1.2 Administration: Flexible Timing, Guideline Times, Tools & Item Formats

How a Stanford 10 Administration Works

Stanford 10 is designed to show what students know rather than how fast they work. Pearson's product page lists the completion time as "2.25-5.5 hours (untimed)", and the scope and sequence chart adds: "Stanford 10 allows flexible testing times. The testing times indicated above are guidelines to help administrators and teachers plan." In practice, the adult giving the test uses the guideline minutes to build a schedule, but a student who is still working productively is not cut off just because a guideline time has passed.

Testing services can still set their own session rules. For example, one homeschool provider's online administration lets students pause and take breaks, but each day's sessions must be finished by that provider's daily deadline. Read your provider's instructions before test day.

Official Guideline Items and Minutes

The table shows Pearson's Complete Battery guidelines for three sample levels (items / minutes).

A dash means the subtest is not part of that level. A useful pacing benchmark comes straight from these numbers: Intermediate 2 Reading Comprehension is 54 items in a 50-minute guideline, slightly under a minute per item including reading time, while Science is 40 items in 25 minutes.

The Easy-Hard-Easy Question Format

Pearson's overview describes an "easy-hard-easy question format—items arranged to facilitate student engagement and test completion." Each subtest opens with accessible questions, builds to harder ones, and finishes with easier ones again. Pearson does not publish item difficulty values, so there is no official percentage for each phase. The practical lessons are:

1. A run of hard questions in the middle of a subtest is normal and does not mean the student is failing.
2. A student who gets stuck should not give up on the rest of the subtest, because easier questions usually follow.
3. Every question counts the same toward the raw score, so a quick easy item at the end is worth as much as a long hard item in the middle.

Tools, Materials and Directions

• Rulers: Pearson states that standard and metric rulers are used on the Mathematics Problem Solving and Mathematics subtests for Primary 1 through TASK.
• Calculators: calculator use is an option on Mathematics Problem Solving beginning at Intermediate 1 and on the TASK Mathematics subtest. The Arkansas guide calls calculator use a local decision that should reflect students' everyday access. Calculators are not part of Mathematics Procedures, which measures computation.
• Mathematics reference sheet: provided at the Advanced and TASK levels with the formulas needed to solve problems.
• Scratch paper: proctoring rules quoted by the University of Minnesota homeschool program call for scratch paper on the mathematics and listening subtests. Pearson's Intermediate 1 listening directions tell students they may take notes on scratch paper.
• Directions for Administering: the adult reads a script and works through sample questions before each subtest. Pearson also sells short practice tests designed to familiarize students with directions, sample items and answer marking.
• Environment: educational materials such as charts and word walls should not be visible in the testing room.

What the Questions Look Like

Every Stanford 10 item is multiple choice. Some formats are worth knowing in advance:

Remote and Adapted Administrations

Pearson's telepractice guidance notes that the SAT10 Online can be given remotely with a facilitator, but it also warns that telepractice is a deviation from standardized administration because the norms were collected in person. Accommodations for students with disabilities should follow the Directions for Administering and the school's or provider's policy. As a rule of thumb, an accommodation should not change what a subtest measures. For example, reading Reading Comprehension passages aloud would turn a reading test into a listening test.