Test Anxiety

Stress and Test Anxiety in Schools: Are Test Scores Really the Most Important Factor in Education?

Embse, Nathaniel von der, and Natasha Segool, and John Carlson, and Anisa Goforth, and Justin Barterian. Heightened test anxiety among young children: Elementary school students' anxious responses to high-stakes testing. Wiley Periodicals, Inc, 2013.ResearchGate. Jan. 1980 .

Some may argue that testing can be a good way to determine someone's level of intelligence but the preparation of it can bring a boat load of anxiety. Students would legit do anything it takes to pass a test because the ideal they have in their minds is that if whether they pass or fail the exam it will have either a positive or negative effect on their futures lives. Some students can handle stress but some can’t. Speaking from experience taking a standardized test every other day to “test my growth” doesn’t leave me any room to think about or accomplish things that really need to be done or what I actually need to improve on to better myself. Stressing over taking tests can also be a an undermine to learning. All the pressure and the stressing of the students passing these standardized Test have the teachers neglecting the fact that they are not teaching students skills that go far beyond testing.

Throughout my high school career, a huge education barrier I had to overcome was test anxiety. Every time I was about to take any kind of test, I always felt agitated. However, as I progressed in to higher grade levels, tests became tougher and weighed more. Test anxiety was a very frustrating obstacle because I always aimed for high grades and high test scores. I was always a perfectionist on the assigned work but when it came to the tests, I struggled, and my nervousness grew. After a few tests, I realized I had to come up with an answer to my problem.

For most people, anxiety is something that occurs occasionally throughout their lives such as, right before a big meeting, presentation, tests, or a simple medical procedure. Other people are facing challenges daily due to anxiety; some are diagnosed while others are not. Anxiety includes, “distressingly unpleasant and maladaptive feelings, thoughts, behaviors, and physical reactions. Students with anxiety often worry about their competence, even when they are not being evaluated” (Durwin, 467). These struggles affect the performance of adults in their everyday lives and more specifically; a child’s performance in academics. It is the role as an educator, to aid students with anxiety and other disorders with coping with these

Test anxiety is a huge problem for many student. Several students in my class are much smarter than their test

In front of you lays a bubble sheet that will evaluate you and determine whether or not you’ll be given your high school diploma. Your number two pencil swims in your sweating palms as the clock becomes your worst enemy striking its hands closer to your indisputable fate. No matter how hard you worked through the whole school year, the amount of tutoring you took, the sleepless nights of studying and homework; This sitting, this paper will reflect your future in school. If that doesn’t give you anxiety then I don’t know what does. Millions of students across the globe have and are forced to go through these stressful settings in order to be compared and measure their intelligence. The intentions behind Standardized testing are well meant but

Test anxiety is a psychological condition that occurs when students undergo a constant state of stress and pressure which can significantly hinder a performance on a test (Columbia University Office Work/Life, 2013). There are many students who fully understand the material presented on the exams even if the results show otherwise. However, standardized testing only evaluates a performance on one particular day, not taking any external factors into consideration. For example, “if a student has an argument with their parents the morning of the test, chances are their focus isn’t going to be where it should” (Columbia University Office of Work/Life, 2013, p. 1). Standardized testing has become so important for future applications that an individual may stress about the consequences of performing poorly on the test and then in return, perform poorly. However, the results of these tests do not reflect an individual’s intelligence level and as previously mentioned, a student is more than just a number. People who oppose standardized testing argue that these tests are full of flaws and inaccurately measure an individual’s intelligence (Sacks, 1999). There are many external factors that influence test performance; however, these factors are not taken into consideration when it comes time for the

A student walks into the exam room. She knows she covered the material and studied very well. When the teacher hands her the exam paper her heart suddenly starts beating very fast, her hands begin to shake, she starts sweating, and she can barely breathe. The time is running out and she can’t control anything or remember the answers. After that, she fails that course because of anxiety. In order to avoid this scenario and perform better, you have to overcome anxiety. Combating test anxiety is not as difficult as some people think. Students can follow these simple guidelines in order to help ease anxiety.

