II. MTEL Reading Test

A. Reading Test Information

MTEL Reading Test Information: Content, Format, Strategies

The Massachusetts Communication and Literacy Test has two parts: a Writing Subtest and a Reading Subtest. The Reading Subtest has two main types of questions. There is a vocabulary section in which you are asked to define a list of about five words. The other questions are multiple choice responses to reading passages. If you are taking only the reading subtest of the Communication and Literacy Test, do not do the dictation exercise that is given first thing when you arrive: that exercise is part of the writing subtest only.

Vocabulary Definitions. This part of the Reading Test consists of words listed in isolation, not in the context of a written passage. Candidates are asked to define words accurately and completely. Complete sentences are not required. Offering an example or use of the word in a sentence might make a definition more complete. However, examples alone do not qualify as an accurate definition. Sample vocabulary items and illustrations of incorrect and correct responses are offered on pages 15 and 16 in the Test Information Booklet.

Multiple Choice Items. The remainder of the Reading Subtest consists of multiple choice items in response to written passages of about 750 words in length. This is the general length of an op-ed article in the Boston Globe. Five to seven passages might be offered with differing numbers of questions following each reading. This section of the test has six objectives which are offered in more detail on page 7 of the Test Information Booklet.

1. Determine the meaning of words or phrases, particularly words with multiple meanings, unfamiliar or uncommon words or phrases, or figurative expressions in context.
2. Identify the writer’s main idea in the passage or paragraph, including identification of the statement that best expresses the main idea.
3. Identify the writer’s purpose for writing (persuasion, description, point of view or intention). Content, word choice and phrasing of a written passage might suggest a writer’s point of view or intention.
4. Identify and analyze relationships among ideas or points of view expressed in written passages. These main ideas might take the form of pro and con positions, problem/solution presentations, identifying sequence of related information, or analyzing cause and effect relationships. Candidates might be asked to draw conclusions inductively and deductively from information stated or implied in a passage (Test Information Booklet, p.7).
5. Evaluate written material, determining the validity or logic of stated or implied assumptions, arguments, the importance of information to the central argument of a passage, the difference between fact and opinion, or the objectivity of a passage or its source.
6. Show the ability to identify an accurate outline or summary of written materials and interpret information presented in charts, graphs or tables.

Suggested Procedure for Approaching the Multiple Choice Section

Candidates might try strategies that have worked with reading comprehension passages on other standardized tests. The following list contains strategies gleaned informally from instructors who offer coaching for similar sections of the SAT, GRE and ETS Praxis exams.

1. Skim the passage for the main idea. Try reading the first paragraph, the first sentence of each middle paragraph, and then more carefully read the last paragraph of a passage.
2. Spend more time on the questions. Read carefully.
3. After skimming the passage, jot down in the margin three to five simple words that express the main idea of the passage. Answer the main idea question first.
4. Next answer specific questions, referring back to the passage to verify answers. If a question asks for sequencing, be careful to respond according to the order in which the material was presented in the passage.
5. Next complete questions asking test takers to infer information from the passage
6. Save the more time-consuming questions for last. Examples are those with a format of a) all of the above; b) 1, 2 and 5 above. Hints to avoid spending too much time on these questions: if one item is wrong, eliminate all answer choices that contain that item; if one item is correct, eliminate all answer choices that do not contain that correct item.

Reading Comprehension sections of standardized tests often have characteristics in common. There is no indication from official study materials that the MTEL Reading Subtest has passages or questions arranged in order of difficulty, although reading selections may vary widely in length. Candidates might want to complete the longer passages first.

More Strategies for Multiple Choice Questions. The following suggestions come from the instructors who offer sessions for the SAT, NTE and GRE.

