By Aviv Weiss, Khan Academy Districts
Each quarter, we sit down with Dr. Kristen DiCerbo, Khan Academy’s Chief Learning Officer, to reflect on what she’s seeing in the field, in the research, and in the data. This time, with SAT prep top of mind for many districts, we asked her to share how she’s thinking about assessment, motivation, and meaningful practice.
Aviv Weiss: What makes practice meaningful when it comes to preparing for something like the SAT?
Kristen DiCerbo: A major element of SAT preparation is mimicking testing as closely as possible. Students should definitely take practice tests to get a feel for the amount of stamina it takes to get through a test and get familiar with the environment that tests are taken with.
After taking a practice test, students should then target practice at the areas where they struggled. Our practice at Khan Academy is good for many reasons, including that our partnership with College Board means our practice questions closely reflect the style, format, and difficulty of the test.
Finally, meaningful practice should be about learning, not just cramming. Many students have gaps in their knowledge for a variety of reasons and filling those gaps will help them not just on the exam but in their future endeavors. An approach that focuses on mastery of skills means that students are more likely to be able to retain and apply information, both on the test itself and after.
Aviv: You’ve talked before about the importance of engagement over time. What have you learned recently about what motivates students to stick with something hard like SAT prep?
Kristen: Motivation is always a challenge. The SAT does come with some built-in motivators like access to college and, in some states, high school graduation. However, it is easy for these goals to get lost in the day to day of working through practice. Two techniques can help:
- Periodically help students visualize what it will be like to achieve that longer goal. Who will be there? What will it feel like? What will they see and hear? Help make that goal tangible.
- Set smaller goals. Identify what could be accomplished in a week, for example, and a small reward for hitting that goal. At Khan Academy, we encourage setting goals for the number of skills leveled up to proficient in a week. These smaller goals offer more opportunities for positive reinforcement and celebration.
Aviv: You’ve spent much of your career thinking about how we measure what students know. Without giving too much away, can you share what’s been on your mind lately when it comes to assessment?
Kristen: We are thinking about how AI might influence assessment. Generative AI is good at conversation and one key way teachers engage in informal assessment is by having conversations with students. Teachers will sit next to a student and ask, “what does this mean?” or “tell me more about this idea.” Imagine if every student had the opportunity to show what they can do with a similar conversation. We are trying out that idea, asking students to explain their thinking. Stay tuned for more on that.
The second place conversation might help is around figuring out reports from assessments. After students spend time taking tests, we get score reports that contain a lot of numbers without a lot of explanation about what to do. We might use generative AI to help us all understand the insights to be gained from score reports and connect them to learning opportunities.
