that one person, unless you have a the brain of a genius, cannot retain everything. Plus, teachers change up the material sometimes, according to student interest.
Anyhoo, the most important thing is that Chicky passed and can focus on her studies and soccer.
Filed under: children | Tagged: children, education, teaching | 2 Comments »
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