A Guide to Free or Affordable GED Test Prep

One of the challenges of getting a GED is paying for classes, study materials or the test. And many students can’t afford the cost of childcare or transportation to attend classes. Or, some adult students simply can’t go to classes on a regular basis because of family and job responsibilities.

There are solutions. Though resources for adult learners vary, no-cost or low-cost classes and study materials for self-guided programs are readily available in most communities. There’s also help available online for GED students working on their General Education Development credential.

Here’s a guide to help you find resources:

1. Your Public Library may have many of the study guides and GED lesson plans available for loan, and may also have videos and CD ROM GED testing study courses as well. In some communities, the library even sponsors free GED classes.

2. Most Community Colleges offer free or affordable GED courses or classes in basic skills, which will apply to a GED study program. The cost of these GED courses will vary from area to area, but generally they’re not expensive. If classes are fee-based, check with the community college Financial Aid Office. You may be eligible for free classes.

3. In many communities, even childcare costs and transportation are available for GED students. Talk to local GED instructors; check with the community college Student Support Services.

4. Community-based nonprofit Family Support Agencies or Family Resource Centers are excellent sources for GED students. Contact your local agency and ask about classes, materials and other needs related to your educational goal such as childcare, transportation or adult education classes or grants. You may even qualify for a grant that allows you to study at home, on your own schedule.

5. Your local Public School District or University may have continuing education courses or adult education courses. There’s often grant money available to school districts that sponsor programs and classes for adult learners. Give them a call to see if they have the material you require for the GED test. You’ll probably want to check with the Central Office of the public school district, the nearest High School and with the Adult Education Office or Career Services office at the university.

6. Don’t forget about the local branch of your State Unemployment Office and local Department of Social Services. Both of these agencies may have funds or resources available through programs related to job training, workforce development, job readiness or a DSS family support or welfare-to-work program.

7. If you’re employed, your workplace is an excellent resource for adult education. Your employer may already sponsor a program, or be willing to sponsor your GED program and costs since your goal is just as significant to your employer as it is to you. Check with your employer or supervisor directly, along with the Workforce Development, Personnel or Human Resources officer or department. You may find you need to ask a variety of people in the workplace to find the answer you need.

8. Your local PBS television station broadcasts GED courses that you can take. PBS also offers some online courses for basic skills required for the GED test. They’re free.

9. PassGED was created to provide free support and low-cost help for GED Test candidates. Lots of free information, test advice and study guides are available, along with financial aid for an online GED program. You’ll also find a learning community of GED students and instructors at the online Message Forum who may have additional advice about free or low-cost GED materials. The website address is passGED.com.

10. You may also want to check with the American Council on Education, the national administrative agency for the GED. The ACE provides information about testing, official test sites, GED scores and transcripts. To locate your official state test site and administrator, a complete listing is available at passged.com/test_state.php.

About the Author: Leonard Williams, an e-learning instructor with passGED.com passGED.com, is also a curriculum specialist who focuses on research and development, implementation and assessment of best-practice learning solutions for adult learners and people with educational challenges. Leonard’s email is mailto:LeonardWilliams@passGED.com LeonardWilliams@passGED.com. He invites feedback and questions from GED students and instructors.

How To Self-Study For the LSAT

If you plan to prepare for the LSAT by book, ensure that you go slowly and understand all points thoroughly, just as you would for a university course textbook. You should plan to spend two to six months preparing for the LSAT. Do five 35-minute study sessions (with one ten-minute break after the third sessions) every other day for all LSAT preparation time. This parallels the timing for the actual LSAT, and will help you build the mental endurance needed for the LSAT.

First

Gain a basic understanding of logical reasoning. If you have not taken a basic logical reasoning course, either do so, or read a logical reasoning book such as Richard Feldman’s Reason & Argument, although Chapters One through Seven, Nine, and Ten are sufficient for the LSAT in that particular book. Obtaining logical reasoning skills is arguably the most important part of LSAT preparation. Without a basic foundation, you will likely have great difficulty with the LSAT. Working through the suggested chapters of Feldman’s Reason & Argument should take you about one month, if you do five 35-minute study sessions every other day.

Second

Work through the preparation material (not the former tests, i.e., LSAT PrepTests) provided by Law Services. Visit Law Services Downloadable Forms at www.LSAC.org. Scroll down to ‘LSAT Preparation: Sample Questions With Explanations’ and click on the link to view/download. The material is somewhat short, and will likely only take you a few days to work through.

