Your FREE Praxis 5622 Flashcards 2026 – 200+ Cards

Birth to ~2 years; the child learns through senses and motor action and develops object permanence.

~2 to 7 years; symbolic thought and language emerge, but thinking is egocentric and lacks conservation.

~7 to 11 years; logical thinking about concrete objects; masters conservation, classification, and reversibility. Most K-6 students.

~11 years and up; abstract, hypothetical 'what-if' reasoning becomes possible.

Knowing that objects continue to exist even when out of sight; develops in Piaget's sensorimotor stage.

Understanding that quantity stays the same despite changes in shape or arrangement; mastered in the concrete operational stage.

A preoperational child's difficulty seeing a situation from another person's point of view.

A mental framework that organizes knowledge; new information is assimilated into it or it is accommodated to fit.

Fitting new information into an existing schema without changing the schema.

Altering an existing schema to incorporate new information that does not fit.

Piaget's process of balancing assimilation and accommodation to build stable understanding.

Learning is fundamentally social; cognitive growth comes from interaction with more knowledgeable others within a culture.

The gap between what a learner can do alone and what they can do with guidance; the prime target for instruction.

Anyone (teacher, peer, parent) with greater skill who can guide a learner through the ZPD.

Temporary, structured support within the ZPD that is gradually withdrawn as the learner becomes capable.

Eight stages, each with a central conflict; elementary children face industry vs. inferiority.

Erikson's stage for ages ~6-12: children develop competence through accomplishment or feelings of inadequacy.

Erikson's adolescent stage: forming a coherent sense of self.

Three levels — preconventional, conventional, postconventional — describing how moral reasoning matures.

Kohlberg's earliest level: right and wrong are judged by punishment and reward.

A model placing the child within nested environments (micro-, meso-, exo-, macro-, chronosystem) that shape development.

A theory that learning is a change in behavior caused by environmental stimuli and consequences.

Pavlov's learning by association: a neutral stimulus paired with a meaningful one comes to trigger a response.

Skinner's theory that behavior is shaped by its consequences — reinforcement and punishment.

Adding a pleasant stimulus after a behavior to increase that behavior.

Removing an unpleasant stimulus to increase a behavior; 'negative' means subtracting, not 'bad.'

Adding an unpleasant consequence to decrease a behavior.

Removing a pleasant stimulus (e.g., taking away recess) to decrease a behavior.

Reducing a behavior by withholding the reinforcement that previously rewarded it.

A theory that learners actively build understanding from experience rather than passively receiving facts.

People learn by observing and imitating models; reinforcement of the model influences the observer.

Acquiring behavior by watching others, central to Bandura's social learning theory.

A person's belief in their ability to succeed at a specific task; it shapes effort and persistence.

A model of memory as input → sensory register → working memory → long-term memory.

Limited-capacity memory that holds and manipulates information briefly; chunking expands its effective capacity.

Relatively permanent storage; information moves here through rehearsal and meaningful encoding.

Grouping items into meaningful units to hold more in working memory (e.g., a phone number).

Thinking about one's own thinking — planning, monitoring, and evaluating one's learning.

Intelligence as several relatively independent abilities (linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalist).

Gardner's ability to understand and work well with others.

Gardner's self-awareness and understanding of one's own feelings.

Motivation from within — curiosity, interest, or the satisfaction of mastery.

Motivation from outside rewards or pressures such as grades, stickers, or praise.

Lower needs (physiological, safety) must be reasonably met before higher needs (belonging, esteem, self-actualization) motivate behavior.

Maslow's base level: food, water, rest, warmth — must be met before learning.

Maslow's top level: achieving one's full potential.

The belief that ability grows with effort and strategy; fostered by praising process, not fixed talent.

The belief that ability is static and unchangeable; tends to reduce persistence after failure.

How learners explain their successes and failures (ability, effort, luck, difficulty) shapes future motivation.

Whether a student credits outcomes to internal factors (effort) or external ones (luck); internal locus supports effort.

A state in which repeated failure leads a student to stop trying, believing effort won't matter.

Deep engagement that occurs when a task's difficulty matches the learner's skill.

Structured peer interaction can raise engagement, belonging, and accountability.

A student learning English as an additional language; benefits from visuals, peer support, and comprehensible input.

Language presented just above the learner's current level, supported so it can be understood.

Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (social, ~1-2 yrs) vs. Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (academic, ~5-7 yrs).

Instruction that draws on students' cultural backgrounds and experiences to make learning relevant.

Students who need enrichment, acceleration, or depth beyond the standard curriculum.

A neurological difference affecting specific skills (e.g., dyslexia in reading) despite typical intelligence.

