Helping Your Child With Test Anxiety or Nervousness
It’s the end of the school year, and we all know what that means…..End of Grade and End of Course testing time! For many elementary aged kids, specifically third graders in North Carolina, this might be the first time they’ve ever had to take a high-stakes standardized test in school. For older students, this time of year might bring about familiar feelings of overwhelm, stress, panic, and nervousness.
Whether your child is an academically middle of the road student, a high achieving AIG student, a student with a learning disability, a twice-exceptional student, or a fun combination of all of the above, taking end of grade and end of course tests can bring up big feelings. For students who have historically performed poorly on tests, there might be a feeling of hopelessness and dread. “Here we go again…” they may think to themselves. For students who aren’t accustomed to experiencing academic failure, there may be an internal fear of what might happen if this is the test they experience failure on. “I’m the smart kid, so if I don’t pass this test, what does that say about me? Will everyone be disappointed?” they might ask.
Some students simply didn’t have the type of school year that resulted in a feeling of confidence and being well-prepared for end of grade testing. They might have experienced family emergencies, sickness resulting in missing a lot of school, changing schools mid-year, changing teachers mid-year, medication adjustments, or any number of disruptions in the continuity of their school year and their ability to consistently focus, learn, and retain the information needed to feel confident when they sit down to take the test at the end of the year.
Unfortunately, against all current research about standardized testing’s bias, lack of accuracy of measuring student learning and growth, and developmental inappropriateness for young students, it seems to be here to stay. Here are some ways you can help your child manage their worry about passing the End of Grade or End of Course Tests.
1. Validate their feelings, but help them reframe their negative thoughts.
The first step in helping your child deal with worry or anxious thoughts is ALWAYS to validate how they’re feeling. “I hear that you feel really worried about the test coming up, it sounds like you really aren’t looking forward to it. Is that right?” This type of validation opens up the door for your child to respond and elaborate on their feelings. If your child has thoughts like, “I’m going to fail because I always fail!” validate the feelings behind that thought (fear, hopelessness), but help them reframe the thought. “It sounds like you’re afraid of failing the test, is that right? Has there been a time you didn’t fail a test, though? Remember that test you took in social studies last week, you didn’t fail that one, right?”
2. Help them learn calming techniques.
If your child gets nervous or anxious before taking a test, breathing techniques will help calm the “panic” part of their brain and activate the “thinking” part of their brain (it’s science!). Techniques like hand breathing, star breathing, and one nostril breathing are all easily google-able techniques that a child can use before a test discreetly to help calm their nerves.
3. Talk to your child about what will REALISTICALLY happen if they do not do well.
Sometimes kids have wild imaginations. “If I don’t pass, I will fail the school year!” “I will have to go back to my old school!” “I’ll be grounded all summer!” Help your child find the balance between the expectation to do their best, and worrying themself to death over a standardized third grade test. They’re eight years old. Help them put this into perspective.
4. Celebrate when it’s over!
The EOG and EOC tests are stressy! Let your child know that if they do their best on the test, take their time, go back and check their work if they’re able, DON’T RUSH, use their test taking strategies provided by their teacher, and use their calming strategies, then you will celebrate together when it’s over. Celebrate the effort!
The end of the year can be a lot. Awards days, graduations, testing, teacher appreciation week, ALL THE THINGS. As moms, we sometimes have to check ourselves and make sure we aren’t transferring our stress and overwhelm onto our children. We have to keep things, like end of grade testing results, in perspective so that we can then help our children keep them in perspective. EOG’s are a tiny blip on the radar of our child’s life, and we can help them through it. You got this, mommas!
