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Study Guide

Field 058: Primary Special Education (PK–5)
Sample Multiple-Choice Questions

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Domain I–Child Development and Individual Learning Differences

Competency 0001
Understand child development and factors that influence human development and learning from birth to age ten (grade five).

A community has been recently impacted by a natural disaster. Since the disaster, a fourth-grade student has developed anxiety and has withdrawn from friends, preferring to stay close to family members. Together, the student, their parents/guardians, and their teacher develop a plan for school and home to assist the student through this challenge. According to the principles of child development, this practice will primarily benefit the student by:

  1. supporting the student's perseverance during adverse times through supportive adult relationships.
  2. demonstrating for the student the significance of continuing academic learning in times of distress.
  3. aiding the student's development of confidence by setting achievable goals for the student in a challenging time.
  4. determining for the student appropriate learning objectives that are attuned with the student's needs during difficult experiences.
Answer
Correct Response: A. Experience of childhood trauma can impact the way a student forms relationships with others. Developing a plan for caring adults to support the student both in and out of school can promote the student's sense of security, attachment, and connectedness. Research indicates these are important protective skills for promoting self-determination.

Competency 0002
Understand how children construct knowledge and then use this understanding to create opportunities for children to learn about and explore their world.

A prekindergarten class learns one-to-one correspondence and counting skills. The teacher plans to reinforce children's development of these skills throughout the day. For example, when in the pretend kitchen area of the classroom, the teacher asks a child to use these skills to determine how many pots the child is using to cook. Which of the following statements most effectively explains the rationale supporting this approach to children's development across domains?

  1. Young children learn new skills when high expectations are communicated clearly.
  2. Young children learn best when concepts are taught through engaging play.
  3. Young children learn to generalize new skills in the order they are learned.
  4. Young children learn and progress through stages when instruction is explicit.
Answer
Correct Response: B. Young children learn a variety of skills through concrete, interactive experiences. Play incorporates many skills which are important for the child's early development and learning. Play is motivating to the child, incorporates multisensory engagement, and requires integrating new learning into schematic knowledge. These factors can promote the child's ability to acquire skills and generalize and maintain new learning.

Domain II–Assessment, Progress Monitoring, and Individual Program Planning

Competency 0003
Understand formal and informal assessment instruments and procedures for evaluating strengths and needs of students with disabilities in grades PK–5.

While administering the Kindergarten Readiness Assessment (KRA) during the first weeks of school, the teacher uses the following strategies to maximize the participation of all students.

  1. repeating the directions as many times as needed for a student with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
  2. allowing a student who was not feeling well extra time to complete an assignment
  3. permitting an English learner to change a response to a correct one
  4. permitting a student with hearing loss to change seats during a direct assessment activity
  5. allowing a student to hold the stimulus booklet instead of leaving it on the table

Which of the following options describes this assessment administration?

  1. maximizing the need for accommodations and modifications given the students' disabilities
  2. providing additional allowable supports to students with disabilities
  3. applying universally designed allowances of general administration procedures
  4. using differentiation practices that would result in scores that would be considered invalid and unreliable
Answer
Correct Response: C. Universally designed allowances for general administration procedures refer to assessment accommodations that do not change what the assessment is intended to measure. These universal accommodations can be utilized by students regardless of special education eligibility or disability and are designed to promote students' access to the assessment.

Competency 0004
Understand policies, principles, and procedures related to referral, eligibility, program planning, and placement of students with disabilities in grades PK–5.

A functional behavior assessment (FBA) is being conducted for a kindergarten student who exhibits behavioral difficulties. The student often screams and throws materials (e.g., books, pencils) in class. A behavior intervention specialist uses a motivation assessment scale as one source of data to collect information about this behavior. A summary of the scale results is shown below.

Escape from task demand Desire for attention Desire for tangible object or activity Sensory stimulation
80% 0% 0% 20%

Based on this information, which of the following strategies is likely to be most effective?

  1. ensuring the student's work is at an appropriate instructional level and prompting the student to ask for clarification of the work when needed (e.g., "I need help")
  2. modeling for the student the question, "Can I play with [preferred peer]?" or "Can you look at my work now?"
  3. teaching the student to request competing sources of stimuli for the behavior during work (e.g., "Can I use my headphones?")
  4. encouraging the student to ask, "Am I doing good work?" and providing verbal praise contingent on the absence of challenging behavior
Answer
Correct Response: A. The purpose of an FBA is to determine the function of a student's challenging behavior and provide data to develop interventions to effectively address these behaviors. Interventions may be designed to establish effective learning conditions and teach and reinforce alternative appropriate behaviors that meet that same need. In this scenario, the student's challenging behavior is primarily escape-motivated. Effective intervention would include designing the student's work to be at the appropriate instructional level and teaching the strategies to obtain clarification or request a break.

Domain III–The Learning Environment and Social-Emotional Learning, Interventions, and Supports

Competency 0005
Understand practices for establishing positive and productive learning environments for students with disabilities in grades PK–5.

A first-grade student often tells classmates what to do, cuts in front of others in line, interrupts people when they are talking, and struggles to make friends as a result of these behaviors. The student ignores teachers when they remind the student to let others speak or to take turns. Which of the following strategies would most effectively support the student in building relationships with peers and foster a positive classroom environment?

