By JASON COLLINS
Bee-Picayune staff
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posted July 11 -
Skidmore-Tynan High School Principal Patty Holubec said that she is pleased with the overall TAKS scores, which included 100 percent passing rates in various grades throughout the district.
She commended the students for their work saying that there is no magic secret to getting children to succeed.
“There are really no tricks,” she said. “It is just hard work and following those kids...
“They don’t always like the individual attention by us but they get it. If they are not passing, they come see me.”
Coaches, she added, play a big part in encouraging students to pass their classes and the TAKS.
“Coaches are a help, especially in the fall when football is going on,” she said. “They want to play. Quite honestly, ‘no pass, no play’ is one of the best things to happen to our academics...
“(Coaches) hold the keys to the things those kids really want to do.
“If we use all of those things correctly throughout the year, it helps.”
At the high school, 100 percent of the 11-grade students passed the social studies portion of the TAKS test.
In reading, 98 percent passed. For math and science, it was 86 percent.
At the junior high level, 100 percent of both the seventh- and eighth-grade students passed the reading portion and the same is true for the fifth-grade students at the elementary.
While not every grade scored a 100 percent passing, many scored close.
Ninety-eight percent of the seventh-grade students passed the writing portion of the TAKS, which is higher than the state average of 93 percent.
For the 10th-grade students, 96 percent passed the social studies portion, up from the state average of 91 percent.
While most passed, some areas showed lower percentages.
Just 77 percent of the 10th-grade students passed the science portion, which is still higher than the state average of 67 percent.
Holubec said that getting the students to pass the test can sometimes be difficult, but it gets easier with each test.
“Every time they pass a test, their chances of passing the next is greater,” she said.
That is why the teachers and administrators are doing everything they can, including having a second bus route for the kids who stay late for tutoring.
As in years past, science and math are again the hardest for students.
The reason, she said, is the very nature of the subject.
“If you look at English language/arts, there is a continuum,” she said. “If you read well, write well, you are going to do well.”
However, students in the other fields, must learn biology one year, then turn towards chemistry another.
“Biology is nowhere near chemistry,” she said. “That is the main reason those tests are harder to pass.”
The secret, she said, is in the teaching of the reading and writing disciplines.
“If you can teach a child to read well, you can teach them a whole lot of whatever they need to learn,” she said. “Reading is the real key to so many things.”
How well would you do on the TAKS?
1. The mass of Earth is close to 5.97 × 1024 kilograms, and the mass of Venus is close to 4.87 × 1024 kilograms.
What is the combined mass of both planets?
A 1.08 × 10 25 kg
B 2.91 × 10 49 kg
C 1.08 × 10 48 kg
D 1.10 × 10 24 kg
2. Which of the following is a sufficient condition to show that a certain equation does not represent a linear function?
A The graph of the equation has a slope of zero.
B The graph of the equation has the set of all real numbers as its domain.
C The graph of the equation has an undefined slope.
D The graph of the equation has exactly one y-intercept.
3. Brian was 1 out of 25 students who took a practice college entrance exam. No two students scored the same on the exam. If x represents the number of students who scored higher than Brian, which expression represents the number of students who scored lower than Brian?
A 24 − x
B x − 24
C 25 − x
D x − 25
4. A hockey player pushed a puck toward the opposite side of a level ice rink. The player expected the puck to continue all the way across the ice, but the puck slowed and stopped before reaching the other side. Which of these best explains why the puck failed to slide all the way to the opposite side?
A The puck’s temperature changed.
B An upward force acted on the puck.
C The puck’s momentum remained unchanged.
D An opposing force acted on the puck.
5. Which of these is an advantage of producing electricity using solar power plants rather than using coal-fired power plants?
A Solar power plants can operate for about 10 hours per day.
B Solar power plants can produce variable amounts of energy.
C Solar power plants produce fewer pollutants.
D Solar power plants require continuous sunlight.
6. The transfer of heat by the movement of air currents in Earth’s atmosphere is an example of —
A conduction
B convection
C radiation
D fusion
So how did you do?
1. A; 2. C; 3. A; 4. D; 5. C; 6. B
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