Third

Most likely you will also wish to complete a commercial preparation book that provides an overview of all LSAT sections. Pick a single book and stick with it.

Fourth

Work through real, former LSAT tests and focus on your pacing (how many questions you will attempt), timing (how much time you will spend per question, game, or passage), and review each question afterwards, whether you got the question correct or incorrect. Take your time to ensure that you fully understand each question and exactly why choices are correct or incorrect. Do not make the mistake of taking plenty of tests with superficial review. Do not confuse quality and quantity — It’s better to take one test and fully review it than to take ten tests with minimal review. Remember that the LSAT is a standardized test and you will see similar material each time.

Law Services provides LSAT PrepTest 20 (October 1996) free for download. To download the test, visit Law Services Downloadable Forms at www.LSAC.org. Scroll down to ‘Complete Sample LSAT’ and click on the link to download. After download you may view and print the test.

What NOT To Do

Purchase used books from a student who took a live LSAT preparation class. Even if the student took copious notes, the text is still not designed for self-study.

Try to cram. The LSAT is a skills test, not a knowledge test. You must develop your logical reasoning and LSAT test-taking skills over time to achieve your maximum score potential. I suggest a minimum of two months for LSAT preparation, but three to four months is probably ideal. Over four months may be necessary, but should be avoided to keep you from getting bored and frustrated.

Michael W. Stone has taught test preparation for many years. He owns MacNichol.com MacNichol.com and Test-Preparation.net. Test-Preparation.net.

How I Scored a 180 on the LSAT

One of the most important steps to getting a high LSAT score happens before you ever open a book to begin studying. The test date you choose can have a significant impact on how high you score. To understand the importance, you should know that all LSAT scores are sent to the law schools to which you are applying. This means that law schools will see every LSAT score you have taken, your best, your worst, and everything in between. Due to this score reporting, it is advisable you only take the LSAT once, and make your one score count. The best time to take the LSAT is the June before your senior year. Taking the test in June means that you are far along enough in your studies, yet you still have plenty of time to apply, and you get the advantage of taking the test during the summer, when you are on a break from school. While the October test date is still early enough to apply for law school, it also falls around the time of midterms, and you could find yourself stressed and ill-prepared to take the LSAT in the middle of the school semester when so many exams and papers are taking up your time.

Take your first practice test long before you take the LSAT. Three to six months before June, schedule a saturday where you will wake up early, sit down at your desk, and take a practice test under the exact same conditions as the real LSAT. Buy a small, cheap, kitchen timer from the store and set each section’s time exactly. Only allow yourself the allotted time, and don’t stop or get distracted. You can easily download practice test online, or buy books with multiple tests. This first practice test will help you see what score you would make with no studying, and thereby tell you how hard you need to study to get the score you want. Most importantly, this test will tell you which section you need the most work on. More than likely you will not have an infinite amount of time to study for the LSAT, so you need to use your time effectively and spend the most time on the sections you score the lowest on. The national average LSAT score is 150, so you want to strive for over 150.

Use the data from your first practice test and take more practice tests. If your worst score was in Analytical Reasoning, take that section of practice tests many times. As you complete each practice test you will learn how the questions are structured so that you can answer them faster. You will also start to understand how the tests are scored, so you will learn which answers are correct. Additionally, you will become familiar with the test so that on test day, you are confident and calm. Continue taking individual sections as practice tests until you are happy with the score. Remember that the LSAT is not about memorizing facts. Therefore, you don’t need to study books or notes. The LSAT tests your thinking skills. The best way to improve these skills is with practice.

The final step in achieving the LSAT score of your dreams is in understanding the scoring of the test. Each test has approximately 101 questions. Your score is based on the number of questions you answer correctly. This means you are not penalized for guessing. You should answer every question, even if you don’t know the answer. Always make an educated guess if you don’t know the answer. This also means every question is given the same weight. If one question has you stumped, circle it and move on. When you are done, go back to the questions you have circled and try to answer the questions that will require the least amount of time first.

Kelli runs the lsat.testprepguide.info/ LSAT Test Preparation Center where you can find all the information you need to get a high LSAT score. Start your studying with an official lsat.testprepguide.info/ LSAT practice test.