  1. teaching, modeling, and reinforcing positive behavior interactions and expectations with the student
  2. recognizing that these behaviors are temporary and demonstrating patience with the student
  3. creating, assigning, and enforcing negative consequences for the student's disrespectful behavior
  4. encouraging peers to openly communicate their perspectives of the student's behavior
Answer
Correct Response: A. When creating a positive classroom environment, it is essential to explicitly teach, model, and reinforce social skills and behavioral expectations. Using visuals and common language can support the student to remember roles and specific guidelines. Embedding opportunities to practice pro-social skills in large- and small-group activities, role-playing situations, and previewing expectations during upcoming events or situations can support the reinforcement of positive behaviors. 

Competency 0006
Understand strategies and methods for teaching and supporting social-emotional competence and developing interpersonal skills for students with disabilities in grades PK–5.

A primary intervention specialist wants to create a supportive classroom environment that encourages students to develop the social-emotional skills to stay motivated and work toward attainable goals. Which of the following strategies has a positive impact on the development of persistence?

  1. highlighting the feedback loop between self-efficacy beliefs and intelligence
  2. using extrinsic motivation techniques that reinforce failure as something to avoid
  3. showing students connections between their learning and their personal aspirations
  4. creating a sense of academic community for students with higher-level competencies
Answer
Correct Response: C. Strategies that effectively work to develop persistence in children prioritize improving a child's sense of competence. Focusing on a child's strengths and personal goals and aspirations and breaking goals into attainable expectations are strategies that promote a child's sense of competence and improve motivation for persistence. 

Domain IV–Specialized Instructional Planning, Design, and Delivery

Competency 0007
Understand evidence-based strategies and practices for developing and implementing effective planning and instruction in a variety of settings for students with disabilities in grades PK–5.

A primary intervention specialist regularly uses the following strategy when facilitating whole-class discussions with a fourth-grade class:

  1. Teacher poses an open-ended question to class.
  2. Teacher provides time to think about responses.
  3. Teacher strategically pairs students to talk about responses.
  4. Students share their thinking with a peer.
  5. Students share their thinking with the larger group.

This strategy primarily scaffolds students in:

  1. generalizing learning to real-life and authentic contexts.
  2. citing evidence to back up personal opinions.
  3. activating schematic knowledge on a specific topic.
  4. formulating ideas and verbalizing thinking in a low-risk setting.
Answer
Correct Response: D. This strategy primarily provides an opportunity for students to process information with a peer and express their thinking in a low-risk setting. Having multiple opportunities to answer questions and consider expressing key content promotes students' engagement and ability to verbalize their thinking with the larger group.

Competency 0008
Understand evidence-based instructional strategies, methods, and activities for promoting the academic achievement and learning of students with disabilities in grades PK–5.

A fifth-grade student with an emotional impairment selects books of interest from the classroom library but struggles to read for the whole time allotted for independent reading. Though the student begins reading attentively, the student tires easily and closes the book and rests for the remainder of the time. The primary intervention specialist considers strategies to motivate the student in increasing the time spent reading during this block of time. Which of the following strategies would be most effective for this purpose?

  1. reminding the student of the rules and routines of reading time, emphasizing the rule of reading the whole time
  2. selecting several interesting books for the student to read and assigning the student specific books to finish each day
  3. working with the student to set a goal for the number of minutes spent reading each day and listing ideas for meeting that goal with the student
  4. arranging a comfortable area for the student to read in quietly with a partner who reads at a similar level
Answer
Correct Response: C. In this scenario, the student has selected books of interest to read during independent reading time. Strategies to increase a student's sustained amount of independent reading time include setting meaningful reading goals with the student and involving the student in how to achieve these goals. Involving students in selecting the number of minutes they will read each day is a goal that is able to be measured, tracked, and achieved by the student.

Domain V–Professional Relationships and Responsibilities

Competency 0009
Understand ways to develop effective collaboration and communication processes to promote home/school engagement, and engage with members of the school and community to promote the educational achievement of students with disabilities in grades PK–5.

A primary intervention specialist is working in collaboration with a general education teacher to integrate grade-level standards with students' Individualized Education Program (IEP) goals. Which of the following instructional goals would this practice most effectively achieve for students with disabilities?

  1. incorporating progress-monitoring rubrics
  2. promoting the inclusion of differentiated instruction
  3. providing instruction in the least restrictive environment (LRE)
  4. developing rigorous benchmarks
Answer
Correct Response: B. Differentiating instruction is a research-based instructional design that refers to tailoring lessons and activities to meet the individual strengths and needs of students. A teacher can differentiate a variety of factors, including the content, instruction, delivery, products, or learning variety to meet the needs of a learner. Promoting the inclusion of differentiated instruction includes teaching students according to their zone of proximal development and integrating grade-level standards with individualized learning goals.

Competency 0010
Understand the professional responsibilities and legal and ethical issues relevant to teaching students with disabilities in grades PK–5.

At the start of the school year, teachers review the district's teaching framework and identify the elements they would like to address during their professional development activities for that academic year. Which of the following strategies most effectively supports teachers in identifying their own strengths and needs in determining goals for professional growth?

  1. collecting articles or videos aligned to elements of the teaching framework
  2. creating a rubric for scoring their own teaching performance
  3. observing master teachers working with children with disabilities
  4. completing a self-assessment that includes reflection on previous work
Answer
Correct Response: D. Self-assessment is a practice that is critical in evaluating someone's own teaching values, beliefs, and practices. Research supports the use of reflective practices to help teachers identify their own strengths and needs and determine areas to prioritize for professional growth. This process can help teachers take an active and informed role in their own teaching practice.