ESL Languages Certification Exam –
Latest and Improved Version with
Answers.
Which of the following programs provides federally mandated accountability data on the progress of
ELL students in Texas in meeting language proficiency goals? - Correct Answers: ✔✔Texas English
Language Proficiency Assessment System (TELPAS)
Which of the following establishes the federal foundation for ESL programs in Texas schools? - Correct
Answers: ✔✔Public Law 107-110 (Elementary and Secondary Education Act) (reauthorized by
Congress in 2001 as the No Child Left Behind Act) includes provisions for ensuring that ESL students
receive necessary educational support.
In an upper elementary class of beginning to intermediate ESL students, the teacher displays the
following exercise on the overhead.
Look at this set of sentences. With your group members, come up with a "rule" that explains a
sentence structure that you see repeated in all of the sentences.
• Growing up, I spent a lot of summers with my grandparents in Mexico.
• On my grandparents' ranch, the mesquite trees, dirt piles, and watering holes were my playground.
• Almost every day, I would wake up with the first light, gobble my breakfast, and dash outside.
• At the end of the summer, it was time to return to my home in Texas.
This teaching activity is designed to address which of the following cognitive processes in L2
acquisition? - Correct Answers: ✔✔Generalization - The sentences all include an introductory
element with a comma separating it from the main clause. The objective in this activity is to
encourage students to generalize about the structure and appropriate punctuation. The teacher wants
students to recognize that English marks introductory phrases with a comma.
Exam with Answers.
,Toward the end of the first grading period of the year, a middle school teacher makes the following
assignment in her ESL class:
I want you to write a short letter to your parents. Write a letter that your parents will understand, so
you can write in either English or Spanish or a combination. From your perspective, tell your parents
the highlights of this six. Write neatly. Use some details. You might want to add illustrations in the
margins. You need to give your letters to your parents. Tomorrow, we will spend some time talking
about what your parents said about your letter.
The primary purpose of this assignment is to - Correct Answers: ✔✔communicate with ESL students'
parents or guardians regarding school activities.
Which of the following statements best summarizes the way an ELL teacher can use results of
mandated assessment to improve student achievement in the classroom? - Correct Answers:
✔✔Although scores on mandated state exams provide summative assessment data, teachers can use
information about performance in discrete areas of the exams to devise formative assessments
embedded in day-to-day class activities.
An elementary school teacher is planning to introduce a new read-aloud story to a class of beginning
and intermediate ELL students. Which of the following prereading strategies would best enable
students to understand new vocabulary in the story? - Correct Answers: ✔✔The teacher posts
labeled illustrations of the new words, with each illustration showing the new word in large letters.
The teacher explains each new word prior to the read-aloud.
A high school English teacher plans a unit focused on a frequently taught short story from American
literature. Because half of his students are intermediate to advanced ESL students, he needs to
provide appropriate accommodations to create comprehensible input. Which of the following
instructional activities should the teacher select to meet this goal? - Correct Answers: ✔✔The teacher
begins the unit with a "book talk" in which he introduces the characters, the initiating event, and
touches on the conflict. He then reads a few pivotal passages from the story.
A writing teacher has shown intermediate-level ESL students how to brainstorm, how to do webs, and
how to pose questions about the topic. An additional strategy that would help students during the
planning stage of writing would be to - Correct Answers: ✔✔draw a simple illustration.
Exam with Answers.
, Ms. Contreras is reading a set of student drafts. The following sentence is in Remi's draft: "I knew that
if I just had too more minutes, I could of finished." Remi's sentence demonstrates difficulty in -
Correct Answers: ✔✔distinguishing between the oral and written forms of homonyms.
Remi's draft ends with this sentence: "You should never feel bad just cuz u didn't finish." Which of the
following strategies should Ms. Contreras use to help Remi understand the difference between social
and academic registers? - Correct Answers: ✔✔She should have a minilesson on texting language
versus academic language, explaining expectations for each register
An elementary teacher has a class of beginning ESL students. During oral reading times, the teacher
notices that the students are using many L1 phonemes in pronouncing L2 words. The most effective
strategy in helping students use their L1 phonological knowledge in producing L2 strings would be for
the teacher to - Correct Answers: ✔✔have students read along silently as she plays an audio
recording of a short book they are familiar with. She plays the recording once more, with the students
reading along chorally.
The best rationale for integrating culturally relevant literature into ELL curricula is that - Correct
Answers: ✔✔students are better able to connect meaningfully with stories and characters that reflect
their culture and/ or native country environment.
A third-grade ESL teacher creates a Home Words Homework Page. The teacher tells the students to
ask their parents or siblings to help them write down 10 words describing their home or objects in
their home. The teacher tells the students to put the words in two columns: one column for the
English word and one column for the Spanish translation. This assignment best addresses which of the
following ESL instructional strategies? - Correct Answers: ✔✔The teacher is creating an opportunity
for family involvement in the ESL students' education
ELL students in a third-grade class are having trouble learning the names of math figures (for example,
hexagon, quadrilateral, pentagon, and so on). Which of the following instructional strategies would
most effectively promote students' learning in this area of math? - Correct Answers: ✔✔The teacher
puts students into groups and assigns a different figure to each group. Their task is to make several
models of their figure using a variety of resources such as craft sticks, twigs, pencils, construction
paper strips, chenille sticks, and any other materials they can think of.
An elementary school teacher has introduced word problems in his ESL class. The teacher knows that
word problems pose conceptual difficulties even for native speakers, so he wants to provide
appropriate instructional support for his ESL students' understanding of this math concept. Which of
Exam with Answers.
