Dear Parents,

Welcome back and Happy New Year! It was wonderful to see all the smiling faces this morning as we came back! We wanted to share some information about testing next week.

Next week, we will have our middle of the year benchmark assessments. On Tuesday, students will take the math test. On Thursday, students will take the reading test. These tests are 4 hours long (time allowed, not necessarily takes that long) and are good practice for other tests.

We wanted to make sure that parents were aware of the expectations we follow during testing. The following are things the students will experience during testing:

• Classrooms are silent during testing.
• Students must raise hands to ask questions, go to the restroom or turn in testing materials.
• Teachers cannot help students with questions or answer choices. Our standard response is: “I cannot help you with that. Please do the best you can!” We have practiced this but we will continue to remind them.
• Students use test booklets and bubble sheets (we have practiced this a lot already)
• Students can have water bottles with them but they stay on the floor.
• Students can bring gum or hard candy (candy must be unwrapped and in a sealed baggie)
• Students will read a book after they have finished their tests and until all tests are turned in.

We know our 3rd graders are going to ROCK this test! Please remind your child that this is just a test, it’s nothing to be scared of. As long as they take their time and show their thinking (work, notes…) they will do great!

On these very special duo of days, please make sure your child is at school on time, especially if they eat breakfast at school. Please encourage your child to take their time and try their best! We only expect their best and we know they can do it! Please feel free to email us with any questions, before the day of the test. We will share your students progress (this is not graded for the report card, just used as data for our teaching) after the tests have been graded.