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder; supported with structure, movement breaks, and clear, chunked tasks.

A learner's current developmental and prior-knowledge level; instruction should meet students where they are.

The capacity to recover from setbacks; supported by relationships, structure, and a growth mindset.

Connecting new learning to what students already know improves comprehension and retention.

Applying knowledge or skills learned in one context to a new situation.

A clear, measurable statement of what students will be able to do, using an observable action verb.

Use observable verbs (list, solve, analyze) instead of unmeasurable ones (understand, know, appreciate).

A hierarchy of cognitive skills: remember, understand, apply, analyze, evaluate, create.

The lowest level: recall facts and basic concepts (list, define, name).

Explain ideas or concepts (summarize, paraphrase, classify).

Use information in new situations (solve, demonstrate, implement).

Draw connections and break information apart (compare, contrast, categorize).

Justify a stand or decision (judge, critique, defend).

The highest level: produce new or original work (design, compose, construct).

Cognitive work above recall — analysis, evaluation, and creation; promoted by open-ended questions.

Planning by starting from the desired results, then assessments, then learning activities (Wiggins & McTighe).

Ensuring objectives, instruction, and assessment all target the same intended learning.

An opening that activates prior knowledge and engages students at the start of a lesson.

A teacher-led, explicit, sequential method best for teaching clear skills or procedures.

Students build understanding by investigating questions and problems.

Students learn concepts through exploration and guided experience rather than direct telling.

Extended, authentic projects through which students learn and apply content.

Structured group work with positive interdependence and individual accountability.

A structure where each member becomes an expert on one part, then teaches the group.

Students think individually, discuss with a partner, then share with the class.

Adjusting content, process, product, or environment to fit varied readiness, interest, and learning profiles.

Changing WHAT students learn or the materials used to access it.

Changing HOW students make sense of content (activities, grouping, support).

Changing HOW students demonstrate learning (essay, model, presentation).

Tasks at varied difficulty levels addressing the same objective for different readiness groups.

Regrouping students by need, interest, or skill rather than fixed ability tracks.

Designing instruction with multiple means of engagement, representation, and action/expression from the start.

I do (model) → we do (guided) → you do together (collaborative) → you do alone (independent).

The teacher demonstrates and thinks aloud, providing full support.

Teacher and students practice together with scaffolds still in place.

Students apply a skill on their own once scaffolds are removed.

The pause after a question (and after a response); 3-5 seconds yields longer, higher-quality answers.

A question with many possible responses that promotes higher-order thinking and discussion.

A question with one correct answer, useful for quick recall checks.

Varying question difficulty across Bloom's levels to challenge all learners.

A follow-up that pushes a student to clarify, justify, or extend an answer.

Inviting other students to respond or build on a peer's answer.

Clear verbal, visual, and kinesthetic prompts that guide student attention and response.

Active learning has students do, discuss, and apply; passive learning has them only receive information.

A framework presented before a lesson that helps students connect new material to prior knowledge.

A visual tool (web, Venn diagram, chart) that structures information to aid understanding.

Diagramming relationships among ideas to build and reveal conceptual understanding.

Concrete objects (counters, blocks) that help students, especially concrete-operational learners, grasp abstract ideas.

Using technology to enable active, higher-order work — not passive consumption.

Adjusting the speed of instruction to keep students engaged and appropriately challenged.

A wrap-up that has students summarize learning and connect it to the objective.

Presenting content again in a different way after assessment shows it didn't stick.

Revisiting key concepts repeatedly at increasing depth over time.

Structured talk (sentence stems, roles) that supports all students in academic conversation.

The pause a teacher allows after a student responds, before reacting, to deepen the answer.

A memory aid (acronym, rhyme) that helps students recall information.

Connecting new content to what students already know to improve comprehension.

Connecting content across subjects so learning is more meaningful and transferable.

Choosing the action verb that matches the intended cognitive level when writing an objective.

Checking for understanding mid-lesson (questioning, thumbs) and adjusting on the spot.

Eye contact, proximity, and gestures that manage behavior and convey expectations.

Ongoing, usually ungraded checking during instruction used to adjust teaching — assessment FOR learning.

A measure of mastery after instruction (unit test, final project, state exam) — assessment OF learning.

Assessment given before instruction to identify students' prior knowledge and starting points.

A brief, ungraded prompt at a lesson's end; a common formative check.

Periodic assessment that tracks progress toward end-of-year standards.

Compares a student's performance to that of a representative peer group (percentiles).

Measures performance against a fixed standard or criterion, not against other students.

A test administered and scored under uniform conditions to allow comparison.

The degree to which an assessment measures what it is intended to measure.

Whether a test's items adequately represent the content domain it claims to cover.

