English Language Arts and Literacy Common Core Subjects

posted by Karen Quinn, The Testing Mom - November 8th, 2013

In the world of standardized testing, the English Language Arts and Literacy Common Core tests are relatively new. Designed through a collaboration between the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) and the National Governors Association (NGA), as well as many educators and administrators across the country, the tests have two main goals.

Graduating Senior Skills

In recent years, as more high school seniors were found to be graduating without the minimal skills needed to enter college or satisfy employer requirements, it became clear that some form of country-wide standards needed to be created.

Graduating seniors across the country have, in the past, been found to be several grade levels below their peers in many different subjects. Of these, two of the most troubling have repeatedly been English and math. Disturbingly, many seniors were found to have difficulties with very simple tasks such as properly constructing sentences for a resume or working basic math problems without the assistance of a calculator.

In response to this disturbing trend, the English Language Arts and Literacy Common Core test battery was created. One of its main goals is to ensure that all United States graduating seniors possess the skills they need to succeed in high education and in the workforce. You can read more about the creation of these tests at http://www.ccsso.org/Resources/Programs/The_Common_Core_State_Standards_Initiative.html.

Grade Advancement Skills

Rather obviously, one of the easiest methods of ensuring that graduating seniors are properly educated is to begin when students are very young. This is why the English Language Arts and Literacy Common Core tests begin at the kindergarten or even pre-kindergarten levels. At each grade level, age-appropriate tests are administered to ensure that each student is progressing at an acceptable rate. If a student is found to be behind in a particular subject, that student can be tutored, placed in different classes or otherwise helped to catch up to his or her peers before being advanced to the next grade level.