Pre-Tests and Post-Tests

March 31, 2016

When I was in elementary school we always had pre-tests and post-tests for spelling. However, in my first student teaching placement pre-tests were not used. This has allowed me to some some advantages and disadvantages of both methods.

Not doing pre-tests is definitely a time saver, however, it doesn't save that much time since they only take about 10 minutes to administer.

In my opinion, I am a fan of pre-tests. It allows students, and the teacher, to see growth and improvement. Also, as a teacher it helps show what spelling exercises, activities during the week may have paid off.

I can't speak for all teachers but from my experience if a student receives a perfect score on the pre-test they are able to keep that grade and not take the post-test. This is a nice incentive for most students. In just the few weeks that I have been here at Salem and have been grading the spelling tests it is very common for more than half the class to receive that perfect school on the pre-test. Now those students have the ability to focus their time on other subjects since they have already proved mastery of that word list.