Comparing Test Scores—Your Student’s and Norm’s
Have you ever wondered who your student is keeping up with when he takes an achievement test? Let us introduce you to “Norm.”
We’ll call him “Norm” for now, though he isn’t a “normal” student in the normal sense of the word. In fact, he isn’t a student at all—he is a group of several thousand students called the “normative group” or control group that your student is compared to on test scores.
First of all, “Norm” did not test this year.
He took the test a few years ago when the publisher selected a group to “try out” the test. If the publisher tried to run statistical scores based on all the students testing this year, it would take a year (or more) to calculate the scores!
Instead, the publishers chose certain schools to “test” their achievement test before publication. The proportion of private schools to public schools was based on the most current census at that time. Then they took those scores and calculated averages from the whole group. Obviously this is a huge—and expensive—project for the publishers, so they typically do it only every 10 years.
“Norm” is not a homeschool student.
Since not all homeschools register, the census doesn’t know how many there are. And the publishers would have a very hard time choosing which homeschools are best representative of the whole nation, let alone coordinate a nationwide homeschool testing session for them. Most homeschools aim for higher standards, so often the private school test score is the best comparison to evaluate.
“Norm” is not a perfect reader.
Remember, “Norm” is actually a group of students—some were strong readers and some were not. The publishers planned for this, though, and lowered the reading level for subjects like math, science, and so forth. This way even a poor reader can still show what he knows in these other subjects. Of course, vocabulary and reading comprehension use full-grade-level reading difficulty since that is the skill they measure.
“Norm” is not a straight A student.
He and his friends were just ordinary students. They had their own best and worst subjects. Some finished all the questions and some did not. Put together, they show you an “average” score. This is what your student is compared to. Your student will likely be higher on his best subject and possibly lower on his worst. Ideally, your student will come close to or come higher than “Norm’s” average on each subject.
Now that you’ve met “Norm” you will be able to better evaluate your student’s scores and determine whether you’re “keeping up with the Joneses”—or maybe even surpassing them!