PAT Tests - Assessment Conditions and Environments

 PAT Tests and Creating a Supportive Learning Environment

As a beginning teacher, one of your primary responsibilities is to ensure that your students not only progress academically but also feel supported and encouraged in their educational journey. As a digital school, our students sit the Progressive Achievement Tests (PAT) on their devices. PAT assessments are designed to evaluate our students' knowledge and skills in a specific subject. These tests help us to gauge their strengths and areas for improvement, which, in turn, informs our teaching strategies.

To prepare your students effectively for PAT tests, it can be helpful to align your teaching with the test format. This is not "teaching to the test."  I focused on the actual format of how questions are delivered, and how students select their answers.  I have found ReadTheory to be quite similar in its setup to what the PATs are like, so my reading groups did a lot of ReadTheory in the week leading up to their PAT tests.

A conducive learning environment is essential for effective test preparation. My syndicate met ahead of the assessments to ensure all student devices were in working order for the test.  Students of the same year level were allocated seats away from each other - this will be different if you do not have a mix of year levels in your classroom.  In my own class, we went over the expectations of being in a test environment.  We also prepared for after the test; students selected a book and put it under their chair.  Once they finished the test (if it was earlier than the official end time) they read their book.  This helped to decrease risk of students distracting others.

Before the actual test, there are example questions and answers. We worked through sample questions and exercises together as a class before starting. This approach can boost their confidence and help them understand the test format and requirements better. I made sure to address any questions or concerns they may have had before the test officially started.

Finally, it was important for me to remember that PAT tests are just one tool to gauge my students' progress. As a beginning teacher, I am continuously seeking ways to improve my teaching and adapt to my students' needs. I know I can use the PAT test results as valuable feedback to refine my teaching strategies and support your students' content knowledge going forward.

Teacher Inquiry - Vocabulary

After discussing my backwards mapping with my senior syndicate in Term 2, one of the things I had planned to do was to have a visual display for vocabulary and draw the students' attention to it.  Below is an image of what my whiteboard would typically look like before starting our reading programme for the week.  

Alongside the tasks for the week, I would write the list of words the students would need to 'SACAWAC.'  You can click here to read more about SACAWAC.  At the start of a guided reading session I'd sometimes get the group to make predictions about the text based only on the word list.  As a result of the SACAWAC activity, students began challenging me to test their spelling ability.  From this, our reading programme grew to include a spelling test every second session - after the students had time to SACAWAC the words.  I have made the spelling lists incorporate vocabulary from the texts they read, as well as vocabulary that have similar patterns to words they may come across in their Peter Schonell Spelling Test.  

How the students responded : 

I feel the students have engaged with this approach to teaching word consciousness / kupu hou.  They are eager to participate in SACAWACing words and spelling tests as they feel a sense of ownership over that part of our reading programme.  They have shown they prefer to do their spelling and marking on paper so that is what we have implemented.  After a spelling test, any words the students got wrong - they had the option to continue to SACAWAC those for homework or when they had completed their other work.

What worked : 

Having a physical copy for students to write on.  This proved more effective than students who just copied and pasted ticks into their Google Docs.  Having a different list for each group - this allowed them to become 'experts' at the particular set of words and the students began teaching others the meanings of the words without being prompted.  Some of the vocabulary has also begun to show up in their writing which has been awesome to see.  Having a spelling test the next day also served as a good purpose for them to be doing the SACAWAC activity and sharing their results with them helped build confidence and a desire to do better.

What I could change : 

I could make an actual wall display of all the topical vocabulary instead of just writing it on the whiteboard.  I am yet to try this as I find the turnover between words could be too much for them to feel like they need to memorise.  I could also do more with their results for spelling as at the moment they just receive a certificate for spelling.  At the moment I store their spelling results in my reading workbook where I can see if/how they improve over the weeks.