– 6 reasons why this might be, and what you can do to help
It can come as a shock if your child takes a mock test and scores poorly. It can also be bewildering: why have they done badly when their teacher said they were doing well?
There are several reasons why their score may be lower than you expected:
1) Perhaps they aren’t yet working at the level that the test demands
The Kent Test is designed to be harder than regular school work, and to identify those students attaining within the top 25% of children in their year. To be within this range, they need to be working ABOVE the level that is generally expected for their age group.
When working at this higher level, your child’s teacher should have reported to you (either in their written report or verbally at parents evenings) that they’re working “at greater depth” or “above expected” for English and Maths.
Students are unlikely to pass grammar tests if they are working “at expected”; they need to be working consistently above that. Beware of phrases like “at the right level”, or “they are doing well”; these do not always indicate that a student is working at the high level that the tests demand.
If in doubt, ask the class teacher outright whether your child is on track to achieve at greater depth.
So what can you do if they aren’t yet at this level?
You can work on supporting them gain the extra skills and knowledge they need. You could invest in some workbooks and text books (I find these Maths ones and these English ones to be very comprehensive), and create a schedule to help them yourself. Or you could seek the help of a tutor who knows the requirements of the Kent Test.
Beware that if your child is in Year 5, and is not already working at greater depth, it can be very hard work, both for them and for you, to raise their levels enough. The Kent Test examines content and skills from the entire key stage 2 curriculum, including some areas that are often not taught in schools until Year 6. The earlier you start, the better.
2) Perhaps they were affected by anxiety
While mock tests are really useful for lots of reasons, including reducing anxiety on the day, they can of course still feel scary for children. Students understand the significance of the Kent Test, especially those who might already have their hopes firmly set on a particular school, so it’s understandable that even practice versions of the test might invoke big emotions. If your child is usually working at greater depth, but scores uncharacteristically low in a practice test, anxiety may well be the reason.
Talk to your child so that they can feel reassured. Talk through what happens on the day (see this post) and talk (positively) about what will happen if they don’t score enough to pass. Try not to drive more anxiety by promising extra rewards if they pass. If the pressure of the test alone is enough to affect their scores, adding any extra will only be detrimental. There are also some useful tips for helping children deal with exam anxiety, here.
3) Perhaps they are unfamiliar with the style of questions
Some parts of the Kent Test can be totally unlike any other tests or work that students will have done in school. This is especially true of the Verbal Reasoning, Spatial Reasoning and Non-Verbal Reasoning parts, which are not explicitly taught in the curriculum at all, but it can also be true of parts of the English and Maths tests.
Many students are unfamiliar with the multiple choice style of questions, and may think this makes them easy to pick an answer that looks good enough, without really giving the other answer options much thought at all. In fact, in many cases the multiple choice format makes it more difficult; often there are two or three options that could seem correct, but the question requires that they think very critically about which answer is the best. Curriculum tests are not presented in this way, so it can be quite unfamiliar.
The most supportive and helpful thing you can do as a parent, is invest in practice books or packs that are specifically written in the style of the Kent Test, and support your child to work through them. The packs from GL are probably the best bet, since these are produced by the same publisher as the real test, so you can be confident that they are authentic in style. You can purchase them on the GL website, or you may be able to find them on Amazon.
This will give them the familiarity they need, in order to not be disadvantaged by this on the day.
4) Perhaps they ran out of time
The time limits for all parts of the Kent Test are extremely challenging. Students have to work very efficiently, but of course, without rushing and making mistakes. This is a comment that I often hear from students after they’ve taken the real test – that it was hard because the time went so fast.
It takes a lot of skill and practice to get used to working through the questions at a suitable pace, recognising when a question is taking too long, and judging when it would be wiser to input a “best guess” answer and move on. Deliberating too long can be costly.
There are books available with timed tests, such as these ones from CGP.
These can be very useful as the date of the test draws nearer, to ensure that your child is quickening their pace.
5) Perhaps they rushed, or did too much guessing
On the flip side of working too slow, is working too fast! Sometimes students are so acutely aware of the tight time limits, that they find themselves giving up on too many questions before they’ve really worked them out, thinking it would be better to move on. Of course, this creates its own problems too. None of the questions in the Kent Test are supposed to be easy (except maybe those in the practice sections!). They are intended to demand careful thought and consideration. In the Maths test, they usually require calculations or careful checking of diagrams or wording. In the reading part of the English test, they require careful analysis of the text and each of the answer options to determine which one best answers the question. In the Reasoning tests, the questions often require a process of careful observation and analysis, followed by elimination of answer options one-by-one, until only the correct answer is left.
None of the questions are intended to be quick or easy. It is important that students get used to successfully judging how long questions are taking. They must understand that in order to get enough correct answers, they will need to focus their attention on questions that are complex and longer as well, rather than guessing and hoping for the best. Again, timed practice tests can help students get used to this.
6) Perhaps they lost their place on the answer sheet or in the questions
This may sound unlikely to cause a problem, but I’ve seen it happen, and it can have a big effect on scores.
Firstly, students must input their answers on a separate sheet, nowhere near the questions. This is unlike other tests they will have done in school, where the answer spaces are usually right underneath or beside each question.
In addition, the answer sheets can be very easy to make mistakes on. They consist of rows of identical answer boxes, to draw lines in, like this…
Although the boxes are numbered, students can be so preoccupied with thinking about putting the answer in, that they forget to check the number of the box against the number of the question. There is the risk that once one answer is put into the wrong box, all the subsequent ones in that section will be too. Sometimes a student reaches the end of a section and realises when they run out of answer boxes (or they run out of questions), at which point understandable panic sets in as they realise their mistake. The effect of losing their place on the answer sheet can be catastrophic if they don’t notice and rectify it quickly.
This can be avoided by making sure that your child is aware of the risk and showing them how to keep their place carefully and double check before inputting each answer.
The instructions given in the test do warn them to make sure they keep their place on the answer sheet, but they don’t advise how. Getting into a habit of double checking numbers before drawing the answer lines in is a quick and simple strategy. Ticking off the questions in the question booklet just before they input their answer is also helpful (this forces them to look at the question number again). Placing their eraser on the answer sheet and moving it along next to each box as they answer that question, can also be a good idea.
These might seem like unnecessary measures, but having seen the effects of students losing their place, they are worth considering.
Mock tests and less formal practice tests are hugely valuable in the run-up to the Kent Test. Not only do they give students the beneficial experience of the style, timings and expectations of the test, but they also help you to pick up on these issues and begin fixing them, in advance of the real test. The alternative is to not be aware of the problem until after the test, and of course by then, there’s really not much you can do.
If you are interested in booking a mock Kent Test for your Year 5 child, please see the details of my small group mock test sessions, here.
If you are considering using a tutor to help your child prepare for the Kent Test, please see details of my Tutoring Service, and contact me to enquire about availability. You are also welcome to send me a message through my Facebook page.
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