A+ Test Prep & Tutoring Blog

From the Today Show on NBC, a student with a perfect SAT score talks about how he did it, and gives some advice to other students on good test preparation practices.

Some of his suggestions include chewing gum, having a motivational theme song, taking at least 8 real SAT practice exams, and doing your homework and practice exams in a noisy environment.  Check out the video… Preparing for the SAT.

Two of the major book store chains are offering kids an incentive to read this summer.

Borders has a summer reading program called ‘10 Summer Reading Double Dog Dare.  If your child (any child 12 or
under) reads 10 books and then completes a form and takes it to Borders, he or she gets to chose from one of the books on
the list. What a great program! Here is the link.

Barnes and Noble has a similar summer reading program this year.  Children who read 8 books this summer can choose a free book from their list.  Simply print the passport from the attached link and bring it to Barnes and Noble before September 7th. Here is their link.

Happy reading, and have a great summer!

February 2010 Newsletter

In This Issue:

SecretBuilders is a virtual world for children 5 to 14 years old powered by a web 2.0 community of children, parents, educators, writers, artists and game developers. On SecretBuilders, children will explore virtual lands, undertake quests, play games, maintain a home, nurture a pet, and interact with their friends.

Check out their blog, which contains an article from our newsletter!

FREE TEST PREP VOCABULARY BUILDER

MemoWiz is a program that makes learning all the vocabulary you need for the new SAT easy and fast.

Learning vocabulary can be a boring and tedious process. MemoWiz was built to make your learning experience as fast, efficient and fun as possible.

Here are some of the key features:

• Fast – learn only terms you do not already know. The learning process starts with screening terms you already know. As you answer correctly, MemoWiz  automatically focuses on vocabulary terms you do not know yet.

• Efficient – MemoWiz has a wide variety of learning aids. You can export your own personalized data base to mp3 format and listen on your mp3 player or your mobile phone. You can also easily print double sided flash cards according to your personal knowledge level.

• Fun – need a rest from learning? Try Vocabinator, a fun action game that helps you learn vocabulary while playing the game. More games coming soon…

For a limited time this new approach to learning SAT or ACT vocabulary is available free to students and friends of A+ Test Prep and Tutoring.  You can try out a demo at  MemoWiz.  If you are interested in getting a Full Version of this software free,  just email us and MemoWiz will provide you with your own personal login.

Good luck and have fun!!

Approximately 4.4 million (7.8%) children in the United States have been diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and 56% of affected children take prescription medications to treat the disorder. Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder is strongly linked with low academic achievement, but the association between medication use and academic achievement in school settings is largely unknown*.

A recently published study in the current issue of the medical journal Pediatrics, which is published by the American Academy of Pediatrics,  found that students who take medication for the condition earn higher scores on standardized tests of math and reading skills.

The study, funded by the National Institutes of Mental Health, and conducted by Richard Scheffler, Ph.D., of the University of California, Berkeley, and colleagues,  surveyed almost 600 students. The students were all in kindergarten in the 1998-1999 school year and were surveyed five times between kindergarten and fifth grade.

Results of the study showed that students who took the AD/HD medications had reading scores equivalent to about 1/3 of a year ahead of their unmedicated peers with AD/HD.  On the math test, the medicated students performed at about 1/5 of a year ahead of the unmedicated group.  Researches believe that there may be an underlying difference in the learning processes of math and reading that would account the for differing results by subject area.

While these results are encouraging, the researchers noted that even the students taking medication were still, on average, behind their peers who do have the disorder.  Researchers are interested in conducting a long term longitudinal study to further study the effect of AD/HD medication  on academic achievement. In addition, further research is required to determine if a combination of medication and behavioral therapy might be even more effective in helping these students improve.

* Source: Pediatrics, May 2009.

Cliffs Notes, the company that publishes the study guides that students have relied on for generations, sometimes to the dismay of their teachers, has published a new line of books in the Manga format.

Manga, a Japanese form of comic book, has recently become a very popular form of literature in the U.S.  Manga are similar to graphic novels, but the artwork is rendered in the traditional style popular in Japan.

This line of books contains classic titles including works by Shakespeare, Hawthorne and Twain. The books contain original text of these works, and remain true to the setting. These books represent a good entry point into some of the more difficult works of classic literature that otherwise might be intimidating for students.

For a sample of these manga adaptations click here.

BrainyFlix.com, a website sponsored by the MIT Alumni Association, is conducting an unusual vocabulary contest.  The website is seeking homemade videos designed to teach the meaning of specific vocabulary words which often appear on college board exams such at the SAT and ACT.

Each video should be about one of the words on the vocabulary list created by BrainFlix.com. Videos must explain the meaning of the word correctly and well enough for students who see the video to learn and actually remember the meaning of the word. Of course, fun anc creativity are  encouraged. The deadline for videos to be submitted is March 16, 2009.  The top prize is $600, of which $200 will go directly to the video’s creator and the balance of $400 will go to the student’s school.

