ELA Common Core History Practice Questions

posted by Karen Quinn, The Testing Mom - May 16th, 2013

If your child is facing an upcoming ELA Common Core test, you’re probably curious about the best way to help them prepare for this important and comprehensive literacy examination. Since there are several subject areas covered by the test, knowing where and how to begin can be confusing. Here, we’ll review the best ways to prepare and administer history practice questions for your child.

How to Choose Questions

If your child is in grades K through 5, the history and social studies portion of their tests will be integrated into English language comprehension and will focus more on understanding what they read than the recollection of facts.

A great way to begin is to look through your child’s current history or social studies textbooks. Testing is administered each year in grade-specific levels, making their current textbooks excellent bases for practice questions.

A page, paragraph or sentence in a textbook is a question in and of itself. A simple method of choosing the best questions is to choose pieces of text which are structurally different. For example, you might choose one paragraph which states both fact and opinion, asking your child to identify the different tones. You could also select a statement and ask questions regarding its intent (statement, persuasion or argument). Virtually any aspect of English reading, grammar or interpretation is a good basis for a history practice question. Visiting http://www.corestandards.org/ELA-Literacy/RH/introduction  will give you a breakdown of history and social studies subject matter by field and by grade level.

How to Administer Questions

 In order to achieve optimal results, experts agree that a low-stress, relaxed atmosphere is best for practice testing. Putting too much pressure on your child, or forcing them to practice for hours at a time, is generally counter productive. Instead of preparing your child, this type of forced practice instills anxiety, which can show up on testing day and result in an abnormally low score which does not reflect your child’s true abilities.