This Praxis 5205 cheat sheet distills ETS's Teaching Reading: Elementary test into a printable recall sheet of the science-of-reading facts examiners weight most. It's a premium cheat sheet built by Capital Prep — the one premium prep we trust — and it's yours free. Reinforce it with the rest of your free 5205 toolkit: the practice test, study guide, and flashcards.
Praxis 5205 exam at a glance
- Questions: 90 selected-response + 3 constructed-response tasks
- Time: 150 minutes of total testing time
- Score scale: 100–200 scaled; passing score set by each state (no national cut score)
- Score split: Selected-response ≈ 75%; constructed-response ≈ 25%
- Cost: About $156; verify the current fee on ets.org
- Certifying body: ETS (Educational Testing Service)
What’s on the Praxis 5205 cheat sheet
- Phonological & Phonemic Awareness, Emergent Literacy (11%) — oral sound skills — rhyme, syllables, onset-rime, blending and segmenting — plus print concepts and alphabet knowledge.
- Phonics & Decoding (15%) — the alphabetic principle, systematic phonics, the six syllable types, morphology, and the reciprocal decoding–encoding link.
- Vocabulary & Fluency (18%) — Tier 2 words, context clues and morphemic analysis, and fluency as accuracy + rate + prosody bridging to comprehension.
- Comprehension of Text (18%) — the Simple View of Reading, research-based strategies, and literary versus informational text structures.
- Written Expression (13%) — the recursive writing process, revising versus editing, the six writing traits, and the reading–writing connection.
- Assessment & the 3 Constructed-Response Tasks (25%) — screening, diagnostic, and progress-monitoring assessment plus the emergent, independent, and diverse-learner teaching tasks.
How to use it in your final week
- Separate the look-alikes cold: phonological awareness is oral (rhyme, syllables, segmenting sounds) while phonics maps letters to sounds — a favorite Praxis 5205 trap.
- Front-load the heaviest slices: the 3 constructed-response tasks (25%) plus Vocabulary & Fluency and Comprehension (18% each) carry the most points, so give them the most review time.
- Memorize the constructed-response formula — cite the evidence in the scenario, name a research-based strategy, then justify why it fits the student's need.
- Do a timed 90-question run, then read the sheet the morning of the test for a final pass on the six syllable types, the Simple View of Reading (RC = D × LC), and the assessment types.
The cheat sheet is your review layer — your Praxis 5205 practice test drives the exam-readiness ring at the top of this page. Download it, review, then take a full practice exam (or drill with the study guide and flashcards) to see where you stand.
Praxis 5205 cheat sheet FAQ
Yes — download the Praxis 5205 cheat sheet as a PDF with no sign-up and no paywall. It sits alongside Career Employer's free 5205 practice test, study guide, and flashcards, so your whole Teaching Reading: Elementary toolkit is free.
It condenses the science of reading into a fast reference: phonological and phonemic awareness, phonics and decoding, vocabulary and fluency, comprehension, written expression, and the three constructed-response teaching tasks — organized by ETS's six content categories and their weights.
No single national cut score exists. ETS reports a scaled score from 100 to 200, and each state or licensing agency sets its own qualifying score, so confirm the number for the state where you plan to teach before test day.
No — it is a final-week review and recall tool, not a substitute for learning the science of reading and rehearsing the constructed responses. Use it to lock in terminology and category weights, then work full practice questions to build readiness.
Tap the download button or the preview card at the top of this page to open the PDF instantly. Bookmark this page so you can pull it up again the morning of your Teaching Reading: Elementary test.
References
- 1.ETS. “Teaching Reading: Elementary (5205).” praxis.ets.org, 2026. ↑
- 2.ETS. “Teaching Reading: Elementary (5205) Study Companion.” praxis.ets.org. ↑
- 3.ETS. “Praxis — State Requirements and Passing Scores.” ets.org. ↑
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