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The TAAS test is like any other requirement of the day’s duties. You wake up in the mornings and shit at night. If the school board wants a test to steer their students in a heading that seems legit, then what is wrong? TAAS test is a subject test and these subjects are a part of the school curriculum. We hate the test because we just don’t care much for the school. If you think about it, that is your whole life. Do this because you have too. Well, what if you don’t want to? Then you focus on the social things and don’t mount up to the life your predecessors have put before you. So suck it up.
The TAAS test is the most dreaded test among Texas students. Teachers and students find it to be both annoying and a waste of time. I had to take the TAAS test several times. I took it in grade school, junior high, and a final time in high school. My sophomore year in high school my English teacher told the class that we would have the privilege of taking the TAAS test, and if we passed we would never have to take it again. Those words were music to my ears. We spent two weeks preparing for the writing and reading sections of the test. I had not taken the test and I was already sick of it. My teacher taught us the correct way to write in order to get a good grade on the test. However, she enforced the fact that we were never to write like this for her. I never understood why we had to write a certain way for TAAS when we were never taught to write that way for class. The following two years of high school, both of my English teachers told students to never write in the TAAS format. They said it was too elementary. The week of the TAAS test classes were put to a halt. Those taking the test came to school at a regular time but the rest of the students got to come to school late. Also, all after school activities were canceled so that students taking TAAS could “study” and rest up. I do not understand why the school suddenly became so interested in preparing us for a simple test but they did not care about preparing us for one of our course exams. I do not know anyone who studies for TAAS or even rests up for it. A majority of students believe that TAAS is a joke. I would not mind it if the state of Texas tested peoples intelligence with a more effective test. I understand that some people do find the TAAS test challenging however these students are usually not productive in school.
The TAAS test seemed to be the whole part of my freshmen and sophomore year. We had to take many practice exams and learn how to write 3-5 paragraph essay. All we did was prepare for the exam. We were always told that it was “the most important test” we would take in high school. It was important in the fact that if we did not pass it we could not graduate from high school. This test was a very easy test to most people. It was supposed to be a sort of placement test, telling the teachers what help students needed. I personally felt that it was too easy to be a challenge.
The TAAS test should not be a requirement for graduating high school. That is unless they are willing to make it a little more difficult. I mean I am not asking to take a hard test, but if teachers are going to spend half of their class time preparing us for the test it should at least be a challenge. I believe that I have cousins in grade school that could master TAAS without having to worry about anything but the writing portion. I say this because the writing portion is the challenging part. However, the prompts should definitely be looked at and refreshed. I think I wrote a descriptive essay on a picture of a groundhog with a huge stack of ice cream for at least three years. That is ridiculous. I could still write a two-page essay on that stupid groundhog to this day because I have seen the picture so many times. Then after that--in junior high--I still got to write a descriptive essay. This time it was a hippo lounging by a pool and drinking lemonade, I mean really. Any one that can see and write could describe these cheesy pictures. The prompts should allow for more creative writing. I mastered the TAAS the first year I took it, yet I was caught in the grade that was required to take it from third grade on. That was no good. The same practice questions are used also. Every year the example question was a multiple choice about the fish imprint and whether it was a fossil or an imprint or whatever the other choices were. If students are being required to spend their class time and school time on this test, the writers of the test should take time enough to change the prompts and example questions. As much as I believe the test should have a higher degree of difficulty, I am ashamed to know that there are people out there that are seniors and stressing the test. In this case, Texas is right, if you cannot pass it by your senior year; you should be pushed right back to first grade. Here you can be taught to describe a little buck tooth groundhog with a backwards hat on and an ice cream cone piled high with scoops of various flavors. Then you should be able to pass it for a couple of years in a row.
The TAAS test should not be so important in high school as it is. First of all, it is taken in the l0th grade before we even learn anything. What does that mean to us even a year from then or 2 years from then? Plenty of people scored high enough on their TAAS to be exempt from the TASP, but then failed the math placement test and ended up in a remedial class anyways. It really has no significance when you get past your sophomore year.
The TAAS test to me, was a complete joke. My teacher’s always were so serious about it, and made us do TAAS prep things, in the English class, but never once did I worry. There had never been one TAAS test that I did not master the English part of the exam. Even before the results came in, I already knew I had passed it, so I didn’t even care about the results really. It was just another test that I could say that I had mastered. I felt that they made the test where anyone with an arm that held a pencil could pass it. I always completed the exam with a lot of time left over, and it was just really boring. So, I do not feel the TAAS test is worth the paper its printed on, or the countless tax payers dollars that are spent on it each year.
