Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Practice STAR?

Has anyone ever heard of kids taking a practice STAR test (we're in California) for information on math ability or readiness? My kindy daughter told me about doing this (on a day she was getting sick, great). I'm finally meeting with the teacher to talk about it, mostly because dd is still asking for more more "new" math. I'm hoping dd did well enough to show them that despite differentiating she needs much more, for the final month of class and next year.

I haven't gone back to your previous posts to see where you are at in getting your child's needs accommodated by the school, but if she is in Kinder and they are giving her STAR practice tests they might be optimistic she will do well: STAR testing starts in 2nd grade this very week, so this is a +2 years out-of-level test for her.

You can find the released questions here:
http://starsamplequestions.org/starRTQ/search.jsp

Of course there is not way to grade the results...

STAR doesn't start in CA until 2nd grade so I'm not sure what your K daughter was doing if she was doing them in class?

When my son was in school in 2nd and 3rd, they gave the released test questions as practice in class. If you look here- you can also see the answers- http://www.cde.ca.gov/Ta/tg/sr/css05rtq.asp

I wouldn't use this as a way to show a need for differentiating however. It does nothing to show if your daughter is above grade level- even if you use the ones that are above level STAR questions they will probably argue that this is "the middle of the pack" kind of work. I'd recommend something more like an ALEKS placement test, using the textbook placement test for your school, NWEA MAP testing or if you can afford it, individual achievement testing.

I say this because even with my son's perfect STAR score in 2nd grade, they said it only proved that he knew that material, not what he was ready to learn next.

The combo of tests used in CA with which you're familiar may or may not be what she's referring to. There is a different group of STAR assessments that are widely used, including one which the company describes as the "leading computer-based diagnostic assessment of early literacy skills developed for Pre-K–3 students."

If you think that may be what she took, you can find more info here: http://www.renlearn.com/training/search/default.aspx?q=STAR%20%22Parent's%20Guide%22

There is some sort of Star testing in FL that my kids take and they take Fair testing.

You are right, I assumed it was in relation to our standardized testing since she pointed out she was in CA. But something else would make more sense!

The STAR test in California starts in second grade. It is really, really basic and is not, IMHO, a good assessment of your child's ability. For end of the year second grade, it has things like a clock and they say what time it is (like 3:00). It's kind of a joke. If your kindergarten child does well on it, it doesn't mean they would be ready or do well for second grade.
The SCAT test for CTY at Johns Hopkins could be a better assessment for that, which also starts in second grade.

Thanks, all! I really had no idea what it might be, so hearing about different star tests helps. I did figure it was just a practice test they had access to as they got ready to start testing with the second graders, so hopefully it does show willingness to do out of level assessments, even if these questions turn out to be easy ones. I'm meeting with the teacher briefly tomorrow to hear about it, and hopefully start a plan for challenging DD a bit for the end of school and into 1st grade. They've been very open, but without out of level I figure they can't really see what we see her doing at home. Hopefully it will at least be a good catalyst for conversation... DD is asking for more so I have to psych up to advocate for get again!

It was the CST practice test for 2nd graders. They had two kindy kids take it, and all of the first graders (charter school with one class per grade, they work very closely together). I guess just for any data they could get. Our teacher admitted it's only useful so far, but testing practice is not a bad thing, especially as DD finds that kind of thing fun. I'm a little confused about how it was scored--it's normed to second graders, obviously, but she said something about only using K standards? Or something. Anyway it was nice to see the teacher point out one thing DD can definitely do that the test missed her on. We also had a good chat about how she wants DD to work on showing her work and explaining it in multiple ways--she showed me work that's just a mess from during class but said verbally DD can just figure it out mentally or on fingers--and we got to a good point, I think, where we agreed DD can only do this if its actually tricky enough to engage her instead of something she already knows automatically. So I'm going to work with dd on more clearly showing her thinking and explain that's going to be her ticket to more multiplication and working with bigger numbers Like she's been asking for. I imagine a bit of explicit instruction in this should quickly sort things--they're so into exploring ways to find the answer, which is great, but DD then needs to hear that they are still looking to be able to look at your work and understand-- and we'll keep doing the crazy advanced stuff she loves, too. Just a month left of school so really it's up to me to feed the beast but now I know what the first grade teacher will be looking for, so DD can show at the August assessment what she really needs instruction on.