The Big Test

When we began homeschooling in Oklahoma several people asked me if my kids would have to be tested to see if I'm doing a good job educating them. They were shocked that Oklahoma doesn't require testing for homeschoolers. When we moved to Colorado we learned that here we'd have to have our kids tested after they completed 3rd grade.

This year Danya was officially old enough to have finished 3rd grade, so we had her tested at our church's Christian school. They were taking the Stanford Achievement Test which took four days to administer. They also included a biblical knowledge and application test. Danya had a fun time, but was nervous about a couple of small areas. We just got the results back this week.

As a homeschooling parent there is always doubt in the back of your mind. You wonder if you're doing a good job educating your kids, whether they are on par with other kids their age, or if those days when you don't get anywhere near what you want to accomplished have added up to make them fall behind. Secretly, you hope that your kids are actually ahead of the curve, but wonder if you've helped them to advance in all the wrong areas. You hear what other kids are learning and wonder if you should have included some of that in your curriculum.

Getting Danya's test results back have officially calmed all our fears. On average, for all the subjects tested, Danya scored at an almost 10th grade level. She actually scored higher than the kids from the private Christian school who all scored higher than the national average. Most of her scores were in the 90th percentile. Her best score was in Mathematics Problem Solving where she scored "PHS" which means post high school. Her lowest score was in language which she still scored three grades ahead. So I guess I can relax now and enjoy the process more without worrying that I'm messing them up for life academically.