1.

In his paper I feel as though I did good in making all the

paragraphs flow together. Before I had a huge problem with making my essays

flow which made them sound awkward. I feel as though I was able to use good

transitional phrases to connect all my points together. Also, I connected all my

information by comparing my paragraphs together.

2. In this essay I feel as though I can still improve my conclusion. I

feel as if my conclusion is not yet very good and does not close the overall

statement. I have always had problems with writing conclusions for I cannot seem

to wrap everything up. I feel as though I did not wrap everything together and its

weak.
3. In the final draft I made two major revisions. One of these

revisions was citing the person or journal in the end of every quotation. In doing

this, I now let the reader know where I got my information and avoid plagiarism.

The second revision I made was explain my evidence furthermore. Although I

may have done some correct I still had a few where I simply summarized. In

explaining them I also added new ideas and included some of my opinions. These

two revisions were the ones which were most noted in my writing.
 Have you ever wondered whether standardized tests effectively measure one's

intelligence? If so, recent studies have shown that standardized tests don't accurately measure

one's intelligence. For as long as the educational system has been around Standardized tests have

been part of this system. These tests are given through a student's life up until they no longer

attend school. As students begin to take more and more of these tests they begin to question

whether Standardized tests actually measure their intelligence. As various students began

questioning these tests, research and studies have been made to be able to explain and

demonstrate if these tests really measure one's intelligence. Within these extensive research

psychologist found that there are various factors that can affect on how well a student performs

on these tests. Some of the main factors that affect a student are that although you might score

high on a test your cognitive abilities do not, not every attribute is tested, there are different

learning styles, and the brain's frontal lobe is different for everyone.

An experiment done by MIT, Harvard, and Brown universities demonstrated the effects

Standardized testings have on a student. The experiment involved measuring a student's

intelligence fluid which measure a persons reasoning skills. These students were from schools

in boston; The study was able to demonstrate that the schools accounted for very little of the

variation in fluid cognitive skills less than 3 percent for all three skills combined. (Trafton).

This percentage is significantly low considering what the tests are testing a student on. Having

this in in consideration, this shows that these tests can only accurately measure one of the many

cognitive skills. But what about the rest of the cognitive skills? Are they not as important?

Measuring only one of the many skills a student has is not an effective way of measuring

intelligence because not all abilities of a student are measured. These universities were able to

conclude that although the students score were high, some cognitive abilities remained low.
 As these universities continued testing the intelligence fluid-- the ability to analyze

abstract problems and think logically-- they found an interesting factor. The universities were

able to observe that programs designed to help students prepare for standardized tests increase

the intelligence fluid. This fluid is a sufficient way to measure intelligence because it

demonstrates a student's ability to understand a problem and be able to accurately answer it.

Although the universities saw how these programs can help students, their studies have found

that educational programs that focus on improving memory, attention, executive function, and

inductive reasoning can boost fluid intelligence, but there is still much disagreement over what

programs are consistently effective. (Trafton). Taking this into consideration, standardized

testings do not measure a student's intelligence because some programs may prove effective but

other may fail in doing so and that is not necessarily the students fault.. This is important because

if a program designed to help a student succeed in a standardized test proves to be ineffective,

the students in this program would not necessarily receive the help they were seeking for.

Following this information Gale Learning, part of Cengage learning, was also able to

prove why standardized testing does not measure a student's intelligence. Gale was studying the

different patterns and results of a standardized test and found that , because of the small sample

of knowledge that is tested, standardized tests provide a very incomplete picture of student

achievement. (Gale). This is a very important point because throughout the year students are

taught many different subjects. However, standardized tests do not test on all the different things

learned and focus only on some of the knowledge the students were taught through that year.

Although testing does measure some of the many attributes someone has it only relies on certain

ones. Some attributes such as creativity are left out of these testings. This is unfair because

students have stronger attributes and some that are not as strong and when taking these tests their
stronger attributes may not be included hence why standardized testing do not measure a

student's true intelligence.

Following these attributes, Doreen Fioretto, a principal and psychology teacher, says that

There are different types of learning abilities in which students are able to learn better.

(Valencia). There are students who are far better when being taught visually which includes

pictures than other who may be auditory learners; For example, some students are visual

learners, other are auditory learners and other are read-write learners. This is a huge disadvantage

when taking standardized testings because only one type of learning style is used when taking

the test. Therefore, students who learn in the way the test is given tend to do better because that

is their preferred learning style but the other students have a big misadvantage because that type

of testing may be their weakness. As it has been concluded by psychologist these read-write

learners often score better than the rest for the simple reason that, that is their preferred learning

style.

Similarly, these learning styles also come into comparison with the frontal lobe.

Principal Fioretto states, The frontal lobes job, you can say, is the maturity of an individual.

You can see from this that not everybody is at the same level when it comes to maturity.

(Valencia). Although all students taking these tests may be in the same grade level and even age,

that does not mean that they are all at the same level of maturity as others. For example, some

students may be more mature than other because of the way they were raised or they simple

developed faster than their fellow classmates. Along with this maturity, When students take a

very important test they tend to become stressed and feel pressure. (Valencia). In the same way

as maturity, some students are able to control or manage this stress while others may not know

how to deal with it. This is also a disadvantage for a student because throughout the test they will
be worried or stressed and this may cause them to not do good in their test. All this stress is given

due to the standardized itself because they feel as if they do not pass then they will either be

unprepared to move on to the next school year or not have leaned all the subjects taught to them

through the year. Along with this, the stress the students are facing does not allow them to

completely concentrate on the test because the stress blocks away or makes you forget certain

things (Valencia). This however is not their fault for they do not know how to deal with stress or

they are yet not mature enough to be able to take such a serious test and this stress can lead them

to forget things when taking the test which would not reveal their true intelligence.

To conclude, When taking a standardized test students face many factors which can

prevent them from achieving the grade they desire or to measure their intelligence. All these

factors are not a student's fault for every student is different and one should cannot expect them

all to pass these tests or be able to measure their intelligence. Perhaps in order to more accurately

measure a student's intelligence they should change these standardized tests to benefit a student

instead of giving them a disadvantage. For example, standardized tests should offer different

types of testing for auditory learners, visual learners, and so on. This would improve a student's

performance because they will be taking a test in their preferred learning style. In the way in

which standardized tests are done today they cannot accurately measure a student's intelligence

for they have many disadvantages which affect a student when taking the test.
 Bibliography

Anne Trafton. "Even When Test Scores Go Up, Some Cognitive Abilities Don't." MIT

News. MIT News, 11 Dec. 2013. Web. 22 Mar. 2016.

Harris, Phillip, Joan Harris, and Bruce M. Smith. "Standardized Tests Do Not Effectively

Measure Student Achievement." Standardized Testing. Ed. Dedria Bryfonski. Detroit:

Greenhaven Press, 2012. At Issue. Rpt. from "Chapter 3: The Tests Don't Measure Achievement

Adequately." The Myths of Standardized Tests: Why They Don't Tell You What You Think They

Do. 2011. 33-45. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 22 Mar. 2016.

Doreen Fioretto. "Standardised Testing." Personal interview. 3 Mar. 2016.