The team at Chalkbeat wanted to know what Indiana’s new teacher licensing tests looked like up-close — so we put together our own practice exam using sample questions from the basic math and reading skills tests teachers take in college.
Think you can be a teacher?
Well, start here with our totally unofficial and unsanctioned practice test of basic skills that uses sample questions from the British company Pearson. Indiana adopted new Pearson licensing tests in 2013, and teachers first took them in 2014.
How teachers perform in the classroom, what credentials they should have and how they should be prepared in college are topics that have sparked passionate and heated debates in Indiana and across the country.
Just in the past few years, Indiana policymakers have passed new rules for teacher licensing, examined what role test scores should play in teacher evaluations and considered new passing rates for teacher licensing tests.
Before aspiring teachers can be admitted to schools of education and earn licenses, the first step is to achieve minimum scores on the ACT or SAT or pass the math, reading and writing sections of the Core Academic Skills Assessment (that’s where our questions came from).
Once they finish their educations, aspiring teachers then must pass separate tests in their content area, as well as a test on the skills of teaching itself. For the really hard stuff (read: physics), you’ll have to check out the sample licensing tests.
For now, see how you do on basic skills.
All math and reading test questions are taken from sample CASA questions available on Pearson’s website.
[slickquiz id=3]