Praxis PLT: PreK–12 cheat sheet

Piaget's stages and age bands: sensorimotor (0–2, object permanence), preoperational (2–7, symbolic play, egocentrism, no conservation), concrete operational (7–11, conservation, reversibility, classification), formal operational (11+, abstract and hypothetical reasoning).

Erikson's psychosocial conflicts in school years: initiative vs. guilt (preschool), industry vs. inferiority (elementary), identity vs. role confusion (adolescence); the school-age crisis centers on competence and peer comparison.

Kohlberg's levels: preconventional (obedience/punishment, instrumental exchange), conventional (good boy/girl, law and order), postconventional (social contract, universal principles); most K–12 students reason at conventional level.

Vygotsky: zone of proximal development is the gap between independent performance and performance with expert guidance; scaffolding is temporary support faded as competence grows; private speech becomes inner speech.

Maslow's hierarchy order: physiological, safety, belonging, esteem, self-actualization; unmet lower needs depress academic engagement before higher-order learning can occur.

Classical conditioning (Pavlov) pairs a neutral stimulus with an unconditioned stimulus; operant conditioning (Skinner) shapes behavior through reinforcement and punishment schedules; positive = add a stimulus, negative = remove one.

Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems: microsystem (family, classroom), mesosystem (links between microsystems), exosystem (parent workplace, community), macrosystem (culture, policy), chronosystem (time and life transitions).

Memory model: sensory register (seconds) → working memory (about 5–9 chunks, seconds to a minute) → long-term memory; encoding, storage, and retrieval failures each require different instructional remedies.

Learning disability identifiers: a severe discrepancy between ability and achievement, processing deficits, and exclusion of sensory, motor, emotional, or environmental causes; dyslexia (reading), dysgraphia (writing), dyscalculia (math).

Bloom's revised taxonomy order: remember, understand, apply, analyze, evaluate, create; objectives should name the cognitive level and be observable.

Direct instruction sequence: review, state objective, present in small steps with modeling, guided practice with high response rate, independent practice, cumulative review.

Cooperative learning requires positive interdependence, individual accountability, promotive interaction, social skills, and group processing; unstructured group work lacks these elements.

Differentiation adjusts content, process, product, or environment based on readiness, interest, and learning profile; it is not tracking or giving extra worksheets.

Wait time of 3–5 seconds after a question increases response length and participation; calling on volunteers only narrows who answers.

Higher-order questioning stems: compare, predict, justify, evaluate the evidence, propose an alternative; lower-order stems recall, define, list, identify.

Task analysis breaks a terminal objective into ordered subskills; it drives sequencing for procedural content such as long division or lab safety routines.

Formative vs. summative use: formative informs in-the-moment teaching adjustments; summative judges achievement at the end of a unit or course.

Inquiry and problem-based designs start with an authentic driving question, supply scaffolds rather than answers, and end with a public product or explanation.

Validity is the degree to which an assessment measures the intended construct; reliability is consistency of scores across occasions, forms, or raters; reliability is necessary but not sufficient for validity.

Criterion-referenced tests compare performance to a defined standard; norm-referenced tests compare a student to a norming sample; percentile rank is not percent correct.

Standard error of measurement: a confidence band around an observed score; smaller SEM means more precise scores.

Test score types: raw score, percentile rank, stanine (1–9, mean 5), grade equivalent (misleading for individual placement), scale score.

Item analysis indices: difficulty (proportion answering correctly) and discrimination (how well an item separates high and low scorers); negative discrimination flags a flawed item.

Formative assessment cycle: clarify the learning target, elicit evidence, interpret against the target, act with feedback; feedback should be specific, timely, and goal-referenced.

Rubric types: holistic (single overall score) versus analytic (separate trait scores); analytic rubrics give more diagnostic feedback but take longer to apply.

Accommodations change how a student accesses assessment (extended time, read-aloud, separate setting) without changing what is measured; modifications change the construct or content.

Assessment bias appears when items assume experiences unevenly distributed across groups, or when language and cultural references confound the construct being measured.

Reflective practice cycle: identify a problem of practice, gather evidence, analyze, act, and re-evaluate; Gibbs and Kolb models both require concrete experience plus structured reflection.

Professional Learning Communities rest on shared mission, collaborative teams, collective inquiry, action orientation, and results orientation.

Adult learning (Knowles' andragogy): adults need relevance, autonomy, problem-centered tasks, and to draw on experience; one-shot workshops without follow-up rarely change practice.

Legal duties: mandatory reporting of suspected child abuse, confidentiality of student records under FERPA, and services for eligible students under IDEA; corporal discipline and discrimination raise separate liability.

Teacher evaluation frameworks commonly score planning, instruction, classroom environment, and professional responsibilities; evidence should be collected across multiple observations.

Family engagement that raises achievement is specific and two-way: shared expectations, regular communication about learning, and invitations to support learning at home.

Community resources include school-based health services, social services, libraries, business partnerships, and mentoring programs; referral requires consent and confidentiality safeguards.

Ethical standards: maintain appropriate boundaries, avoid dual relationships, protect student dignity, and keep professional judgment free of personal gain.

Answer structure for each prompt: name the concept, define it accurately, apply it to the specific details in the scenario, then state the likely outcome or next step.

Use scenario evidence explicitly - quote or paraphrase the observed behavior, score, or statement - rather than describing generic best practice.

When asked to identify a problem, name the underlying learning or assessment principle (for example, lack of scaffolding or a mismatch between objective and assessment) rather than only describing the symptom.

When asked for a strategy, give a concrete action, its mechanism, and how the teacher would know it worked; two well-explained strategies beat five vague ones.

Score points are earned per required element; count the prompt's verbs (identify, explain, justify, describe) and address each with a separate sentence.

If the prompt asks for a rationale, connect the choice to a named theory or principle and to the student's specific need.

Watch for distractors in the scenario: details about unrelated students or past events are usually context, not the problem to be analyzed.

Use precise terminology (formative assessment, ZPD, accommodation) but define it in context; unexplained jargon earns no credit.

Budget time proportional to point value, and reserve minutes to reread for completeness against the prompt's requirements.