CAT study plan

Define agile software development and distinguish it from plan-driven development using at least five concrete dimensions (requirements volatility, delivery cadence, documentation, change control, team structure)

Compare Scrum, Kanban, and XP by mapping each to its core practices, roles, and artifacts, and note where testing activities sit in each

Explain the Agile Manifesto's four values and twelve principles well enough to state how each principle changes a tester's day-to-day priorities

Describe the whole-team approach and quality ownership, and contrast it with a separate QA-gate model

Identify how iterative and incremental delivery changes test planning, entry criteria, and regression scope

Explain how continuous change and emergent requirements affect test basis, traceability, and test documentation depth

Map the tester's contribution to each Scrum ceremony: backlog refinement, sprint planning, daily scrum, review, and retrospective

Describe how a definition of done and acceptance criteria shape test design and exit decisions

Distinguish product backlog, sprint backlog, and increment in terms of what testing evidence each needs

Analyze a retrospective scenario and propose two test-process improvements with measurable success signals

State the seven ISTQB agile testing principles and give a concrete example of each in a sprint context

Contrast traditional test levels with agile test quadrants and place at least eight test types in the correct quadrant

Explain the shift-left rationale and identify which testing activities move earlier and why

Describe how risk-based testing is applied within a sprint, including how to rank stories by risk

Explain the role of regression testing under continuous change and how automated checks support it

Define acceptance criteria in both rule-oriented and scenario-oriented formats and convert three vague requirements into testable ones

Apply behavior-driven development syntax to write executable acceptance criteria for three stories

Apply acceptance test-driven development sequencing to describe who writes tests, when, and against what

Explain exploratory testing's charter, timebox, and session debrief, and distinguish it from ad hoc testing

Select appropriate test design techniques (equivalence partitioning, boundary value analysis, decision tables, state transition) for given story types

Describe the purpose and risks of test automation in agile projects, including the test automation pyramid and its trade-offs

Explain how continuous integration and continuous delivery pipelines use automated checks as quality gates

Distinguish tool categories: test management, defect tracking, static analysis, unit and acceptance test frameworks, and build and deployment tools

Explain how service virtualization and test data management support early testing

Evaluate a tool choice against team skills, maintenance cost, and feedback speed, and state the main risk of the choice

Describe the tester's role in an agile team across planning, design, execution, and retrospective activities, and distinguish it from a gatekeeper role

Explain how testers support the whole team through pairing, coaching, and reviewing acceptance criteria

Identify the skills and mindset a tester needs in agile contexts, including technical, communication, and analytical skills

Describe how defects and technical debt are handled in agile teams, including when to fix versus log

Explain how metrics and reporting work in agile settings without undermining self-organization

Analyze how organizational culture and distributed-team constraints affect agile testing practices

Explain how scaling frameworks change testing coordination, and identify the added risks of cross-team dependencies

Describe how testers contribute to release planning and to assessing release readiness in continuous delivery

Apply the whole-team quality principle to a scenario where developers skip testing, and propose concrete interventions

Identify common agile testing anti-patterns and their observable symptoms

Consolidate all four domains into a single concept map linking principles, methods, tools, and roles

Complete two timed practice sets across all domains and review every wrong answer to its root concept

Re-derive the seven agile testing principles and the test quadrants from memory without notes

Write and self-score a set of scenario questions that test role-based judgment in agile teams