Test Preparation

The first important thing to keep in mind while preparing for the test is that is not necessary to memorize and remember all the information. Good thing to be done is to analyze all information in general and fine the key words which help remember the most important things. Keywords should contain separate words which should be added with some phrases to explain and give definition of the keywords. So firstly the separate keywords should be found; then explanation phrases should be composed. Explanation phrases must not be remembered, they should be composed in your own words and express your own understanding of the key words. It is better to fix the key words and your own explanations as the notes. Such notes can easily and quickly refresh your memory just before the test begins. They will serve as a summary or an outline for the whole information.

Sometimes tests require not only knowledge and understanding of the whole information; they can also require presenting the details regarding definite pieces of information. In this case summary notes and outlines would not be so helpful. However, it would not be possible to memorize and remember all the details. Here the choice of questions to be answered is the best way to pass the test. Making the choice of definite questions can be based on their weight analysis. You can weigh the questions importance by yourself or you can ask your teacher which questions would give the greater importance on the test results. Focus on remembering the details of the questions with the greatest weight and leave the less important questions for the time left. While answering the questions during the test find these most important questions and give answers to all of them. Then, return to the questions left and give answers to them. Even if you do not have enough time for answering the rest less important questions you can still pass the test by gaining the limit needed for the grade by more important answers.

Whatever test should be done one general thing is to be remembered: you should practice a lot. If you want to succeed in test you must have good memory and time management skills. Memory development and time management skills can be provided best with practice. Find as many sample tests as possible to understand how much time you would really need and what gaps in knowledge you have. Finish each test practice with analyzing your weak and strong points, fix them in written form and keep these notes near you while doing the next test practice.

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Sacramento Schools Lose Charter Over Controversy

The role of charter schools in education at Sacramento Schools is constantly emerging and evolving. Sacramento Schools have been involved in the on-going battle between privately run charters and the public systems that fund them for years. The enormous impact of this inability to form a cohesive working relationship will come to a head on June 14th when the Sacramento Visual and Performing Arts Charter (VAPAC) closes its doors.

VAPAC was originally a part of the Sacramento Schools system. It began as a program within the Sacramento High School. When Sacramento Schools decided to make that a charter in 2003, VAPAC leased separate space and established its own charter. Part of what makes the Sacramento Schools’ charter programs difficult is determining who is in charge. Charter programs like VAPAC are fully funded by public funds, yet have their own governing boards. This is what landed VAPAC and the Sacramento Schools in court this past year.

Sacramento Schools demanded the authority to fire administrators governing the charter school, citing budget and student safety concerns. VAPAC leaders disagreed. The lawsuit was finally settled in September of 2006. However, when VAPAC tried to get a new charter from Sacramento Schools, they were denied. Officials in the Sacramento Schools district office said that the charter was not able to produce the necessary curriculum and budgets requested.

So where does this leave VAPAC students, the charter, and Sacramento Schools? VAPAC Director Arbatel de la Cuesta and some others are opening a new private school, the Sacramento Art Conservatory. About two dozen students are currently enrolled. But for many the $7,000 annual tuition eliminates private school as a possibility. This leaves many of Sacramento Schools’ students scrambling to locate a new school. It also leaves Sacramento Schools without an arts school.

In an error of mandatory testing and higher standards, many Sacramento Schools’ educators and parents are already concerned about the lack of balance as time for art, music and physical education give way to academic test preparations. Tom Barentson, Deputy Superintendent for Sacramento Schools, has stated that Sacramento City Unified will have another arts program. He just can’t say when it will be, or whether it will be another charter or part of an existing program.

That eliminates one option of school choice for many Sacramento Schools’ students. And this is not a controversy likely to fade away soon. Sacramento Schools are trying to look at all the options it can to use a public school budget to meet rising standards for its many students. But until local school boards, like the Sacramento Schools, find a better way to govern charter schools, the controversy will continue.

Patricia Hawke is a staff writer for Schools K-12, providing free, in-depth reports on all U.S. public and private K-12 schools. For more information please visit schoolsk-12.com/California/Sacramento/index.html Sacramento Schools

Philadelphia Schools Gains New Institute for Teacher Diversity

The Philadelphia schools need to improve the effectiveness and diversity of their teacher workforce. Currently, 85 percent of their students are African American, Latino and Asian, but they have only 38 percent teachers of color.

After discussions initiated by Congressman Chaka Fattah with School Reform Commissioner Sandra Dungee Glenn, Philadelphia schools’ secretary of education, President and CEO Dr. Sharon Robinson of the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE), and the AACTE’s Vice President M. Christopher Brown II, a resolution to the Philadelphia schools’ diversity problem was conceived.