1. Answer questions in your own words before you look at the answer choices, because the correct answers are more likely to be paraphrases of information in the passage than quotations from the passage.
2. Eliminate obviously incorrect answers first. Second, eliminate extreme or highly controversial answers.
3. Notice extreme language. Answers involving words like always, all, every, or will are likely to be wrong answers. In contrast, statements that are more moderate and use qualifying terms like most, tend to, may or might, and some are likely to be correct answers. Strongly worded statements tend to be more arbitrary, and they are easier to disprove. However, be careful when applying this rule. If the question asks for an idea which is LEAST likely or with which the author would most likely DISAGREE, then the extreme answer is likely to be the correct one! In general, extreme answers are unlikely to be true, so if the question asks for a true answer, an extreme answer is likely to be wrong, but if the question asks for a false answer, an extreme answer is likely to be correct.
4. Eliminate answers that are very extreme or controversial, are not sensible, or contain long quotations from the passage. (Look for matching key words, not long quotations.)
5. When passages contain complex and technical words (i.e. science passages), focus on the main ideas of the passage. Don’t get anxious or distracted by technical language.
6. Watch for differences of question focus or format by liberal arts content area. For example, science-related passages are often followed by questions asking for analysis of point of view, cause and effect, or problem/solution answers. In contrast, humanities-related passages might be followed by questions asking for the writer’s intention, point of view or a pro and con analysis of information, such as comparison of two contrasting ideas and emphasizing one perspective. Mathematics-related questions might require interpretation of information from charts and graphs. The information needed to answer the question is given; read carefully.
7. Identify key words in a question, and look for those same key words in the passage when searching for answers.
8. Eliminate answers that are too specific (unless the question asks for a specific fact) or contain information that is not in the passage (unless the question asks you to infer from the passage).
9. Return to the passage to find answers to highly specific questions. These often begin with "the writer said...", "according to the writer...," "the passage stated...," or "the primary point was...".

B. Reading Test Objectives

The complete text of the test objectives for the reading subtest can be found at the DOE web site.

C. Reading Test Practice Exercises

The passage below is followed by six questions which are aligned with MTEL test objectives 0001-0006 and linked interactively with responses and rationale. Please note that in the MTEL, objective 1 (determine the meaning of words) is tested using the general vocabulary section as well as the reading comprehension passages.

Directions: Read the following passage carefully. Respond to the multiple choice questions related to it. Check your responses against the answers and rationale offered interactively. Some might choose to answer all questions and then check their responses. Others might choose to use the interactive feature as they answer each question. Students are advised to answer the questions before checking the interactive response.

PASSAGE ONE

Philips, J. (1933). Salem at the end of the century.Salem in the Seventeenth Century. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, pp. 326-329.

The importance of the location of Salem as a trading center was beginning to be emphasized as the colony grew larger and more prosperous. There were no good harbors between Boston and Salem to the southward and none except Gloucester, far out on the Cape, between Salem and the mouth of the Merrimack to the northward. It was far easier to bring the fish of the fishing fleets of Gloucester and Marblehead to Salem for export than to Boston, and Salem was nearer to the lumber and fur trade of the eastward settlements. Moreover, there is evidence among the old family papers that the men of Salem had established sawmills and other interests along the Maine coast villages of Wells and Kennebunk, so that as the forests within easy reach of Salem were depleted, they could count on further supplies of barrel staves and boards from the eastward for export and also for ship timbers.

We think little of the use of the deep estuaries about Salem Bay as a means of transportation, but when the roads were little more than bridle paths, it meant much to be able to haul farm produce a few miles to a landing and then transport it the last six or seven miles by water to Salem. Even boating produce down Plum Island Sound and around Cape Ann was easier than hauling it ten or fifteen miles overland.

For all these reasons in the closing years of the century Salem had become quite a trading center. The land south of Boston was not nearly so fertile as the rich plains of Beverly, Danvers, Lynnfield, Topsfield, Wenham, Hamilton, Ipswich, and even the more distant farms of Reading and Wakefield.

It is noticeable that during the seventeenth century the same emigrations did not take place from Salem that occurred from other towns which were more largely dependent on agriculture. In such communities when the large families grew up, the old farm was not large enough to take care of all, so groups of young people pushed onward into the forest and started new communities westward and northward. In Salem the young people looked to the sea for their support, and for this reason Salem became far more industrialized than the surrounding towns.

A shipping industry in those days presupposed ship-building, and at about this period there were at least three active shipyards on the creek (just east of Norman Street) and one or more at the foot of Becket’s and Turner’s Lanes, perhaps owned by those families. Bartholomew Gedney and John Ruick both had shipyards, though they were merchants rather than shipbuilders, while the Lamberts were entirely shipbuilders. Undoubtedly at least forty or fifty men were more or less regularly employed as ship-carpenters and no doubt built houses in their spare time, for there are many men listed as shipwrights and few if any as simple carpenters.

The shipbuilding produced other trades as well. There was an anchorsmith, who presumably made anchors, and many other smiths located near the shipyards who no doubt turned out the multifarious iron work needed on the ships. There was a rope walk run by the Verens in 1635, and no doubt the industry persisted, as there are frequent attempts to encourage raising hemp which must otherwise be imported. There was importation of raw cotton, but whether they had got to the weaving of sails is not evident.

