Originally Posted by Dude
The head-scratcher: DD explained why she was rushing... her public school teachers were always telling the kids to hurry through tests. Whoever finished quickly would get 15 minutes of extra recess.

I scratch my head over that one, too. DD9 will be taking the state writing test this year, and while she has excellent mechanics, she's slow slow slow at figuring out what she wants to write and organizing her thoughts. She's also not particularly fast at the physical writing process.

The test is has no time limit - if you want to write for 4 hours straight, the testing instructions say that the school has to give you a quiet place to work and let you use every minute you want. DD reports that her teacher has said that she expects everyone to be finished in 30 minutes - 45 at the outside, and that once you turned your paper in, you get free reading time. That would be the day DD's practice essay consisted of half a sentence, which was all she could manage to write under time pressure.