In the ninth grade, I vividly remember standing in front of my English class. My knees literally knocked as I attempted to level my voice. My wobbly stance and stuttering voice put my anxiety on full display. I had a fear of public speaking, even if it was just in front of about 24 students in my public school classroom.
I made a promise to myself, then and there, to overcome my fear of public speaking. I vowed to prepare thoroughly when facing any presentation and to force myself into the spotlight. I began teaching soon thereafter: ballroom dancing at our local cotillion, swimming lessons at our local pool and at camp, and even a ballroom dancing short course for other students in college. I gained confidence in my public speaking skills by teaching topics I knew well to others.
Over the span of five to six years, I got my sea legs. Before I knew it, I had earned a spot on the National Moot Court Team in law school and, thereafter, I became a trial litigator, speaking before a full courtroom almost weekly. In ninth grade, I would never have envisioned a career that involved public speaking.
Today, a different anxiety seems to plague many of our children: test anxiety. A large portion of my students seem to handle their classwork without a hitch. They are fairly organized and attentive to their daily work. They “study” for tests; however, on test day, they falter. They earn a failing or near failing grade. The students and their parents are dismayed. How could they do so poorly after ten years in school of nearly straight As? These children are bright. In fact, they may have never needed to study much before tenth or eleventh grade – maybe for the occasional spelling or history unit test but certainly not in math.
Unfortunately, test anxiety today is very common, and students now seem to simply adopt the phrase, “I have test anxiety,” as if they’ve been stricken with a disease, without adequately addressing it. Parents used to share with me in hushed tones that their child suffers from test anxiety. Now, students themselves “own” the label. Teachers who struggle to reconcile their classes’ poor grades offer the students the opportunity to earn points back on tests and to opt out of exams, relieving them of the need to sharpen their study habits and test taking skills. Teachers offer extra credit to bring up quarterly grades, too. Our high school students can now navigate high school and sometimes even college without ever facing a full courseload of exams, and college students shop classes looking for the courses that have final projects or papers in lieu of exams.
Therefore, when many colleges went test optional in admissions, the number of students to jump ship and avoid the SAT and ACT altogether soared exponentially.
Avoidance, however, is not the best way to combat this problem. Test anxiety is a very real thing for some students; however, in my experience, the best way to overcome test anxiety is by sharpening the student’s approach to preparing for the test and by, well, taking the test!
Test prep is more than just gaming the test: It is skill development – learning the math and grammar concepts that were never perfected, gaining an understanding of what it means to read a passage strategically, and learning how to evaluate multiple choice questions with a keen eye. Yes, there are tricks involved, but many of my test prep students become not only significantly more confident and more shrewd test takers but also better students overall. We can denounce the importance of test taking, but a strong test taker is often an observant and knowledgeable student, which is why colleges do, in fact, care about test scores and are reinstituting testing requirements.
I know that fears only grow in time when they are not addressed. If your children continue to struggle on unit tests, they need to revamp their study habits, and if they want to improve on the SAT and ACT, they need to dig in and practice. Conquering fears is empowering, too, and most of our children will benefit from a boost in confidence.
Recently, I added group test prep sessions to my offerings, specifically to broaden my reach and to accommodate my waitlist, so if your child needs support in test prep, please reach out. My next group test prep session is for the ACT and will take place on Sunday, October 6.