The first tests that applied the same standard to each test taker was done in China during the seventh century. Chinese people were tested on Confucian philosophy and their ability to write poetry. Anyone wanting to work for the Chinese Government had to take this test.
Standardized tests for school-aged children in America weren't implemented until the Industrial Revolution of the 1800s. During this era, children were allowed to go to school, and standardized testing was the best way to test a large number of children at one time.
In the early 1900s, Alfred Binet, a French psychologist, created a standardized test that would later become our modern day IQ test. These early tests were graded by hand, until the first testing scanners were created in 1936. The IBM 805 could read marks made with a special pencil; this eventually gave way to the modernized bubble sheets that required a No. 2 pencil.
In the 1900s, the first college entrance exams in America were created in order to test a possible student's knowledge of Latin, literature, science and math. These tests were scored by the professors of the schools giving the exam. It wasn't until 1926 that the SAT was used by colleges. The SAT test of 1926 was a multiple choice test, instead of the essay format used previously.
When the SAT was first created, it lasted only 90 minutes; it tested on Vocabulary and basic math. It was changed in 1930 to separate tests for vocabulary and math. It wasn't changed again until 2005, when a writing section was added; it was also then that the analogies section was removed. This change caused the perfect score to be upped to 2,400 from the original 1,600.
By the 1950s, high school graduates would have taken three standardized tests by the time they graduated. It was during this time period that the schools were beginning to be judged on how well their students were doing on the tests. It was in 1957 that standardized testing really came into full swing, because of the successful launch of Sputnik. When this happened, it was realized that the schools weren't educating the students to their full potential. Math and science were pushed heavily, and the testing soon followed.
It wasn't until 1965 that standardized testing was brought to the younger grades. Schools were now testing their students regularly in all grades. Ridged testing soon followed, as schools vied for the new federal funding that was made available. The tests were seen as a way to determine which schools were meeting the set requirements.
In the 1980s, new standardized tests were constructed to be given to children about to enter kindergarten to determine if they were ready to enter school. If they didn't score well, parents were told to wait another year to enroll their children. Such testing has become mainstream in later years.
In 2002, President George Bush signed the bill, No Child Left Behind, which allowed for yearly tests in all public schools. It also threatened schools that didn't live up to the standards set on a consistent basis. Those schools that didn't measure up would lose their funding.