Middle Schoolers and the SAT

At my daughter's middle school, some of the children take the SAT as early as seventh grade. What is the reason for this? Won't the children get very low scores? Is it really necessary to start practicing for this college-admission test so early? I can see my child getting test phobia if she didn't do well. - Questioning
Answer: According to the College Board, the organization behind the SAT, one of the main reasons middle schoolers take this test is for admission into college talent search programs. These schools want to use SAT scores as an indicator of the ability of seventh- and eighth-graders to do high level work in their summer programs. Also, some students take the SAT early for practice or to see what it's like.
Just because middle-school students are much younger than the high-school juniors or seniors who take this test as part of the college-admission process definitely does not mean that they will get poor scores. Really good readers and math students will receive scores comparable to those of many high-school students. In any case, the SAT scores the middle schoolers earn are removed from their records when they enter ninth grade, unless the students want to keep them because they are so high.
There is no big benefit to taking the SAT in middle school for practice, as the practice effect is likely to wear off before students take the test later on for college admission. And we must remind parents and students that if students take the SAT in ninth grade or beyond, every score will be sent to the colleges where they apply.
At the high-school level, students should take the PSAT for SAT practice, as it was designed for this purpose. While the PSAT is typically given to juniors, individual high schools determine whether the test will also be offered to sophomores or freshmen.
Parents know how their children are likely to react to taking the SAT in middle school and should base their decision on this. For those children who have done well on standardized tests, it could take the mystery out of the SAT and be a confidence booster. For others who get very anxious about tests, there is no advantage to taking the test early, and it could possibly lower a child's confidence in his or her testing ability. In any case, parents need to remember that SAT scores are only part of the admission process, along with grades, class rank, activities, talents and interviews.