Hello to all of my 8th Grade Science Families!
As I stated earlier I would be sending some more information about how we will prepare for TAKS and that is the main purpose of this email.
Before I get into that now would be a good time to remind all students that we are now past progress reports. Students will be bringing home progress reports as early as Wednesday this week. Many students have very low scores due to nothing more than zeros or a single low graded assignment. That is easy to take care of – just get it done and turn it in. Or re-do the work or finish what was missing. Panther Prep is also an option.
Our TAKS test for Science will be April 28th, 2011. Yesterday and today the students are finishing up looking at their DBA #3. They are looking at every question to see what topics they are good at and which topics they are weak at. This is extremely important as we will use those topics and objectives all the way up to our TAKS test.
There is a place for the students to do some goal setting to get ready for the TAKS test. On this same page of the worksheet is a place for the student to sign and for a parent to sign. The entire packet along with the signatures will be due WEDNESDAY 3/23/11 in class. The signature is just so that everyone at home can see what the STUDENT’S plan is to get ready for TAKS.
Goals that will not be accepted as things like:
“Pay attention in class”
“Try harder”
The reason why goals like that will not work is that we are done covering the material. The 3 years of science that is on the test has already gone by. Students who abused or neglected that time will need another strategy to prepare.
Our plan as TMS science teachers is this. The rest of the week after today, we will go over the very basics or rounding numbers, measuring, and things that students can look for on the TAKS test. The remaining weeks after that will be spent going over a few of the topics/ objectives that as a school we were weakest on. Then the last week or so before our test we will do a general review/ blitz of as much material as we can so that the information is fresh in their minds before they test over them.
There will be some fun moments of competitions. There will also be some moments of home work. The homework we give will be some of the most important practice problems that we can locate. It is not our goal for this to be a punishment. It is our goal to get as much practice as we can in during the short time that we have. The home work, when given, will most definitely be for a grade.
Students who take advantage of their time through April are set for a great TAKS test!
Students who have continually had low scores on their DBA’s (60% is passing on a DBA) will really need to reach deep within themselves and try to find a drive or a reason to step it up at the end. For any student who is low on confidence or has low scores I strongly recommend going to TEA’s website and looking at as many of the old Science TAKS test as you can from previous years.
http://www.tea.state.tx.us/index3.aspx?id=3839&menu_id=793
Some students have asked why we don’t go over these old tests in class. To that I will say that many of our warm up questions in the future are a few of those old test questions but we simply do not have time in class to do everything. Some students will need to do more work outside of class than others to set themselves up for success.
That is our plan. I wish all of my students the best of luck as we prepare for and get through the TAKS season of April!
If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to email me.
-Mr. Sampson