Computerized testing in the land of digital natives

Before we left on our long spring break vacation, we had the opportunity to give Smarter Balanced assessments at our school. It was an interesting process watching how the kids and adults deal with the testing, the technology and the testing environment. Being a homeschool charter, it's also an extra challenge to communicate with families that there are mandatory requirements and no opportunity to change the schedule. This is a difficult message for homeschoolers, as 99% of the time we live and breathe by the schedule of our children, not the school. When testing and school requirements sneak up, we have to flip flop everything around and make sure we are present. This is not an easy feat with kids that are used to doing math in their PJs!

Particularly fascinating to me was the huge range of technical skills our kids had going into the test. We were testing 3rd through 8th graders, so each of these kids was born post-iPod. Many of them sat down at their brand new Chromebook and began touching the monitor, trying to get the non-existent touch screen to work. Chromebooks are small and look more like a tablet with a docked keyboard, than a laptop. It was easy to see why they were puzzled!

We saw others frustrated by the lack of a right click on their mice in the Mac computer lab and just a few who were unsure how to use a Mac at all. We had other kids challenged by the use of the trackpad. Overall, the testing went smoothly and we had very few technical issues that couldn't be overcome by a few short clicks or a reboot. It was a successful test of our system, by all accounts.

However, what I noticed more than the success was the underlying annoyance of the students, particularly our 5th graders and up. They found the test to be cumbersome, poorly formatted and generally not user-friendly. They didn't like multiple scrolling windows on one screen with some funky options for highlighting and dropping and dragging. They wanted a searchable help menu or a wiki for commands, not some ridiculously long screen to read. They rolled their eyes, groaned and growled at the test frequently- and this had nothing to do with the content.

In the land of digital natives, students want multiple ways to give input to a computer and expect the tool to adapt to their needs, not the other way around. If they need to drag and drop something, they don't want to do it with a trackpad- they want to reach up and use their fingers. They expect a computer to respond quickly and accurately and are frustrated by slow websites. The older kids, particularly our 7th and 8th graders, expect a fully adaptive test where they don't have to prove repeatedly that they understand a concept. They want to prove it and move on and feel insulted when the test asks them, yet again, to do the same type of problem.

Most of all, I felt like the SBAC test designers forgot to reach out to the kids. In the land of digital natives, you should have children on your beta and QA teams. Let THEM tell you what's broken, what's not user-friendly and what you're expecting to happen in comparison to what actually does. It's time for the generation before me, the ones still running the world, to accept that without the kids, you have no product. They're the digital natives, who grew up with more computing power in their pockets and backpacks than the generation of the Vietnam War could even imagine would be possible at age 10.

Next time, give the kids half the test questions and spend the other half of the time letting them answer a survey about the test, running a focus group discussion or watching their actual behavior, not their scores. Or better yet, hire a group of 12 year olds to run your entire beta testing. I can promise you'd receive better results about not only the type of questions but the layout and setup of the test!

Contests and competitions- how to "show what you know"

Homeschoolers, particularly academic homeschoolers, are looking for ways to "show what you know" beyond the mom-required assignments. Several parents have asked me how we find authentic ways to demonstrate knowledge and growth without yet another essay, test or worksheet. For us, we use a lot of contests and competitions! My son loves a good contest and will participate in almost anything I can rustle up. My personal favorites are those that are simply contests against yourself- where you're not beating out anyone else, but just improving upon your previous results. The kid though, he likes prizes and will work for even the promise of a prize, certificate or award at the end!

Some of our favorites:

National Mythology Exam:  This will be our third year and as a mythology junky, the kid has a goal of earning every color medal for his wall. This year, he's hoping for silver to go with his previous gold and bronze. I'm working hard to discourage him from throwing a question just to get a silver!

Sikorsky Helicopter Challenge: Part engineering, part design and a whole lot of imagination required- this contest makes kids really think outside the box for a new idea that solves a problem

Doodle For Google: Answer the question in an artistic way and your doodle could win you a place on Google's homepage, as well as a scholarship!

Scholastic Contests: Scholastic always has an interesting contest cooked up- from skyping with authors, to book related treasure hunts and poetry writing contests, there's something for everyone!

Math League: Several weekends a year, math-loving kids gather in school cafeterias around the country to try their hand at challenging math tests. Even independent homeschoolers can participate!

Math Olympiad: School based teams participate in individual and team based math competitions. Tests are five times a year and problems are novel, challenging word problems.

PBS Writers Contest: For young elementary kids in K-3, this writing contest is a fun way to get kids engaged in writing and brave enough to share their stories.

Google Science Fair: Big ideas, bold research and amazing prizes for kids 13-18 that have a true passion for science.

Test- based opportunities are also available from local talent searches. Students take a standardized test to qualify for merit based awards, scholarships and participation in enrichment and academic courses. Hoagies' Gifted maintains an up to date talent search page if you're interested in these types of opportunities.

Other contests and competitions like Geography Bee, Spelling Bee and Poetry Jam may be available in your local area. Some of these are held at a city or county level and independent homeschoolers can enter. If your local competition starts at a traditional public school, it doesn't hurt to call and ask if your child can participate!

Summer- Live it up!

I've gotten a lot of questions from readers, friends and family about how we handle summer in an Academic Homeschooling family. I can promise, our summer is just as summer-y as traditional school families, with a few twists!

Summers of my childhood are filled with memories of playing in the empty fields, making dandelion launchers, breaking my parents' garage door by trying to ride on it. My brother and I rode our bikes to the local Dairy Queen for ice cream on special occasions and generally wandered the neighborhood with all the other kids. 

Summer in my neighborhood isn't like that anymore. Most of our friends have full-time jobs and their kids are in daycare all summer, all day. Families try to take their vacations before school starts up again. I cannot remember the last time I saw a kid riding a bike down the street in my neighborhood. It's just not like that where we live.

So that leaves an interesting conundrum for our family. Summer is time to discover interests, passions, take on projects and lounge by the pool for hours. We wholeheartedly support this as a family! We indulge a few summer wishes like "I want to spend an entire day playing Minecraft without leaving the computer." We also travel, go camping with friends, take the long hot days to start a new project like building a 3,000 piece Lego shop or playing cup bowling on our long tile hallway.

The other opportunity that we use summer for is exploring independence. The kid has attended a sleep-away camp the past two summers and will tackle two camps this summer. He goes completely unplugged, off into the hands of international college students and a well-established camp philosophy to learn how to kayak, slingshot, build log forts, sing silly songs and play poker in the cabin on a rainy day. It's about life experience too- learning to trust others, be brave and resilient. This year, he will also have a video game design sleep-away camp on a college campus. It will be a completely different experience for him, to have one single goal and project to accomplish in one week. 

Summer is the perfect time for Academic Homeschoolers to take advantage of enrichment camps, day experiences and filling your child's emotional and social buckets full of adventures. The kid will have a half-day camp week at the local SPCA learning how to take care of animals and prepare them for adoption. In a completely opposite direction, he'll also have a full-day camp week in 3D printing and CAD design. He'll also have six weeks of plain boring summer. We like to mix it up around here! 

I encourage you to consider spending some of your homeschool budget on a high quality camp, whether it's day or overnight. The opportunity to explore something completely outside of your home, your realm of knowledge and your family's focus will develop a new sense of exploration and adventure in your child. Sure, as a mom it's completely panic-inducing to drop your kid off in the mountains and not hear from them for a week. But the stories, the smiles and the skills he comes home with will be worth every single near heart-attack moment. 

For camps near you try the American Camp Association, your local park and recreation or Google your major metropolitan area and "day camp".