TExES Core Subjects EC-6 ELAR (901) practice test

In Spanish, no native word begins with s followed by another consonant; words such as escuela and estrella start with a vowel sound instead. Spanish speakers learning English often carry this rule over and add a vowel before clusters such as sp, sn, and sm, while pronouncing s correctly in other positions, as this student does in yes and bus. The pattern is a typical influence of a first language on a second one, not a sign of a disorder.

A

The student pronounces s correctly in yes and bus and changes only word-initial s clusters, as Spanish speakers typically do, so a referral is an extreme response that mistakes normal language transfer for a disorder.

B

Speak, snow, and smile have no similar-sounding Spanish counterparts, so confusion with Spanish words cannot explain the pattern.

C

The student adds a vowel before s clusters rather than substituting one English vowel for another, so vowel discrimination is not the issue.

In competition and definition, the vowel in the second syllable is unstressed and reduced to the schwa sound, which any vowel letter can spell, so the sound gives no clue to the letter. Related words keep the spelling of their shared part even when its sound changes, and in compete and define the same vowel is stressed and clearly heard. Pairing words this way teaches students to use the meaning connections between words, their morphophonemic knowledge, to spell vowels they cannot hear.

A

Listening for the vowel cannot reveal its letter when the vowel is unstressed, because the schwa sound can be spelled with any vowel letter; this is the strategy that produced the errors.

B

Repeated copying may fix these two words, but it gives students no way to spell the unstressed vowels in other words.

C

A spell checker corrects the drafts without building the knowledge of related words that the teacher wants students to use.

Fluency practice is meant to support comprehension, but a routine that measures and rewards only speed teaches students that fast reading is the goal, which is why these students race and recall little. Retelling each passage makes understanding part of the routine, so students read to make sense of the text while the repeated readings go on building their rate.

A

A higher rate goal rewards the very speed that is crowding out meaning, so it would deepen the problem instead of solving it.

B

Graphing accuracy might slow students enough to read words correctly, but it still measures only word reading, so the routine would still not ask students to understand what they read.

D

Timed word lists build speed with isolated words, a different goal, and they drop the connected text that students need to read for meaning.

Inferential comprehension asks readers to combine clues in the text with their own reasoning to reach ideas the author does not state directly, such as a theme. Asking what lesson the girl's choices teach requires students to infer a theme from her actions and their outcomes, which moves the class beyond the recall questions it has been answering.

A

The answer is stated in the text, so this literal question repeats the kind of recall the class has already practiced.

B

Recalling the order of events the story states is literal comprehension, not inference.

D

Judging whether the girl's decision was wise calls for an evaluation of her choice, which targets evaluative rather than inferential comprehension.

In explicit vocabulary instruction, a student-friendly explanation tied to the text is followed by examples of the word in other contexts, so that students see its meaning is not limited to one story. Describing everyday situations in which someone might be reluctant, such as a swimmer facing cold water or a child asked to share a new toy, broadens understanding before students interact with the word and use it in their own writing.

A

Students already have a clear, student-friendly explanation, and a dictionary definition is often harder to understand and adds no new contexts for the word.

B

A quiz right after the introduction assesses students before they have worked with the word, so it comes too early in the sequence.

C

Writing with a new word is a later step, and students who have met it in only one context are likely to misuse it, so they first need more examples of its meaning.

Abstract ideas become understandable when students see them at work in concrete examples. Real cases in which one branch limits another, such as a president vetoing a bill and Congress voting to override the veto, show students what checks and balances look like in practice. The definition the students can already recite has not given them that picture.

A

The students can already recite the definition, so copying it again adds nothing to their understanding of how the branches limit one another.

C

A chart of the branches and their leaders organizes the structure of government but shows none of the ways one branch limits another, the idea students cannot explain.

D

Partner rereading builds fluency, but hearing the same text again does not supply the concrete cases students need to grasp the idea.

Spellings such as lik, pla, and mi show that the child hears the sounds in words and represents them with letters, sometimes using a letter's name for its sound, a predictable early stage of spelling development. Explaining this helps the parent see the invented spellings as evidence of growth; conventional spellings develop through instruction and continued writing, while marking every error in a journal can discourage a beginning writer.

B

Marking every error in a beginner's journal can discourage her from writing, and early sound-based spellings are a normal stage rather than habits that must be stopped.

C

Steering a beginner toward words she can already spell shrinks what she can express and removes the sound-by-sound spelling practice that moves her development forward.

D

Copying word lists is rote practice detached from her own writing and does not build on the letter-sound knowledge her spellings show.

Keeping the topic and purpose the same while changing only the reader isolates audience as the variable. Comparing a formal letter to the principal with a version written for a friend lets students see directly how greetings, word choice, and tone shift to suit each reader.

B

Adding evidence strengthens the argument's support, but the reader stays the same, so the activity does not show how audience changes a writer's language.

C

Choosing more precise words improves the letter's word choice, but the reader stays the same, so students do not see how audience shapes word choice and tone.

D

Peer editing for spelling and punctuation targets writing conventions, a different goal from understanding audience.

An illustrator's style, the overall look created by choices of line, shape, color, and technique, helps set a picture book's mood, the feeling the book creates in readers. Asking how the look of the pictures makes readers feel about the whale's journey leads students to connect the soft, blurry shapes and muted blues to the quiet, lonely feeling of the story and to explain how that style creates the mood. The question calls for analysis of the illustrator's choices and their effect, not simply a preference or an inventory of what the pictures contain.

B

Choosing a favorite picture invites a personal preference, an appreciative response, rather than an analysis of how the style creates the book's mood.

C

Naming the colors and shapes that recur notices elements of the style but never asks how they affect readers, so it meets only half of the goal.

D

Asking what the pictures add to the words examines how illustrations extend a story's content, a sound question for a different goal, not for the style's effect on mood.

Questions about why an event happened and how two things differ depend on recognizing cause-and-effect and compare-and-contrast relationships, two of the structures authors use to organize informational text. Because the student already answers questions about stated facts and understands stories, explicit instruction in these structures and in signal words such as because, as a result, and unlike targets the one gap her checks reveal.

B

Her strong comprehension of stories shows that story elements are already a strength, and they do not explain how informational articles are organized.

C

She answers questions about stated facts correctly, so unknown words are not what keeps her from explaining how ideas in an article are related.

D

Oral rereading builds fluency, but her correct answers about stated facts show that reading the words is not her difficulty.