Please check the Massachusetts DOE website for sample writing test questions and for model open response items at www.doe.mass.edu/educators.
Grading of the writing practice test should be handled by individual institutions that wish to provide this service. To get the best sense of how you would do on the actual exam, we suggest that you do your best to simulate the test conditions. Allow no more than four hours to complete a practice test. If you are planning to take the reading and writing tests on the same morning (experienced MTEL test takers discourage this!), allow yourself no more than four hours to do both the reading and writing tests.
Name
Telephone Number
1. What is a noun?
2. What is an interrogative
sentence?
3. What is an independent
clause?
4. What is a direct object?
5. What is an adverb?
The following sentences contain one or more grammatical errors. Rewrite the sentence as a new single sentence in proper grammatical form.
1.The senators aides much like armed warriors marched down the halls of congress determined to do battle with every foe.
2.Flying to kentucky to visit his grandparents Gregorys baggage got lost.
3. Its only for one day said the professor.
4. The portrait photographer sees only what is before her, the
portrait artist sees something more than her subjects face.
5.Their is only one way to hit the ball proper.
Please note: grammar and usage errors in have been deliberately added to the following passage.
(1) For decades, HBCUs have responded to these challenges by engaging in cooperative ventures with religious denominations and private philanthropists. (2) Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) have had to overcome many obstacles during the course of their existences. (3) These alliances have allowed HBCUs to advocate for and find ways to educate large numbers of African-Americans for over a century.
(4) As we move into the next century, HBCUs face one of their greatest challenges yet, preserving and renewing their mission of educating teachers. (5) Teacher preparation has been a major focus of HBCUs since 1865, when the creation of the Freedmens Bureau spurred the development of elementary schools for African-Americans and a corresponding need for more teachers. (6) Enriching this tradition remains a priority at these institutions.
(7) From the past to the present collaborative efforts have facilitated the preparation of African-American teachers. (8) This chapter presents a context for the stories told in this volume by providing an overview of these efforts, including an introduction of the creation of one of the most recent collaborations to improve teacher preparation in HBCUs—the HBCU Teacher Education Technical Support Network.
Adapted from “Challenges and Collaborations in Historically Black Colleges and Universities,” by Boyce C. Williams, in Boyce C. Williams, ed., Reforming Teacher Education through Accreditation: Telling Our Story. Reprinted by permission.
Please note: grammar and usage errors in have been deliberately added to the following passage.
(1) This study is part of a larger project that studied how families of different cultural and racial backgrounds and income levels support their children’s school success in the early primary grades. (2) Research has repeatedly demonstrated the positive connection between parent support and involvement and children’s school achievement (Davies, 1990; Dornbusch & Wood, 1989; Epstein, 1987; Swap, 1993). (3) Middle- and low-income African American, Chinese American, Irish American, and Puerto Rican families were included in the project sample. (4) The project was undertaken to obtain a clearer understanding of how families of different backgrounds value and support academic success. (5) We focused on family practices and beliefs within a community context in order to deepen our understanding of the process of family and community support.
(6) Ten Chinese American children were recruited for the ethnographic study between 1991 and 1992. (7) The first cohort of five families, recruited in 1991—Aaron Lam, Ivan Chan, Paul Lee, Julie Ho, and James Ma—stayed for three years, while the second cohort of five families, recruited in 1992—Lori Kao, Megan Hung, Tim Woo, Stacey Yee, and Dennis Yuen—stayed for two years. (8) All the first cohort children plus two (Tim Woo and Stacey Yee) from the second cohort, were recruited from one public school in Boston. (9) The remaining children were recruited from two different public schools in the suburb called Greenland (a sudonym). (10) At this time, all the first cohort children are eight years old and in third grade. (11) All the second cohort children are seven years old and in second grade. (12) (Names have been changed to preserve confidentiality.) (13) All ten children were initially identified by their kindergarten teachers as potentially successful. (14) According to their subsequent teachers these children continued to do well in first grade and second grade.
Adapted from “Part I: The Ethnographic Study: Purpose and the Sample,” in Sau-Fong Siu and Jay A. Feldman, Patterns of Chinese American Family Involvement in Young Children’s Education: Final Report, Report #36, July 1996
This section of the writing subtest presents a passage for the candidate to summarize in his or her own words. Responses are scored on the extent to which they effectively communicate the main idea and essential points of the passage clearly and concisely, in the candidate’s own words.
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate—we can not consecrate—we can not hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Abraham Lincoln, “Address Delivered at the Dedication of the Cemetery at Gettysburg,” November 19, 1863
Read the passage below on election of Supreme Court justices; then follow the instructions for writing your composition.
Answers to Practice Writing SubtestShould justices of the US Supreme Court be elected, rather than appointed for life as they are now? Proponents argue that justices standing for election would make them more representative of the views of the people, and that life tenure as a Supreme Court justice affords the public little hope of removing an incompetent judge. Opponents argue that appointing judges allows them to rule impartially, separated from the current fads of public opinion, and that forcing justices to stand for election would corrupt the judicial system by introducing special interest money as campaign contributions.
Your purpose is to write a composition, to be read by a classroom instructor, in which you indicate whether you agree or disagree that justices of the Supreme Court should be elected rather than appointed. Be sure to defend your position with logical arguments and appropriate examples.