The degree to which an assessment yields consistent results across administrations or scorers.

A test can be reliable without being valid, but cannot be truly valid without reliability.

Features of an item that unfairly advantage or disadvantage a group unrelated to the skill measured.

Assessment requiring real-world application of skills (a performance, product, or task).

Evaluating a skill by having students perform it (an experiment, a speech, a project).

A purposeful collection of student work over time showing growth and achievement.

A scoring guide listing criteria and performance levels; improves reliability and clarifies expectations.

Scores several dimensions of work separately (e.g., ideas, organization, conventions).

Gives a single overall score based on general impression against criteria.

A list of criteria marked present or absent; useful for procedural or behavioral tasks.

A question with provided options (multiple choice, true/false, matching).

A question requiring students to generate an answer (short answer, essay, performance).

Students evaluate their own work against criteria, building metacognition.

Students evaluate one another's work using shared criteria.

Specific, timely feedback focused on the task and next steps, not just a grade.

Descriptive tells what to improve and how; evaluative only judges ('good job').

Praising effort and strategy fosters a growth mindset; praising fixed ability undermines persistence.

A change in how a student takes a test (extended time, read-aloud) that keeps the construct intact.

A change in what is assessed (fewer items, different standard); alters the construct measured.

Using assessment results to plan re-teaching, grouping, and the next lesson.

Reviewing how students performed on each item to judge difficulty, discrimination, and clarity.

Assessment gathers evidence of learning; grading summarizes it into a reported mark.

Reporting achievement against specific learning standards rather than a single averaged grade.

Comparing performance before and after instruction to measure growth.

Systematically watching and recording student behavior or skill as evidence of learning.

A method of recording a student's oral reading to assess accuracy and strategies.

Brief written observations of student behavior collected over time.

Designing the assessment from the objective first so it measures the intended learning.

Supports (bilingual dictionary, extra time) that let an ELL show content knowledge.

Clear, well-defined criteria raise consistency across different scorers.

Analyzing one's own teaching and its effects in order to improve, often via journaling or peer observation.

A teacher's systematic inquiry into their own practice to solve a classroom problem.

Ongoing learning (workshops, courses, coaching) that improves a teacher's knowledge and skills.

Pairing a new teacher with an experienced colleague for guidance and support.

A group of educators who collaborate regularly to improve teaching and student learning.

Working with co-teachers, specialists, and staff to support student learning.

Two teachers (often general and special education) sharing instruction of one class.

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act — guarantees a free appropriate public education in the least restrictive environment.

Free Appropriate Public Education — a right guaranteed to students with disabilities under IDEA.

The IDEA requirement to educate students with disabilities with non-disabled peers to the greatest extent appropriate.

Individualized Education Program — the legal plan of specialized instruction and services for a student with a disability.

The group (parents, teachers, specialists, administrator) that develops and reviews a student's IEP.

A civil-rights law providing accommodations so students with disabilities can access education equally.

A plan of accommodations (not specialized instruction) for a student with a disability under Section 504.

A tiered framework providing increasing levels of support and monitoring before a special-education referral.

Educating students with disabilities in the general classroom with appropriate supports.

The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act — protects the privacy of student education records.

Student records may be shared only with those who have a legitimate educational interest.

Federal law prohibiting sex-based discrimination in education programs receiving federal funds.

A teacher's legal duty to report suspected child abuse or neglect to authorities.

Procedural protections (notice, hearing) for students and parents in disciplinary or special-education decisions.

Keeping student information private and sharing it only as legally and professionally appropriate.

Standards of honest, fair, and responsible conduct toward students, families, and colleagues.

Making sound instructional and ethical decisions within school and legal expectations.

Regular, reciprocal contact that shares strengths and concerns and invites family input.

Reaching out with positive news and updates, not only when problems arise.

A scheduled meeting to discuss a student's progress, strengths, and goals with families.

Involving families as partners in their child's education through communication and participation.

Providing translation or interpreters so families with limited English can participate fully.

School and community supports (counselors, social services, after-school programs) a teacher can connect families to.

Counselors, psychologists, social workers, and specialists who support students and teachers.

Acting in students' best interests, including connecting them to needed services and supports.

Releasing student data only to authorized parties with a legitimate educational need (FERPA).

Ongoing coursework and PD required to maintain a teaching license.

A teacher reflecting on their own performance against professional standards to set growth goals.

Observing colleagues (and being observed) to share strategies and improve practice.

Respecting families' cultural values and communication norms when partnering with them.

Discussing student information with colleagues only when there is a legitimate educational purpose.

Maintaining appropriate, ethical relationships with students and families.

A teacher's commitment to continually growing professionally throughout a career.