Fattah, Philadelphia schools officials, and other partners in a joint news conference officially launched the Dr. Ruth Wright Hayre Urban Teaching Institute in April 2006. The institute is supported by the AACTE and Temple University’s College of Education, and operated by the Philadelphia schools. Its purpose is to train student teachers as urban classroom specialists, who will then be recruited into full-time teaching positions with the Philadelphia schools.

The ground-breaking institute will recruit college students from 700 of the best teacher training colleges across the nation. They are looking for the best and the brightest future teachers, who already are committed to making a difference in urban education. Though they will begin with 20 to 30 teachers this fall, the goal is to prepare up to 100 student teacher “fellows” each year for urban teaching positions within the Philadelphia schools. At least 50 percent of these teachers will be of color.

In addition to the urban classroom training, the institute will provide:

• Improved pass rates among teachers of color on the Praxis exam through a test preparation initiative. The exam is required for teacher certification.
• A cultural proficiency program to assist teachers to connect their classroom instruction with the students’ diverse cultural experiences.
• Cultural proficiency standards have been proposed for use in evaluating Philadelphia schools educators.
• A teacher diversity advisory council will advise the Philadelphia schools on its teacher diversity initiatives, and will consist of community-based partners.

The Philadelphia schools and Fattah’s office will provide funding, with the Congressman pledging to secure grant money for the institute. Marketing efforts have been focused on teacher recruitment from universities with large African American and Latino enrollments in nearby states and Puerto Rico.

The institute is named for the outstanding Philadelphia schools educator, Dr. Ruth Wright Hayre (1910-1998). Hayre was the first African American to teach full time in the Philadelphia schools, the first African American senior high school principal in the Philadelphia schools, and the first African American and female president of the Philadelphia schools board of education. She won numerous awards locally and nationally, and co-wrote “Tell Them We Are Rising: A Memoir of Faith in Education” with Alexis Moore and Ed Bradley. Hayre exemplifies what the institute stands for — diversity and quality teachers. The institute fulfills Fattah’s belief that “you don’t have to sacrifice diversity to have quality” in the Philadelphia schools.

Patricia Hawke is a staff writer for Schools K-12, providing free, in-depth reports on all U.S. public and private K-12 schools. Patricia has a nose for research and writes stimulating news and views on school issues. For more information on Philadelphia schools visit schoolsk-12.com/Pennsylvania/Philadelphia/index.html Philadelphia Schools

Test Preparation Tutoring

Standardized tests have plenty of resources available to prepare candidates. Test preparation tutoring programs can be found both in libraries and online. There are many forms of tutoring, such as home tuition with coaching, self-tutoring or group tutoring sessions. Selecting a test preparation-tutoring program should be based on the difficulty of the test, your knowledge levels and remaining time until the test has to be taken. Test preparation tutoring for standardized tests may be your best strategy for preparing and successfully passing an important exam.

Different forms of test preparation tutoring

Here are some of the opportunities and variations you can take when considering tutoring for a test:

· Individual home test preparation tutoring – this approach provides the user with a series of resources (either print or online), such as guidebooks and question and answer tests. Many people favor the reduced costs of this method, but self-determination plays an important role in the success of this approach. Since the individual is left with both the test taking and evaluation tasks, determination levels might drop with some people.

· Group study and mind mapping test preparation tutoring – similar to leaning in class, this classical approach also employs some modern learning techniques, such as mind mapping.

· Multiple test taking – different forms of test preparation tutoring are available for this highly popular test type. Learn how to master the question and answer approach and how to prevent your mind from forgetting essential information.

· Computer based test preparation tutoring – learning the logic and characteristics of computerized tests is essential, especially since more and more tests are presented in an electronic form.

Things to remember during test preparation tutoring programs

The single most important thing you have to remember is to keep your determination level close to maximum at all times while getting ready for an exam. The best and most sophisticated test preparation tutoring programs won’t be able to replace lack of motivation, so maintaining a constant sense of hope and positive affirmation in your ideal is key to any exam success. Of course, once you are motivated, it is time for some efficient test preparation tutoring. Try to become familiar with the requirement of the exam a long time before taking it. Study while keeping in mind what environment the test will be in and what the most frequent requirements are. And when the test time arrives, make sure to let your rational side dominate the emotional one, and the end result will be a success.

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