The Taas test was a COMPLETE WASTE OF MY TIME!!! I spent miltiple years learning how to structure an essay to meet the pointless standards of Taas. If it wasn’t for two years of AP english pounding the Taas format out of my head I would be totally lost in college. Why learn to write something that you will eventually have to UNlearn? Herein lies the basis of my angered confusion towards the taas test. We need to be preparing young people to be ambassadors of knowledge, for after all knowledge is power. Why waste valuable time, money, and brain power on such a skills’ test? This test is basically gives bright students an ego boost and those less fortunate (intellectually) are given a glimmer of hope that is brutally demolished with the SAT, ACT, and eventually college. Why not teach the right thing form the beginning, and make a test that is a true test of one’s skills? This is what we, as a nation, should be concerned about; not sports, but the true intellectual measure of children.
The TAAS test was a great experience for me. The test itself was hard the first time because I did not know what to expect at all. The first time around I failed the writing and the math part. I could not believe that I had failed the test, I took it over in the summer and I passed it. We shouldn’t have to take the test in order to graduate high school, because some people have a lot of problems to pass the test, and some people just can’t do the work. The test may help some succeed but others it may bring them down.
The TAAS test was a HUGE deal when I was growing up. Not only was it required that every student had to pass the TAAS test to graduate from High School, it was the fact that I took that test so many times growing up. Compared to SAT and ACT exams, the TAAS is a walk in the park. An 8-year old could pass the test with their eyes closed! The only preparation we had for TAAS was a few miniscule practice TAAS booklets, and of course the previous times we had taken it. Overall, I feel our school discrict over-prepared us for the TAAS exam. I took that test about 4 to 5 times before acing it my sophomore year. Kids were laughing about how easy it was. Being an English student helped me out a great deal, especially when the writing section came.
The TAAS test was a really boring test. In the school that I went to they been throwing TAAS stuff at us every since we probably came into the 6th grade. Well I guess earlier than that cause we took one in the 4th or 5th grade one of them. After that that was about all that they taught us was stuff to do with the TAAS test. Then when you get to high school they really pound it in hard you freshman year and the beginning of your sophomore year. At the end of our freshman year we had to take a practice TAAS test that didn’t count for anything it was just for practice. Then at the end of your sophomore year you have to take the real one that you have to pass all the parts of it before you are allowed to graduate. At my school they even had a whole class that you could take just to help you with the stuff that is in the TAAS test. I didn’t really like taking the test but it was the easiest standardized test that I had to take.
The TAAS test was a very monotonous experience. I lived in Nebraska during part of my elementary schooling, and when I began fifth grade here in Texas, those four letters hung over my head until the final test my sophomore year. In my English classes, we were given sample tests, objective and essay-style. We had to find the errors in each sentence, or decide if a certain essay was well-developed or not. It seemed that during certain years of schooling, there was either a tremendous amount of preparation, or little preparation at all. Honestly, preparing on my own was not necessary. We were given samples and I felt pretty comfortable with these. Overall, I feel like instruction given in the classroom that was not centered on TAAS related items was most beneficial to helping me on the test. Learning to broaden my vocabulary and to write more descriptive essays was proved mare valuable than going over the basic “five-paragraph essay” that we have grown so accustomed to. If our teachers are strong in their grammar and writing skills, this may be more beneficial than strenuous sample tests. While I received “academic recognition” on the TAAS test, I felt that I was not challenged to my fullest extent. It came as no surprise (I don’t mean to sound arrogant at all, I just feel that after talking with others they felt the same way.) I feel that we need to enhance a child’s learning by teaching them in other methods. A test is important to measure a student’s capacity to learn, but I think the TAAS structure may need to be reviewed.
The TAAS test was a waste of time. My english class spent an entire 6 weeks practicing for the TAAS. I might have understood 1 week possibly 2 weeks but six weeks. Come on, there are so many other parts of english that I could have learned about. The TAAS is a mininium level skills test. If you can write an introduction, a conclusion, and stick 3 body paragraphs with details and an example or two in there you will get a 4 which is the highest you could get. I got a 4 and personally my essay wasn’t as good as it could have been but I knew no one would really sit there and read every word of every paper. So teachers told us to write a really good introduction and that might cause the grader to skip to your 4th paragraph and if it was a good body paragraph they would go to the conclusion and if it was good you got a 4. I just think to much emphasis is put on a test in which only mininium skills are met.
The TAAS test was a waste of time. Not entirely but the fact that schools take so long to prepare for it. It takes time from regular classes. Time that students could have used to prepare for college. Instead, we take 2 years of high school in order to prepare for a test that only makes a school look better if a great percentage pass. Then, Junior and Senior level come and we are completely lost. All we know is TAAS, and they try to prepare us for college writing, mathematics, and sciences in two years. Just recently, I heard that the TAAS test is moving to junior level. So now student will have one year to prepare for college!
