Jumping Through Hoops

Don’t know how you spent your Saturday morning, but we were trying to prove we’re smart enough to be teachers. Alaska (like some other states) requires teachers to take and pass the Praxis I Pre-Professional Skills Test in reading, math and writing for teacher certification (or in our case, a different state certification).

Official poster outside the official testing room

The good news was that we didn’t have to travel to Anchorage to take the test. Our site administrator was kind enough to proctor the test for us.

Testing Location

We’ve given enough high-stakes assessments to students, so we knew how to prepare.

Plenty of sharp #2 pencils

After we had all our materials and test booklets, and bubbled in our names and required information, there was an hour for each test. How many times have we told students to “just do your best”, or “it’s okay if you don’t know all the answers”? When you’re on the other side of the test booklet, you get a whole new perspective. Here are some of the practice questions from the study guide:

Some values of X are less than 100.

Which of the following are NOT consistent with the sentence above?

A. 5 is not a value of x.

B. 95 is a value of x.

C. Some values of x are greater than 100.

D. All values of x are less than 100.

E. No numbers less than 100 are values of x.

F. “Mr. Berg when are we going to use this?”

Writing Part A: (check out the underlined portions–okay or mistake?)

Contrary to its reputation for aggressive brutality, the sperm whales that were observed around the Galapagos Islands proved to be timid and sociable. No error.

It's over.

Don’t expect us to share our scores with you; just cross your fingers that we don’t have to do retakes. Coming in April: Praxis II–Elementary Education Content Knowledge….