According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA), anxiety disorders are the most common mental health problem, but many types of anxiety exist. The most frequent among children and adolescents is the infamous “test anxiety” (“Live and Thrive,” 2016). Sixteen to twenty percent of students in the U.S. experience high levels of test anxiety; another eighteen percent carry moderate levels of test anxiety. Since 2010, test anxiety levels in schools have risen over twenty percent due to the drastic requirements used for college entrance and state exams (Driscoll, n.d., p.1). Even a typical test can send these students into a panic. This makes perfectionists and adolescents with

Test anxiety has always been an issue I have struggled with and it has only increased since I started University. My personal experience with test anxiety leads to physiological symptoms such as nervous jitter, accelerated heart beats and light-headedness, all of which impacts my test taking skills and influence my decision making ability. This is a problem because although I am prepared with the knowledge for an exam, it still affects my judgement when writing my answers and thus causes an impact on my grades.

Although some struggle to understand why, a staggering 68% of teens say that school is the source of their stress. Additionally, 31% of teens reported feeling overwhelmed and 30% reported feeling sad or depressed as a result of their stress. This is a well known problem, especially in the U.S. The pressure of standardized tests creates a highly stressful environment for students nationwide. Students are constantly being pressured and forced to spend hours on hours, studying, preparing and memorizing when they could be doing something more engaging, positive and helpful. One teenage girl named Sophie Z decided to share her story. "I think all teenagers are stressed in some way, but as a junior in high school, the SATs and ACTs really freak me out. It feels like they can determine so much of your future!” Sadly, this story is one that feels familiar to most students, and it is apparent that standardized testing is the source of that. In fact, according to a recent survey conducted by The New York State Parent Teacher Association, 75% of the surveyed students are more stressed out about standardized testing than in previous years. As part of the same survey, 88 percent of respondents said they think students receive “too much” testing and test-related preparation. Sadly, perspectives like this are easy to find in today’s stressed student population. For example, one mother tells the story of her severely stressed young boy. In her story she explains that ”By 5th grade, he was worried about every assignment, every lesson, and every new concept. The night before each test was sleepless for the

Testing anxiety has a major effect on the outcome of student’s placement on standardized tests. Throughout my education experience I have struggled with taking tests. Furthermore, tests have affected the outcome of my educational career. On the other hand, I have overcame those hardships because of the opportunities I was given. Well, Mike Rose in “I Just Wanna Be Average” understands what it feels like to be misplaced. Throughout that time period, Mike Rose’s test and some other person with the last name Rose got their test scores mixed up. Furthermore, this was the start of how it affected Mike Rose’s academic career. Mike Rose and I have had many similar predicaments with what the effects of standardized tests can do to our literacy ability.

In life today society is surrounded by numbers, in particular schools districts depends on data from tests to evaluate how they perform in comparison to other districts. Students who attend public or private schools are subjected to take certain standardized tests to measure their academic achievements throughout their school life. Studies show, that these test do not always help student’s academic growth, in fact some researchers show that standardized test may hurt students in the long run. Due to the fact that retention is a possibility for students who perform low on standardized test, these students may develop test anxiety and disengagement from their academic career. An example in 2015 is that, the overall performance of student failing

When students experience test anxiety in a classroom environment, they sweat, become nauseated, shake, increase their heart rate and tense their muscles up. Avoiding these symptoms is very hard when they arise because they are nearly impossible to relax when the body already experiences the issue. Triggers of these symptoms occur immediately when a student walks into the classroom on test day. They hear other students discussing the test, and often start to overthink how much they studied and if they studied the correct information, leading to higher levels of anxiety. These issues are so common in classrooms because testing is required and many students dislike it. There are several ways in which teachers can help students learn to stay relaxed when testing to lessen the issue of testing anxiety. Brittany Balkam, a professor at a Saint Xavier University, claimed that one of the many things that could be done in order to help accommodate students’ needs for increased success on tests would be to hold testing interventions. During these interventions, the most common way found to help students overcome this testing anxiety issue was to teach multiple test taking strategies, as well as study strategies to heighten success. More students were reported feeling good or prepared for the test because they learned test taking strategies which helped them stay relaxed for the test. Students will distract themselves away from their symptoms if they focus more on “highlighting