The TAAS test was all I heard about my sophomore year. That is all the teachers cared about. Because if we all did well on it, the school got more money. So all we did was drill everything on that test in our heads. They even took away our study session to have a TAAS review thing. But all the school cared about was the TAAS test and getting everyone to make the perfect score in order to get more money. But after it was over, I did not learn very much in English. And the test was very easy and I almost made a perfect score on everything. The experience was boring and pointless. I never learned anything out of it. I learned everything I knew for the TAAS in 7th grade. Standardized tests never show a person’s skill or intellect. I do not think it should be a requirement to graduate. It is enough just to pass all your classes. It was a bad experience overall. It just made me see that politics ruled schools as well. TAAS was boring and did not work. I think they should get rid of it and not base graduation on it. We already have enough tests.
The TAAS test was always made out to be a big deal in high school. Teachers and administrators made it seem like it was death. “If you do not pass the TAAS, you cannot graduate from high school!” Those words of horror, I heard everyday until my senior year.
My high school was very TAAS oriented, we had a special time allotted into our daily schedules in order for us to practice our skills needed to take the test. My freshman year, our whole curriculum was based on learning information that my teacher thought we should know for taking the TAAS test. We even received hand-outs that were copies of past test questions so we could practice. It was so bad, we even had to keep notebooks. I truly think there was too much emphasis on learning “TAAS skills” rather than learning a normal high school education. We even had an incentive to pass the test. All sophomores who passed the test were given a free day from classes to go to Six Flags.
The TAAS test was apart of my school experience since as long as I can remember, so as I got older and results began to matter more, the test was something I was very used to and familiar with. It was never something I got nervous over or prepared for outside of school even. I always thought teachers made such a big deal about it considering how easy of a test it is. I did not feel like the test measured anything beyond very basic skills, and when I would do well on it, it was not something I felt extremely accomplished for. The writing portion I can recall being stressed the most in my English classes in high school. It was a very certain, structured style that was taught, and I think that has helped me because I notice my writing now sometimes reflects that style. Overall, I think it was a good educational experience.
The TAAS test was more of a nuisance than anything else in my opinion. I do not have a problem with standardized tests such as the TAAS test, but I do have a problem when a school district decides to have its’ teachers teach students how to pass TAAS. School districts place too much emphasis on how well its’ student do overall on this test. I do not know why so much emphasis is placed on TAAS. It is an eighth grade level test administered to tenth graders. If students are taught material on their level, then passing a test that is two levels below what they are should not be difficult. The TAAS test was the easiest test administered to me during high school. It was frustrating to practice for TAAS every day until the week before the test. I felt that it was a waste of time to practice grammar and mechanical skills that I had learned two years earlier. The writing prompts were worse. Writing a five-paragraph essay on a mundane topic did not help my abilities as a writer. I am almost certain that I would have done just as well with out a semester of reviewing and practicing for the test.
The taas test was never anything that I worried about because I took a pre-taas test in the eight grade and I passed with ease. The only preparation I had for the taas was given to us by our english teachers in class. She would give practice reading questions and lists of vocabulary. When I took the test my sophomore year I pretty much blew right threw it because it was too early in the morning and just guessed on the ones I didn’t. Overall I think the test is a little outdated and I am not a big fan of long standardized tests, but it really does see who has comprehended things in high school.
The TAAS test was one of the easiest tests I have ever taken in my life. I had a really bad experience with it because I had to take it about 5 years in a row because they kept changing what grades had to take it. I liked reviewing for it because I always made good grades on the practices and we didn’t have to do real work in our classes. I don’t think it was a very good educational experience for me because it was really easy and seemed pointless to me.
The TAAS Test was supposed to be a milestone in my high school years according to all my teachers. After taking the test I was upset because it had been the focus of my English classes for four years. I was told it would be the determinant of whether I went to college or not. From seventh grade until the middle of sophomore year, the year I took the real TAAS test, the major focus of all my English classes was short story comprehension, analogies, and the persuasive composition. Our teachers gave us the privilege of completing the TAAS tests from the previous twenty years trying to prepare us for our test. The State of Texas must consider the test a tell tale sign of your comprehension skills to put that much money, time, and effort into changing the test every year to make sure it is impossible to cheat. However, I do think the State of Texas Board of Education should not stress the TAAS Test to teachers as much as they do because I feel I was deprived of very valuable information that should have been focused on in a little more detail although it was not on the TAAS Test. In later years I was behind on information necessary to complete assignments that other students were familiar with. It could have been the teachers I had that stressed the test a little more than others could, but they were not remedial classes: I feel the information on the TAAS should be incorporated with normal English lesson plans instead of focusing on the TAAS and if there is time learning other information. The TAAS Test is a good evaluation of student’s skills, but the students should be prepared for the following years of school instead of prepared for the TAAS Test.