Educators and policy makers, including Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, have said in recent days that they hope President Obama’s example as a model student could inspire millions of American students, especially blacks, to higher academic performance.

Now researchers have documented what they call an Obama effect, showing that a performance gap between African-Americans and whites on a 20-question test administered before Mr. Obama’s nomination all but disappeared when the exam was administered after his acceptance speech and again after the presidential election. Click here to read the full article.

Source: The New York Times, January 22, 2009.

1. Using background knowledge (schema)
Proficient readers recall their relevant background knowledge before, during and after they read.

• Proficient readers assimilate information from texts they read and learning experiences they have into their background knowledge and make changes in it to accommodate new information.
• Proficient readers adapt their background knowledge all the time, deleting some information, adding to schema, connecting to other knowledge.
• Proficient readers use background knowledge to make: Text-to-self, Text-to-text, Text-to-world connections to help them link information to prior knowledge and store information in long-term memory.

2. Creating Mental Images

• Proficient readers create mental images during and after reading. The images come from all five senses, as well as emotions, and are anchored in the reader’s background knowledge.
• Proficient readers use images to immerse themselves in rich detail of the text. The detail engages the reader more deeply with depth and dimension, making the text more memorable.
• Proficient readers use mental images to draw conclusions, to create distinct interpretations of the text, and to recall details. Images from readers’ personal experience frequently become part of their comprehension.
• Proficient readers adapt their images as they read. Images are revised to incorporate new information and images are modified in response to images other readers share.

3. Questioning

• Proficient readers generate questions before, during and after reading.
• Proficient readers ask questions to; clarify meaning, speculate, determine intent, determine content.
• Proficient readers understand that many of their questions are not answered in the text but left up to their interpretation.
• When an answer is needed, proficient readers determine whether it can be answered by the text, whether the answer will need to be inferred from the text and their background knowledge, or whether they will need to seek the answer somewhere else.
• Proficient readers understand how questioning is used in other areas of their lives.
• Proficient readers are aware that as they hear others’ questions, new ones are inspired in their own minds.

4. Inferring

• When proficient readers infer, they create a meaning that is not stated explicitly in the text.
• Inferring is the process of creating a personal meaning form text. The reader combines what is read with relevant prior knowledge (schema).
• Inferring may cause the reader to slow down, reread sections, talk, write or draw to better understand the content.
• Teachers should allow great latitude for inferences as long as the reader can support the inference with specific text and prior knowledge.
• When proficient readers infer, they: draw conclusions, make predictions, create interpretations, answer questions as they read, make connections, make judgments about what they read.

5. Determining Importance

• The readers schema – - ideas connected to the reader’s background knowledge will be considered most important.
• The reader’s purpose.
• The reader’s beliefs, opinions and experiences.
• The reader’s knowledge of text format, particularly of non-fiction texts (titles, headings, subheadings, graphs, pictures) give clues about what is important.
• Students should be able to articulate how they make decisions about what is important and how those decisions enhance their comprehension.
• Pointing out what is not’t important can help students distinguish importance more clearly.
• Interesting discussions spring from disagreement about what is most important. Children need to work to defend their positions, but there is rarely a true set of most important ideas.

6. Synthesizing (is based on)

• Answers the question, what does this really mean to you?
• A synthesis is the sum of information from the text, other relevant texts and the reader’s background knowledge, ideas, and opinions produced in an original way.
• Proficient readers use synthesis to share, recommend, and review books they have read.
• Proficient readers monitor the overall meaning and themes in the text as they read and are aware of the ways text elements “fit together” to create that overall meaning.
• Proficient readers pay attention to character, setting, conflict, sequence of events, and to text patterns and use their knowledge of these elements to make decisions about the overall meaning of the text.

7. Monitoring for meaning (“fix-up strategies”)

• Proficient readers monitor their comprehension during reading. They know when the text they are reading does not’t make sense.
• Proficient readers identify difficulties they have in comprehending at the word, sentence, and whole text level. They are flexible in their use of strategies to solve their comprehension problems. They monitor, evaluate and make revisions to their evolving interpretation of the text while reading.
• Proficient readers can identify confusing ideas, themes, and/or surface elements and can suggest different means to solve the problems they have.

Possible “Fix-Ups”
Go back and reread. Often.
Read ahead to clarify meaning.
Identify where it is that is not’t understood: word, sentence, concept.
If it is a word, read beyond it and see if its meaning is cleared later in the text; think about the content and predict what word might make sense.
If it is a sentence in a picture book, look at the pictures and think about what has happened so far; then reread and read ahead. If still confused, talk with a friend, parent or teacher about it.
If it is a concept, try to summarize the story up to confusing part. See if that clears up confusion. It may be necessary to build more background knowledge. That means going to an encyclopedia, the Internet, or having a conversation with someone who knows about the topic.

Source: Susan Zimmerman, co-author of Mosaic of Thought:The Power of Comprehension Strategy Instruction, Second Edition. Portsmouth, NH:Heinemann Publishing,  2007.