Acting Education Secretary Fe Agudo Hidalgo said the readiness examination will be conducted in over 20,000 public elementary schools by teachers with the supervision of their principals in 165 provincial and city schools divisions in 17 regions.

Hidalgo explained the SRA is designed to improve the quality of first grade pupils who are entering formal education for the first time in their life and ultimately raise the quality of basic education which continues to be the object of public criticisms.

The readiness test, Hidalgo stressed, is neither an entrance examination nor an instrument to determine who among the children should be enrolled or accommodated in Grade 1.

According to Hidalgo, the SRA will be merely used by first grade teachers as basis for properly grouping the Grade 1 entrants.

The acting DepEd chief said the SRA, using an appropriate evaluation tool, will be administered twice. The first test, she said, to be conducted during the enrolment period or a week preceding the opening of classes, will assess the motor, language, and cognitive skills of the incoming first graders.

Hidalgo said the second test, using the same questions, will be administered sometime in September when the children shall have undergone the initial eight-week Grade 1 curriculum.

It was revealed in DepEd studies that grouping children with similar motor, language, and cognitive abilities will be beneficial to them.

This is because, the studies noted, children with similar motor, language, and cognitive skills — whether they belong to the fast, average, or slow group — tend to learn or progress together at their own pace.

Hidalgo said that "No child shall be refused entry to Grade 1 based on the SRA result."

She said that the SRA result will be used to guide teachers in Grade 1 to provide appropriate academic and pedagogical assistance to address specific needs of the children.