Why Are so Many Students Acing Some SOL Tests?

Jun 03, 09:04 AM

Current Headlines: By Amy Jeter, The Virginian-Pilot, Norfolk, Va.

Jun. 3--Last spring, 50 third-graders took the history Standards of Learning exam at Norfolk's Dreamkeepers Academy at J.J. Roberts Elementary School.

More than half of them received a 600, the highest score possible.

Miles away in Chesapeake, the same thing happened at Southeastern Elementary School: 56 percent of the third-graders aced the test. And across the state, 1 in 5 students did.

Perfect scores were far less common in other subjects, such as math and English. In science, fewer than 6 percent of students taking the tests in the state earned the highest score.

Educators said students' success in history showed how well Virginia's standards are being taught and learned. Others wondered whether the tests are too easy.

"The obvious question," said Steve Dunbar, an education professor at the University of Iowa, "is, Are kids in third grade in Virginia really better in social studies than anything else?"

When the Standards of Learning exams were designed in the late 1990s, little thought was given to how many students should be acing them.

In the traditional bell curve -- what statisticians call a "normal distribution" of scores -- most students would be in the middle of the range. About 2.5 percent would receive the highest mark.

But Virginia's standardized tests are not graded on a curve. They're supposed to gauge how well students know the Standards of Learning, and the hope is that as many students as possible are proficient.

"The more kids who are getting the perfect score, the better," said Doris Redfield, an education consultant who headed the Virginia Department of Education's assessment and reporting division in the late 1990s.

Before the SOLs are given, a scale is set that links each possible number of correct answers to a score. The scale changes slightly each year when test questions change.

A 600 means the student missed either zero, one or two questions, depending on the test. On the elementary science tests last year, students needed to be perfect. On the history tests, they could miss one or two.

While 600s sound impressive, principals, administrators and state officials are most concerned with pass rates -- the percentage of students scoring 400 or above. Pass rates are important in determining whether a school is accredited by the state and whether it meets academic goals under the federal No Child Left Behind law.

The Virginia Department of Education doesn't routinely report the actual scores received on the SOL tests. At the request of The Virginian-Pilot, officials released the number of 600s on all SOL tests in 2005-06 and the scores of all tests taken by third- and fifth-graders in South Hampton Roads.

Usually when a series of tests is developed, the scoring patterns tend to be the same from subject to subject, said the University of Iowa's Dunbar.

The number of Virginia students who passed history and science was similar, with the rates each at about 90 percent for third-graders and at about 85 percent for fifth-graders.

But the difference in the number of perfect scores was much more pronounced. So was the variation in students scoring "pass/advanced" -- a 500 or above. In third grade, 57 percent earned that score on history compared with 40 percent for science; in fifth grade, it was 45 percent for history and 23 percent for science.

There are two disadvantages when lots of students earn the highest score on a test. Teachers can't determine the finer details of what students haven't learned, and there's no room left to improve.

"If you're getting kids who are close to the ceiling or hitting the ceiling, they have nowhere to go," said Bruce Bracken, an education professor at The College of William and Mary.

Students haven't always sailed through the SOL history exams.

In the early years, scores were so low in several grade levels that in 2001 the Virginia Board of Education took the unusual step of lowering the number of questions that students needed to answer correctly to pass some of the tests. That included the fifth-grade exam.

"The one thing we've always heard is the history tests are too hard," said Charles Pyle, a spokesman for the Virginia Department of Education.

The tests were based on standards from 1995, which required elementary students to know the basics of economics, geography, civics and history. Before, they had started out learning about family and community, then eased into state, national and world history.

Teachers felt that the SOL tests covered too much ground in one year and that the standards were unclear.

When the state's history and social science standards came up for a seven-year review in 2001, committees consisting mostly of teachers recommended a rewrite of the curriculum. Among their suggestions: pare back the information covered.

By 2003-04, the entire test had been changed to meet those new standards.

Historically, scores have dropped in the first year or so of new or revised tests.

But that year, the percentage of perfect scores in third-grade history jumped to 16 percent from 2.6 percent. For fifth-graders, the number increased to 9 percent from 2.4 percent.

State officials say that doesn't mean the tests are too easy.

"There were some legitimate concerns that had to be addressed about the teachability of the standards," Pyle said. "Our history and social studies teachers are finding that the 2001 standards are teachable. They're rigorous, but they're teachable."

The new tests feature more clear-cut questions and more illustrations, some teachers said. The answer options for the multiple-choice tests often include at least one that seems implausible.

