Praxis II Physics Results

I just received my Praxis II Physics results. As I had hoped, I have also received a passing score on the physics test. The actual result was 175/200 with a Virginia passing score of 147. Based upon the information on the score report, the average score for the physics test is higher than the mathematics test. The average performance range is 137 to 166 so using a little math, it looks like the average score is around 151. The average performance range is the middle 50% of the scores. So anything higher than 166 is in the top 25% of scores. Unlike the math results, I didn't qualify for recognition of excellence which is the top 15% of scores. Therefore my score must have been between the 75% and 85% percentile. My best area was mechanics where I got 31/32 right. This is not surprising since I'm a mechanical engineer and mechanics is covered extensively in our curriculum. Surprisingly, I only got 4/8 right on the heat and thermodynamics part of the test. Since I taught thermo in college, I would have hoped to have done better. Maybe I didn't pay enough attention. Also I only got 4/8 right on the atomic, molecular and nuclear structure. Anyway, I'm pleased with the overall results. Now I can have both math and physics on my teacher's license.

Accepted into the Program

I received my acceptance letter and accompanying paperwork for the Career Switcher Program offered through the Virginia Community College System. The orientation is January 12th and the first classes start on January 19th. I will be traveling to Blue Ridge Community College for the weekend classes. We received a list of books that we need for the classes. I ordered all the books using Amazon.com. I bought six of the books used and two of the books new. Including shipping and handling, the total was only $120. The tuition is around $3150. I am looking forward to the classes and meeting the other members of my cohort. They say that you should expect to spend 10 to 20 hours per week on the classwork. I'm hoping for closer to the 10 hours but we will see what is required. I will probably read as much from the textbooks as possible before the start of the classes to spread the workload out as much a possible. Hopefully, I will hear about my Praxis II Physics results this week.

Physics Praxis II Exam

I have already passed the math Praxis II exam. That was enough to get me into the Career Switcher Program. To make myself more marketable, I decided to take the Praxis II exam for Physics as well. I started studying for the Physics test after I had finished the math exam in September. That gave me about two months to prepare. As a mechanical engineering major, I had been well grounded in the mechanics and thermodynamics aspects of physics. But I was not so well prepared for the electrostatics, magnetism and relativistic parts of the exam. To prepare for the exam, I bought the Praxis study guide: "Sciences: Content Knowledge for Biology, Chemistry, Earth and Space Science, General Science, Physics and Combination Tests". The math study guide had contained a review of the material and three sample tests. This combined book only had sample tests. Nevertheless, it was still helpful in giving me an idea of the difficulty of the questions to be expected. I also bought "Cracking the AP Physics B&C Exams". Finally I borrowed the text used at Alleghany High School. I also had my college text to study from. Since calculators could not be used during the exam, the difficulty of the questions had to be limited. However, the breadth of information covered on the exam was significant.

The test consists of 100 multiple choice questions. The passing score in Virginia is 147. The test is two hours long. With 100 questions in 120 minutes, you have to move quite rapidly through the test if you hope to finish. I went through the test and probably had five to ten questions remaining unanswered. I went back and answered those and then had only about five minutes remaining in the test period. I decided to count the number of question that I felt confident about the answers. I think it was about 70 questions. I knew that was enough to pass so that was good. I will receive the results in mid December and will report them at that time.

I hope to also pass the Chemistry Praxis II exam before starting school next year. My career switcher classes start on January 12th, 2008. This is also the next date for Praxis II testing. So I will probably hold off on taking the test untilJune 2008. I may do some preliminary studying before the career switcher classes start in January and then more studying just before the exam. I had already done some studying in May 2007 when I thought there was a chance of getting a teaching position in the fall of 2007 in chemistry and physics.

I'm In the Program

Even though I have not received the official letter, I have gotten confirmation that I will be accepted into the program. It is a relief to know that I have satisfied all the requirements. Many people have said that they find it hard to believe that someone with a PhD in engineering can not get a job teaching math in high school but would be qualified to teach at the college level. Of course, there is some validity to that observation. However, if you make one exception to the requirements, everyone wants an exception. It will also be good to have the knowledge of classroom management, etc... They probably should have some requirement for teachers at the university and college level. I'm just fortunate that they have the career switcher program so that I can become qualified with reasonable committment of time and effort.

Next I will be talking about taking the Praxis II in Physics.

Who is Highly Qualified?

It is interesting how the passing scores for the different states can vary so widely. Here is link to an interesting point of view on passing scores for the Praxis Mathematic Content Knowledge test 0061.

http://eduinsights.blogspot.com/2006/07/highly-qualfied-math-teacher.html

What is most important is that the students learn the material. You can have an excellent knowledge of the content but be poor at teaching the material. So a high score on the Praxis II exam is not a guarantee of success in the classroom. However if you don't a firm grasp of material, you won't be able to effectively teach the material. This is especially true for the higher level math classes such as Algebra II and Calculus.

VCLA

The second test required for acceptance into the career switcher program is the Virginia Communication and Literacy Assessment. You are required to take both the reading and writing parts of the test. The reading section is just reading comprehesion. The writing section includes multiple choice questions to check your knowledge of spelling, punctuation, grammar etc.. There are also two writing assigments. Each test is scheduled for 2 hours for a total of 4 hours. You can spend any part of the four hours on either test. I spent about 3 hours and 45 minutes on the test and was busy the entire time. As expected I did better on the reading comprehension than the writing part. I still passed with plenty of room to spare. To prepare, I looked at the example test questions on-line and I also looked at a book on grammar and punctuation about a week before the test. I'm not sure how you would study for a test like this. You either know it or you don't based upon many years of use.

Both the Praxis II and VCLA tests are required for college students who are going into education. You have to pass both tests to be accepted into the education departments at their schools. Since less than 50% of the students pass the mathematics content test on their first try, it must be discouraging wanting to get in the department and not being able to start because of your test scores.

I was definitely the oldest person taking the VCLA test by about 30 years. It was stange to be in the classroom environment but it didn't bother me too much. Next I will talk about the validity of the Praxis standards for new math teachers.

Praxis II Math Content Knowledge

The second step in qualifying for the career switcher program is to get a passing score in the content area that you are looking to be qualified in. In my case, the test is mathematics content knowledge, Praxis II 0061. I borrowed high school text books and found my college calculus text. I also bought the book sold by ETS which gives a review of covered topics and as well as three practice tests. I started studying about three months prior to the test date. I probably studied around 30 minutes per day on average. One confusing part of taking the Praxis test is knowing how well one needs to do on the test. The state's passing scores are published on the Praxis website. For Virginia, you need to have a score of at least 147 out of 200. But what does that mean? The average score for the Praxis II 0061 test is 142. Therefore more than 50% of the test takers fail the test. Just prior to taking the test, I found out to pass I needed to get approximately 33 out of 50 questions correct. I took the entire 2 hours allowed. I thought I was moving along pretty well and would have time to check answers at the end. But the last few problems were fairly difficult and in the end I didn't have time to recheck as many problems as I would have liked to. I left the test feeling I had done well enough to pass. But I wasn't 100% sure so I was still anxious to get the test results. Unfortunately you have to wait four weeks to get the results. Now the results: I scored 171. I passed and it turns out my score was in the top 10% of test takers. Not bad but I certainly didn't feel like I was a math wiz after taking the test.