Latest and Improved Version with
Answers.
Which of the following programs provides federally mandated accountability data on the progress of
ELL students in Texas in meeting language proficiency goals? - Correct Answers: ✔✔Texas English
Language Proficiency Assessment System (TELPAS)
Which of the following establishes the federal foundation for ESL programs in Texas schools? - Correct
Answers: ✔✔Public Law 107-110 (Elementary and Secondary Education Act) (reauthorized by
Congress in 2001 as the No Child Left Behind Act) includes provisions for ensuring that ESL students
receive necessary educational support.
In an upper elementary class of beginning to intermediate ESL students, the teacher displays the
following exercise on the overhead.
Look at this set of sentences. With your group members, come up with a "rule" that explains a
sentence structure that you see repeated in all of the sentences.
• Growing up, I spent a lot of summers with my grandparents in Mexico.
• On my grandparents' ranch, the mesquite trees, dirt piles, and watering holes were my playground.
• Almost every day, I would wake up with the first light, gobble my breakfast, and dash outside.
• At the end of the summer, it was time to return to my home in Texas.
This teaching activity is designed to address which of the following cognitive processes in L2
acquisition? - Correct Answers: ✔✔Generalization - The sentences all include an introductory
element with a comma separating it from the main clause. The objective in this activity is to
encourage students to generalize about the structure and appropriate punctuation. The teacher wants
students to recognize that English marks introductory phrases with a comma.
Exam with Answers.
,Toward the end of the first grading period of the year, a middle school teacher makes the following
assignment in her ESL class:
I want you to write a short letter to your parents. Write a letter that your parents will understand, so
you can write in either English or Spanish or a combination. From your perspective, tell your parents
the highlights of this six. Write neatly. Use some details. You might want to add illustrations in the
margins. You need to give your letters to your parents. Tomorrow, we will spend some time talking
about what your parents said about your letter.
The primary purpose of this assignment is to - Correct Answers: ✔✔communicate with ESL students'
parents or guardians regarding school activities.
Which of the following statements best summarizes the way an ELL teacher can use results of
mandated assessment to improve student achievement in the classroom? - Correct Answers:
✔✔Although scores on mandated state exams provide summative assessment data, teachers can use
information about performance in discrete areas of the exams to devise formative assessments
embedded in day-to-day class activities.
An elementary school teacher is planning to introduce a new read-aloud story to a class of beginning
and intermediate ELL students. Which of the following prereading strategies would best enable
students to understand new vocabulary in the story? - Correct Answers: ✔✔The teacher posts
labeled illustrations of the new words, with each illustration showing the new word in large letters.
The teacher explains each new word prior to the read-aloud.
A high school English teacher plans a unit focused on a frequently taught short story from American
literature. Because half of his students are intermediate to advanced ESL students, he needs to
provide appropriate accommodations to create comprehensible input. Which of the following
instructional activities should the teacher select to meet this goal? - Correct Answers: ✔✔The teacher
begins the unit with a "book talk" in which he introduces the characters, the initiating event, and
touches on the conflict. He then reads a few pivotal passages from the story.
A writing teacher has shown intermediate-level ESL students how to brainstorm, how to do webs, and
how to pose questions about the topic. An additional strategy that would help students during the
planning stage of writing would be to - Correct Answers: ✔✔draw a simple illustration.
Exam with Answers.
, Ms. Contreras is reading a set of student drafts. The following sentence is in Remi's draft: "I knew that
if I just had too more minutes, I could of finished." Remi's sentence demonstrates difficulty in -
Correct Answers: ✔✔distinguishing between the oral and written forms of homonyms.
Remi's draft ends with this sentence: "You should never feel bad just cuz u didn't finish." Which of the
following strategies should Ms. Contreras use to help Remi understand the difference between social
and academic registers? - Correct Answers: ✔✔She should have a minilesson on texting language
versus academic language, explaining expectations for each register
An elementary teacher has a class of beginning ESL students. During oral reading times, the teacher
notices that the students are using many L1 phonemes in pronouncing L2 words. The most effective
strategy in helping students use their L1 phonological knowledge in producing L2 strings would be for
the teacher to - Correct Answers: ✔✔have students read along silently as she plays an audio
recording of a short book they are familiar with. She plays the recording once more, with the students
reading along chorally.
The best rationale for integrating culturally relevant literature into ELL curricula is that - Correct
Answers: ✔✔students are better able to connect meaningfully with stories and characters that reflect
their culture and/ or native country environment.
A third-grade ESL teacher creates a Home Words Homework Page. The teacher tells the students to
ask their parents or siblings to help them write down 10 words describing their home or objects in
their home. The teacher tells the students to put the words in two columns: one column for the
English word and one column for the Spanish translation. This assignment best addresses which of the
following ESL instructional strategies? - Correct Answers: ✔✔The teacher is creating an opportunity
for family involvement in the ESL students' education
ELL students in a third-grade class are having trouble learning the names of math figures (for example,
hexagon, quadrilateral, pentagon, and so on). Which of the following instructional strategies would
most effectively promote students' learning in this area of math? - Correct Answers: ✔✔The teacher
puts students into groups and assigns a different figure to each group. Their task is to make several
models of their figure using a variety of resources such as craft sticks, twigs, pencils, construction
paper strips, chenille sticks, and any other materials they can think of.
An elementary school teacher has introduced word problems in his ESL class. The teacher knows that
word problems pose conceptual difficulties even for native speakers, so he wants to provide
appropriate instructional support for his ESL students' understanding of this math concept. Which of
Exam with Answers.
