Aunt Melissa, the Wise Big Sister, recently coached my youngest daughter in better test-taking skills. In our public school, we have many assessments–both in reading in math–that can quickly overwhelm students.
Melissa serves so many students as a Reading Specialist, and she’s especially gifted in offering strategies for success on multiple choice tests. She’s been teaching us cool phrases like “slash the trash,” and how test writers like to provide an answer that could almost be true but isn’t. She tells my daughter to circle the question, read and underline key words, slash the trash (find the answers that couldn’t possibly be correct), beware of the tricky answer that looks almost right, and recheck your work once you’ve chosen an answer.
All day long, I find myself more alert to multiple choices set before me.
We have many opportunities that come in a morning, and we sit there trying to manage our time well and pick what’s best. I think about focusing differently–slashing the trash of what’s not in line with God’s best and recognizing subtle temptations that seem like a good thing but distract from the main work of the day.
Mostly, I just love repeating, “I’m gonna slash the trash!” when I filter out what’s not best today.