Becoming an Effective Teacher

BECOMING AN EFFECTIVE TEACHER

1. Which of the following is the best definition of effective teaching?

a. Teaching that involves students in cooperative learning

b. Teaching that increases students’ self esteem

c. Teaching that provides students with enjoyable learning experiences

d. Teaching that maximizes learning for all students

2. Which of the following is the best description of motivation?

a. The process of meeting personal needs

b. The energizing force behind student learning

c. Being reinforced for desirable behavior

d. The process of making learning fun

3. Of the following, extrinsic motivation is best described as:

a. motivation to complete a activity that meets a need for safety.

b. motivation to complete a task to receive some incentive.

c. motivation to complete a task because it enhances self-efficacy.

d. motivation to complete an activity because it results in a feeling of competence.

4. Which of the following is the best description of intrinsic motivation?

a. Motivation to complete a task as a means to an end

b. Motivation to complete a task to meet a need for intellectual achievement

c. Motivation to engage in an activity for its own sake

d. Motivation to complete a task to meet the need for relatedness

5. Which of the following is not true of motivated students?

a. They tend to have higher grades.

b. They learn content almost effortlessly.

c. They have more positive attitudes toward school.

d. They persist on difficult tasks.

6. David Moore starts each of his lessons with a demonstration, such as dropping two objects of unequal weight and seeing them fall with the same rate of acceleration. Which of the following best describes Mr. Moore’s attempts?

a. He is trying to begin his lessons with an attention-getting activity.

b. He is trying to capitalize on learners’ intrinsic needs for intellectual achievement.

c. He is trying to promote students’ extrinsic need for a learning incentive.

d. He is trying to capitalize on learners’ intrinsic needs for control and self-determination.

8. Of the following, what is the best description of learning objectives?

a. Statements that describe the activities teachers design to promote deep understanding of a particular topic

b. Statements that describe the techniques teachers use to help students learn specific knowledge or skills

c. Statements that specify what students should know or be able to do with respect to a topic

d. Statements that specify the strategies that teachers will use to promote students’ interest in a topic

9. Other than selecting topics, all of teachers’ planning decisions are guided by:

a. creating assessments.

b. identifying students’ interests.

c. selecting learning objectives.

d. preparing learning activities.

10. Which of the following is most important when teachers prepare and organize learning activities?

a. Finding or creating high-quality examples and problems

b. Designing effective cooperative learning activities

c. Creating effective assessments

d. Ensuring that objectives are written according to Mager’s or Gronlund’s formats

11. Which of the following is the best definition of a high-quality example?

a. An example that is concrete and which captures students’ attention

b. An example that is likely to increase students’ intrinsic motivation to learn

c. An example that will require students to process information in one of the higher cells of the taxonomy table

d. An example that has all the information in it that students need to understand a topic

12. A teacher wants her first graders to understand the concept mammal. Which of the following is the best case of a high-quality example?

a. One of the students’ hamsters

b. A picture of a cat and some kittens

c. A description on an overhead saying that mammals are warm blooded, nurse their young, and have hair

d. A description on an overhead saying that mammals are warm blooded, nurse their young, and have hair together with a picture of a dog

13. Of the following, which is the best definition of assessment?

a. The process of creating tests and quizzes to determine how much information students have acquired in learning activities.

b. The process teachers use to gather information and make decisions about students’ learning progress

c. The process of using effective rubrics when observing young children perform basic skills such as forming letters

d. The process of writing end-of-term tests and assigning grades based on students’ performance on those tests

14. Which of the following are questions addressed by effective assessments?

1. How will I know if students have reached my learning objectives?

2. How will I decide if a topic is important to teach?

3. How will I match my instruction to state standards?

4. How can I use assessment information to increase my students’ learning?

a. 1, 2, 3, 4 b. 1, 4 c. 1, 2, 3 d. 3

15. Which of the following statements best describes instructional alignment?

a. Teachers’ beliefs about their abilities to instruct students in such a way that all students, regardless of ability, will learn as much as possible

b. The consistency between teachers’ objectives, learning activities, practice they provide for students, and assessment

c. Teachers’ willingness to invest their time and effort to be sure that all students learn as much as possible

d. Teachers’ behaviors that cause students to behave in ways that mirror the teachers’ behaviors

16. When teachers’ lessons are out of alignment, which of the following is the most likely reason?

a. Their thinking about their learning objectives isn’t clear.

b. They are low in personal teaching efficacy.

c. They are unprofessional.

d. They lack essential teaching skills, such as the ability to guide students with questioning.

20. Which of the following best describes essential teaching skills?

a. The skills that veteran teachers acquire after approximately three years of teaching experience

b. The skills that teachers who complete traditional teacher preparation programs acquire, but that people who complete alternative licensure programs do not.

c. The abilities that teachers acquire from their university courses, which are then more fully developed by their experiences in classrooms

d. The abilities that all teachers, including those in their first year of teaching, should have in order to help students learn

21. When a teacher believes he or she can positively affect student learning, that teacher is said to possess:

a. effective attitudes.

b. teaching efficacy.

c. empathetic effectiveness.

d. proactive attitudes.

22. Mandy Jackson was reflecting on the problem of Francisco. He was in her third period English class, and he was failing. She had tried gentle reminders to him to complete his work and made sure she recognized him when he did so; she had tried simplifying directions; she had tried counseling him; she had tried drawing him out in class and elaborating on his comments and questions. “So far, none of those has really worked for very long”, she mused, “I know I can get him to learn. I wonder what I should try next. I think I’ll call his parents and ask for their help.” Which of the following statements best describes Mandy’s behavior in the episode you just read?

a. She has demonstrated high teaching efficacy.

b. She has demonstrated modeling and vicarious learning.

c. She has demonstrated effective organizational skills.

d. She has demonstrated a commitment to ethnic diversity.

23. Research indicates that teachers treat students for whom they have high expectations differently than those for whom they have low expectations. In which of the following areas do these differences exist?

1. Questioning: Teachers tend to call on perceived low achievers more often, because lower achievers are less likely to volunteer responses on their own.

2. Teacher effort: Teachers give perceived high achievers more thorough explanations, their instruction is more enthusiastic, and they require more complete and accurate student answers than they do from perceived low achievers.

3. Feedback: Teachers praise perceived high achievers more and criticize them less. They also offer perceived high achievers more complete and lengthier feedback.

4. Emotional support: Teachers interact more with perceived high achievers, make more eye contact, stand closer, and orient their bodies more directly toward these students, because low achievers are less confident than are their higher achieving peers.

a. 1, 2, 3, 4 b. 1, 3 c. 2, 4 d. 1

24. Rick Reynolds calls on all his students as equally as possible. Of the following, he practice most

closely which essential teaching skill?

a. Teacher expectations

b. Teacher modeling

c. Teacher caring

d. Teacher warmth and empathy

25. Roger is a world history teacher. He peppers his presentation with questions to the students in the class. If Roger’s behavior is consistent with existing research, which of the following students is Roger most likely to call on?

a. Pete, a low achiever.

b. Jon, a passive student who rarely participates in class.

c. Burton, who tends to be disruptive.

d. Fritz, a high achieving student.

26. Tony Martin’s students are convinced that he loves teaching English. Of the following, their belief is most likely related to:

a. Tony’s personal teaching efficacy.

b. Tony’s expectations.

c. Tony’s modeling.

d. Tony’s organization.

View this related post: Creating Productive Learning Environments.