Praxis II Special Education: Teaching Students with Mental Retardation Exam
This exam is designed for individuals who would like to teach mentally retarded students from preschool through grade 12. You will be given 1 hour to complete this 50 multiple choice question exam. There will be 39 questions regarding service delivery to mentally retarded students, and 11 questions regarding factors that impact the education of mentally retarded students.
Service Delivery to Mentally Retarded Students
This section of the exam will cover management of the learning environment, curriculum and instruction, programming and placement, assessment, professional roles, and conceptual approaches. The learning environment management questions will cover documentation and communication with parents and other professionals, student transitions between activities, grouping students and, organization of the physical and social learning environment. Questions regarding the usage of behavioral intervention, data collection, behavior management and behavior analysis will be included in this section of the exam. Physical and social learning environment questions will cover attitudes, seating, lighting, expectations, consistency, rules, consequences, and positive interaction strategies. The behavior management questions will cover behavioral analysis and behavioral interventions. Behavioral analysis questions will cover target behavior, consequent events, and identification of antecedents. Behavioral intervention questions will cover dealing with changing behaviors and the degree of intervention required to change the behavior. Questions regarding curriculum and instruction will cover appropriate areas of instruction, instructional formats, and selection of appropriate teaching strategies. Your knowledge of gender, cultural, and linguistic differences, modification and usage of adaptive equipment, volunteers, and other professionals will be included in this section of the exam. There will also be questions regarding student assessment, effective data collection, preparation of the IEP, methods for evaluation and grading, and positive reinforcement strategies in this section of the exam. Student assessment questions will cover cultural and community influences, access to assistive technology, family participation in the educational process, cultural differences, student placement and programming issues. Questions regarding mainstreaming, inclusion, modification of student assessments, and IEP/ITP development will be included in this section of the exam. Professional role questions will cover working with social and health-related service providers; the usage of professional organizations and literature to improve teaching skills, the impact of teacher attitude on student achievement, teacher responsibility in cases of suspected neglect or abuse, promoting student and parent advocacy and impacting public attitude toward mentally retarded individuals. The questions regarding conceptual approaches will cover sociological, cognitive, psychodynamic, and medical service delivery for mentally retarded students.
Factors that Impact the Education of Mentally Retarded Students
This section of the exam will cover terminology regarding concepts that impact the learning of mentally retarded individuals. The terminology questions will cover professional organizations such as IDEA, AAMR, CEC, etc. Questions regarding basic concepts will cover the prevention and causes of mental retardation such as genetics, environment, culture, and neurological factors. Your knowledge of the classification of mentally retarded students including race, gender, degrees of severity and, limitations of standardized testing will be assessed in this section of the exam. The family and personal living skills questions will cover self care, dependence, sexuality, and motivation. The language and physical development questions will cover physical development, motor skills, and communication skills. Questions regarding affective behavior will cover self-concept, self-esteem, interpersonal skills, and resistance to changes. Learning deficits questions will cover memory, generalization, abstract thinking, and maintaining skills.
