- English: I felt about my answers to about 20/30 and the others were educated guesses. Overall, I feel pretty good about this section.
- Math: I totally rocked the math portion of the test! There is only one question that I guessed on.
- Social Studies: This section was 50/50 for me. This is the subject that I spent the most time reviewing for, so it was really discouraging to find questions that were so random. I knew the answers to some, made pretty educated guesses on others, and totally guessed on some.
- Science: This section was ridiculous! I can honestly say that I only felt confident about my answer to maybe five questions in the section. The rest were mostly guesses, some using a little background knowledge. (After the test, I asked my friend Andrea who is a science minor how she felt about it, and she was equally frustrated, which made me feel a little less ... dumb.)
In all honesty, studying for/anticipating the Praxis II was extremely stressful for me. I hate standardized tests like this. That is one of the reasons that I chose to transfer to Alverno. I didn't feel like I was getting the most of my education at UW-Madison by constantly cramming for exams, taking them, and forgetting most of the information.
As a elementary or middle school teacher, I realize that it is important that I know the content that I am teaching. In fact, that is essentially standard one of the Wisconsin Teaching Standards. However, I find it impossible to know everything about English, math, social studies, and science. Obviously, I will work my hardest to master a particular concept before teaching it to my students, but that is what the plethora of resources available to me are for. Plus, through my teacher education, I have learned that one of the best ways to master a concept is to teach it to others.
Personally, I don't agree with the mentality behind the test, because I think it is much more important to learn strategies for how to most effectively teach, rather than the actual content that I will be teaching. And that is exactly what I am doing through my education at Alverno. But I can't change the requirements ...
Anywho, last night, as I was studying cramming, I was stressed out. And for me, stress makes me eat. It's a bad habit, and it got the best of me last night. I finished off a bag of baked chips, had a piece of lasagna that Brad's family ordered for me with their dinner, then got "hungry" again later and decided to eat the leftovers from my lunch at work (half of a giant turkey club sandwich). I also snacked on some mini-choclate eggs still left from our Easter basket. I say "hungry," because I think I was more anxious than hungry, but used food to calm my nerves. Needless to say, it didn't work and just made me feel sick to my stomach. Not cool.
I woke up this morning feeling restless. (My nerves also prevented me from getting a solid night's sleep.) I hopped in the shower, ran through my notecards one last time, forced myself to eat a bowl of cheerios with banana and chia seeds, and headed to the test. I was feeling prepared with my number two pencils, calculator, and two copies of my admission ticket. I left my purse in the car, because the online directions were very strict about not brining extra belongings into the "testing environment," especially cell phones. Well, in my effort to follow the rules, I had forgotten to bring my ID. I had to sprint to my car to grab it. Good thing I have been working out! It was a little very stressful, but it actually got my blood flowing (hopefully to my brain!).
I left the test feeling totally unsure of whether or not I passed, but I am hoping for the best. Then, I headed out to lunch with my friends Andrea and Amy. We decided to try AJ Bombers, a burger bar that locals rave about. We all ordered the basic AJ Cheeseburger and shared sides of sweet potato chips, fries, and cheese curds. We also ordered beers all around! (I stuck with MGD64, my go-to calorie-concious beer.) Now I know this was not the healthiest meal by any means, but I am not going to lie; burgers and beer provided good comfort food after the anxiety of the past few days.
I came home and lounged on the couch for the rest of the afternoon, hoping for the motivation to head to the gym. The motivation never really miraculously appeared, but between the binge eating of last night and the burger/beer splurge, I knew it would make me feel better. I did 30 minutes of running/incline walking on the treadmill and some strength training to round out an hourish-long workout.
My apologizes for the lack of pictures in this entry, but it has been a rough couple of days (obviously!). I am looking forward to some healthy eating and good workouts over the next couple of days to re-cooperate from Praxis-mania. Keep your fingers crossed for good news!
How do you deal (or try to deal) with stress?
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