Spatial IQ Test

The Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test, more commonly known as the FCAT, is a series of exams given to students of specific grade levels over the course of their public school career.  As Florida's public schools are guided by detailed “Sunshine State Standards” and benchmarks in all core realms of academia, the FCAT serves to critically measure students' retention and comprehension of the mandatory curriculum. 

For example, students are assessed depending on grade level on information from topics such as:

·         Grades 3 through 10 – FCAT evaluates reading skills and abilities

·         Grades 5, 8, and 10 – FCAT evaluates reading, mathematics, and science skills and abilities

·         Additionally, grades 4, 8, and 10 evaluate key content material in addition to writing skills

In more closely examining the FCAT, the assessment focuses on “Sunshine State Standards,” which have gradually been established to represent the key material that Florida residents believe their children must understand at each specific grade level. 

For example, the FCAT reading assessments evaluate the construction of meaning from informational and literary texts, while the FCAT mathematics assessments evaluate students' comprehension of the sense, concepts, and operations of numbers, while the math tests continue to gradually evaluate students' measurement, geometry, spatial sense, algebraic, and data analysis skills. 

The ITBS testing (Iowa Test of Basic Skills) is a comprehensive standardized assessment test which evaluates a student's level in all of the major subject areas including Language Arts, Math, Science, and Social Science.

Here is a breakdown of what specifically is covered for grades 1 & 2:

• Vocabulary
  
  • Reading Vocabulary
     
  • Word Analysis
     
  • Assess how well students can recognize letters and letter-sound relationships
     
• Reading Comprehension
  
  • Using print, context, and picture cues to identify unfamiliar words; completing sentences that tell about a picture by choosing a word for filling in a blank; and answering multiple-choice questions after reading a brief story
     
  • Listening
     
  • Short oral scenarios are presented, and then one or more multiple-choice questions are read
     
  • Alphabetizing, using a picture dictionary, using a table of contents, and using maps to determine location, direction, and distance
     
• Language
  
  • Skills in spelling, capitalization, punctuation, and skills in usage and expression in writing

• Mathematics
  
  • Math Concepts: numeration and number systems, whole numbers, geometry, measurement, fractions, currency, and number sentences
     
  • Math Problem Solving: solve brief word problems and interpret information presented in graphs and tables
     
  • Math Computation: addition and subtraction problems

• Social Studies
  
  • The content is taken from the areas of geography, history, government, economics, sociology, and the other social sciences
     
• Science
  
  • The content is taken from the areas of life science, earth and space sciences, and physical sciences

The TerraNova is a nationally-administered standardized assessment test similar to the ITBS (Iowa Test of Basic Skills) and the SAT-10 (Stanford Achievement Test, Version 10).  The overall purpose of the TerraNova is to provide achievement scores that are valid for most types of educational decision-making.  This gives teachers, parents, and tutors a better understanding of a student's educational strengths and weaknesses which can then be used to help differentiate the student's studies.

The TerraNova test includes questions in each of the 4 main subject areas: Reading / Language Arts, Math, Science, and Social Science / History.  Scores in each of these subject areas are then compared as a percentile with other students in the same grade around the nation.  These percentile scores can be useful in judging overall performance of a student irrespective to difficulty level of the questions themselves.  For example, a 90% on a very easy test may not be that good of a score and only put a student at the 50th percentile, but a 90% on a difficult test may be good enough for a 98th percentile meaning that the student scored the same or better than 98% of his or her colleagues.

Since the scores on a test like the TerraNova can be instrumental in shaping a child's education it is very important for students to do well.  That is why we have created extensive practice materials through our www.BrightEducation.com website.

Learn about TerraNova Practice Testing >

The word, IQ, seems to be not only on the minds of consumers but also companies looking for product names.  Toyota is unveiling one of their newest cars, the Toyota iQ.  It should be out in Europe soon and may make its way to America shortly.

What does this choice of naming say about the car or about the marketing strategies employed by Toyota?  One thing is clear - it's about intelligence.  Intelligent decision making.  Intelligent price.  Intelligent economy.  Intelligent consumer.   Especially during tough economic times, intelligent decision making is extremely important.

At FunEducation.com, we offer a free and fun way to test your intelligence.  Take our Online IQ Test and find out what your IQ score is.  It is a PhD-Certified and accurate exam and best of all, it's a free IQ test!