TJ SIS/Essay Test

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There were only 32 kids at our test site according to my DS. He was also very excited by the main question. Said he solved it quickly but it took awhile to actually write it up! He talked about the question for nearly 10 minutes! (remind me to never fall ill on a boat and have the closest coast guard 400 miles away. Or at least I want to be on a boat traveling faster than 10 miles an hour!)

I was most amused by how my son said he had a hard time thinking how to write since there was no spell check on the software! Said he picked words he knew how to spell a few times!! Yes, dear little one, spelling is important!

am a little scared that a kid who needs spell check is considering TJ.

Seriously PP? The skills needed to do well at TJ and being adept at spelling are quite different.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There were only 32 kids at our test site according to my DS. He was also very excited by the main question. Said he solved it quickly but it took awhile to actually write it up! He talked about the question for nearly 10 minutes! (remind me to never fall ill on a boat and have the closest coast guard 400 miles away. Or at least I want to be on a boat traveling faster than 10 miles an hour!)

I was most amused by how my son said he had a hard time thinking how to write since there was no spell check on the software! Said he picked words he knew how to spell a few times!! Yes, dear little one, spelling is important!

am a little scared that a kid who needs spell check is considering TJ.

Seriously PP? The skills needed to do well at TJ and being adept at spelling are quite different.

Yes, spelling has nothing to do with intelligence. I've known two extremely intelligent people who had dysgraphia.

Writing ability, however, is quite important for a TJ kid. The humanities classes at TJ are just as challenging as the STEM classes; the teachers of all the classes at TJ hold the kids up to high expectations of their performance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There were only 32 kids at our test site according to my DS. He was also very excited by the main question. Said he solved it quickly but it took awhile to actually write it up! He talked about the question for nearly 10 minutes! (remind me to never fall ill on a boat and have the closest coast guard 400 miles away. Or at least I want to be on a boat traveling faster than 10 miles an hour!)

I was most amused by how my son said he had a hard time thinking how to write since there was no spell check on the software! Said he picked words he knew how to spell a few times!! Yes, dear little one, spelling is important!

am a little scared that a kid who needs spell check is considering TJ.

Seriously PP? The skills needed to do well at TJ and being adept at spelling are quite different.

Yes, spelling has nothing to do with intelligence. I've known two extremely intelligent people who had dysgraphia.

Writing ability, however, is quite important for a TJ kid. The humanities classes at TJ are just as challenging as the STEM classes; the teachers of all the classes at TJ hold the kids up to high expectations of their performance.

Exactly! And spelling skills and writing ability are not the same. If anything, knowing how to correctly use spell check IS part of an editing process. Kind of silly for the program to not have this feature. Would rather see a kid know how to access information.

[Anonymous]

I think it's also the fact that kids rely so much on spell check now, that when the pressure is on and you'd like it - you don't have it

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My DS was at Hughes and said there were about 25 kids, compared to 100+ at the first round test. He felt very confident, but when pressed, I realized he did not mention an important activity. He seemed cool as a cucumber, and now we wait.

My DS was also at Hughes. I wonder if my son knows him... Also, my DS said that there were about 75 kids on the first round. The other day it was 23.
Are we allowed to discuss answers online?

[Anonymous]

I'm The first poster who posted about Hughes. I'm not sure that my son counted the first time so his guess was probably way off. For the person asking about Hughes, we have been extremely happy there. We are thankful he is not in a pressure cooker but he is doing extremely well, is very happy, and obviously doing well enough to pass the TJ exam.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There were only 32 kids at our test site according to my DS. He was also very excited by the main question. Said he solved it quickly but it took awhile to actually write it up! He talked about the question for nearly 10 minutes! (remind me to never fall ill on a boat and have the closest coast guard 400 miles away. Or at least I want to be on a boat traveling faster than 10 miles an hour!)

I was most amused by how my son said he had a hard time thinking how to write since there was no spell check on the software! Said he picked words he knew how to spell a few times!! Yes, dear little one, spelling is important!

am a little scared that a kid who needs spell check is considering TJ.

You can be a math/science genius and a terrible speller, you know. Or maybe you are the parent whose kid gets a 100% on all their spelling tests and thinks they should get into AAP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There were only 32 kids at our test site according to my DS. He was also very excited by the main question. Said he solved it quickly but it took awhile to actually write it up! He talked about the question for nearly 10 minutes! (remind me to never fall ill on a boat and have the closest coast guard 400 miles away. Or at least I want to be on a boat traveling faster than 10 miles an hour!)

I was most amused by how my son said he had a hard time thinking how to write since there was no spell check on the software! Said he picked words he knew how to spell a few times!! Yes, dear little one, spelling is important!

am a little scared that a kid who needs spell check is considering TJ.

You can be a math/science genius and a terrible speller, you know. Or maybe you are the parent whose kid gets a 100% on all their spelling tests and thinks they should get into AAP.

No. But my math whiz kid was a great speller too.

I get that SOME very bright kids can have difficulties with spelling, I do. But to say spelling is unnecessary because we have spell check is like saying knowing how to add, subtract, multiply and divide doesn't matter because we have calculators. You still have to get the basics no matter how plugged into information you are. You still need to be able to reason and express yourself. A child whose ability to write intelligently is limited without a computer or other aids is not going to come across as well as a child who isn't. And when we're talking about TJ applicants, I'm willing to bet you have plenty of math geniuses who can spell just fine without spellcheck.

[Anonymous]

In that case I will prefer if they let kids write essay on paper & also be judged on poor hand writing and quality of pen ( and some one to test the quality of pen... really? how far are we going?)
Now read again what you write "spell check is like saying knowing how to add, subtract, multiply and divide doesn't matter because we have calculators", think about it + - / * is not same as spelling - it's way easier right? So why most fail in math and science?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In that case I will prefer if they let kids write essay on paper & also be judged on poor hand writing and quality of pen ( and some one to test the quality of pen... really? how far are we going?)
Now read again what you write "spell check is like saying knowing how to add, subtract, multiply and divide doesn't matter because we have calculators", think about it + - / * is not same as spelling - it's way easier right? So why most fail in math and science?

Huh? Handwriting and pen quality aren't relevant to content. Sorry. Your analogies need work.

[Anonymous]

Agree, I need to work more on my essay

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DS was at Hughes and said there were about 25 kids, compared to 100+ at the first round test. He felt very confident, but when pressed, I realized he did not mention an important activity. He seemed cool as a cucumber, and now we wait.

My DS was also at Hughes. I wonder if my son knows him... Also, my DS said that there were about 75 kids on the first round. The other day it was 23.
Are we allowed to discuss answers online?

Discussing them right now is a bad idea. Accommodations and makeup testing hasn't happened yet, so there are still kids waiting to test.

[Anonymous]

Questions and Prompts will not be same for makeup tests.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Questions and Prompts will not be same for makeup tests.

How do you know this?

[Anonymous]

I don't think it matters if the helicopter left at 1:30, 10:30 or noon. It was an essay question to show your work and how you could explain yourself.