The farmers and fishermen got their share of the prosperity, for they furnished the provisions which supplied the crews of the ships, the mechanics who built them, and to some extent the cargoes. For export there were cheese and salt beef, potatoes, grains, and the big yellow onions for which the plains of Danvers have been famous. Some horses were also sent to the West Indies though not so many as from Rhode Island. The fishermen supplied the main cargo of good salt cod, while the woodsmen supplied the planks which built many houses in the Leeward Islands and the barrel staves for the containers in which the sugar and molasses returned.

The community itself required many industries to keep itself going. The farmers supplied the grain which was ground at Trask’s Mill or at the new mills on the South River, which was made into bread in the many households. There was a butcher’s shop and John Cromwell ran a slaughter-house. Eggs, butter, and fresh vegetables not raised in the kitchen gardens came in to market from the farms, while the delicacies of the table like sugar and spices arrived in the ships.

There were at least three tailors in town . . . Much cloth was already made here, but the finer cloths were imported. There were glaziers and joiners and chairmakers, coopersmiths and chandlers and weavers. The ancestor of all the Derbys was the soapmaker. Benjamin Gray was the gunsmith, and Samuel Phillips was the goldsmith. Shoes have been made here ever since the town began, and many citizens were listed as cordwainers, which seems to mean a worker on a Cordovan leather, but is, in plain twentieth-century English, a shoemaker. This industry began at the bottom with tanners of hides. . . . The shoes were actually made in the little home shoeshops, where the families put in their spare time profitably at odd moments when the weather was too stormy to work out of doors. . . There were no working hours in early New England, and everybody in almost every family worked from dawn till bedtime at some useful employment. In some of the larger homes special rooms were set aside for spinning and weaving. It was this training in industry which made the New Englanders so efficient in everything they undertook and made them respect the value of things by knowing the labor it took to make them.

Questions

1. What is the meaning of the word "emigrations" (paragraph 4)?

a. People moving to a new place.

b. Flocks of birds going south for the winter.

c. People moving from an old place.

d. A sea-based economy as opposed to an agriculturally-based economy.

Click here for answer and rationale for question #1.

 

2. What is the writer’s main idea in paragraph 2 ("We think little… ten or fifteen miles overland.”)?

a. We tend to forget about means of transportation.

b. The easily navigable bay at Salem helped to facilitate the selling of agricultural products for surrounding farms.

c.   Boating produce down Plumb Island Sound and around Cape Ann was easier than hauling ten or fifteen miles overland.

d. Transportation by water was easier than transportation by land in the seventeenth century.

Click here for answer and rationale for question #2.

3. What best describes the writer’s purpose in this passage?

a. To inform the reader about the economic history of Salem.

b. To educate the reader about the importance of Salem as a trading center in seventeenth-century America.

c. To persuade the reader of the long historical roots of New England thriftiness.

d. To summarize historical data uncovered about seventeenth-century Salem.

Click here for answer and rationale for question #3.

4. What is the most important reason that the writer concludes that "Salem became far more industrialized than the surrounding towns.”?

a. Salem used the sea for its economic prosperity, while other local communities relied chiefly on agriculture.

b. Salem became a trading center in the closing years of the seventeenth century.

c. Salem was blessed with deep estuaries, which allowed easy transportation into and out of Salem Bay.

d. Young people did not emigrate from Salem as they did from surrounding towns.

Click here for answer and rationale for question #4.

5. How is this writer least likely to continue his/her description of Salem in the seventeenth century?

a. By discussing what members of the community did on the holy day, or the Sabbath.

b. By arguing that historical accounts of Salem need to respond to feminist concerns and issues.

c. By giving greater detail about fishing patterns in Salem Bay.

d. By giving statistics about agricultural production in the environs of Salem

Click here for answer and rationale for question #5.

6. How might this passage best be outlined?

a.

I. Comparison of different Massachusetts communities.

II. Means of transportation.

III. Emigrations.

IV. Shipbuilding

V. Export.

VI. Food.

VII. Household goods.

b.

I. Importance of the location of Salem.

A. Good harbors.

B. Difficulty of overland travel.

II. People moved to Salem.

A. To build ships.

B. To work around ships.

III. Community life.

c.

I. Economic life of Salem.

A. Fishing, lumber, and fur.

B. Shipbuilding and carpentry.

C. Farming and wood products.

D. Mills and butcher shops.

E. Miscellaneous other occupations.

d.

I. Why Salem was a good trading port.

A. Good harbor.

B. Deep estuaries.

II. Details of Salem’s economy.

A. Shipping.

B. Ancillary trades.

C. Community industries.

Click here for answer and rationale for question #6.

Go to Interactive Reading Test A