Patty Costis, a teacher at Dreamkeepers, approved of the changes.

"The tests were meant to be broad strokes of the general knowledge instead of just these individual details," Costis said. "Not, 'Do you remember a little, minute detail of first grade, second quarter?' "

Educators said the large number of high scores last year could be due to the age of the test.

"Once the test has been out for a while, you have years and years to perfect what you do -- with the instruction, with the strategies, just equipping the students with the knowledge," said Patricia S. Williams, principal of Westhaven Elementary in Portsmouth.

At Dreamkeepers, Principal Doreatha White has score improvement down to a science. She identifies which concept tripped up her students the most in each subject area and has her teachers include lessons on that concept every week.

In history, this year's concept is geography. Maps of the world in glitter, paint and colored pencil line the hallways, and students inside the classrooms constantly drill the names of oceans and continents.

"We don't wait until January to start test preparation," White said. "We start in September."

In nine years, the elementary-level science SOL tests have never been significantly revised.

Elementary students don't seem to have trouble passing the exams, yet the percentage of perfect scores statewide has remained relatively low: 5.4 percent for third graders last year and 2.3 percent for fifth graders.

Why is it harder for students to ace this test?

It could be the type of questions. Science tends to require problem-solving rather than fact memorization.

In an example from last year's exam, third-graders were given four pictures of animals on a seesaw and asked, "Which of these shows that the toy cow is lighter than the toy horse?"

Fifth-graders were shown four pictures and asked which depicted the type of cloud that would most likely be seen during a thunderstorm.

"They have to know the concept, and they have to be able to apply it," said Ashanda Bickham, a teacher at Norfolk's Chesterfield Academy of Math, Science and Technology. "It's a higher level of thinking."

Some teachers, such as Bickham, must also figure out how to relay science concepts to students who have weak reading skills.

She solved the problem by chucking the thick textbooks. Instead, she uses work sheets from a prepared curriculum to help students create an "interactive notebook."

The children paste paragraphs and pictures into a spiral notebook in which they also write notes and draw pictures. Bickham walks the students through the texts, asking increasingly difficult questions.

Said fourth-grader Lytaja Brown, "You get to draw what it's about, and it stays in your head."

More hands-on activities and lessons that promote inquiry will help students improve in science, said Paula Klonowski, a science specialist with the Virginia Department of Education.

More time in class would also help, teachers say.

The most common complaint from elementary teachers is they don't have enough time in their schedules to teach science effectively, Klonowski said.

Costis, at Dreamkeepers Academy, said science lessons require more supervision from teachers and often can't be interrupted.

"To have enough time to set up and put down a full-blown science experiment," she said, "you're kind of up a creek."

Additionally, teacher training programs sometimes give short shrift to science, said Veronica Haynes, Norfolk's senior coordinator for the subject.

"I think they're afraid of science," she said, "and all the hands-on that comes with doing science education."

Virginia's standards in U.S. history and world history have been rated highly by the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, a Washington think tank.

Standards aren't necessarily linked to test scores, though. In Georgia, another state with solid ratings, 120,166 third-graders took the state's standardized social studies test last year, and just 43 received the highest mark.

Virginia has the chance to revise the history and social science guidelines -- and possibly change the tests -- this year, as they come up for review again. The science standards, which also drew praise from the Fordham Foundation, are up for review in 2010.

Pyle said the history and social science standards are unlikely to change a lot, given the overhaul in 2001.

Mark Emblidge, president of the state Board of Education, said scores are one of many factors considered when standards are reviewed. Ultimately, he said, the goal is for all students to pass. But high achievers also should have something substantial to strive for.

Despite the focus on pass rates, some educators are now encouraging students to shoot for scores higher than 400.

One Southeastern Elementary teacher has a "500 club," and Costis tells her high-achieving students that "pass/advanced is for sissies."

For 600 scores, some schools offer rewards including trophies, boomboxes and passes to Busch Gardens.

The ever-rising scores put increasing pressure on teachers and administrators, who are often expected to show improvement each year. But parents and children say scoring a 600 is like racking up bonus points: good for bragging rights but not much else.

"I didn't tell any of my friends," said Edward Grant, a Dreamkeepers fourth-grader who scored a 600 on the history test last year. "I was just talking about it in my head. I was so happy."

News researcher Jake Hays contributed to this report.

-- Reach Amy Jeter at (757) 446-2730 or amy.jeter@pilotonline.com.

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