Michigan Test for Teacher Certification (MTTC) – Sample

An English teacher has students write their own poetry during an integrated unit about poets from the United States. Before the students can submit their poems to the teacher, they must read them aloud to at least three people. The primary benefit of this requirement will be that it encourages the students to:

When teaching literature, the books of Virginia Hamilton, Sandra Cisneros, Laurence Yep, and N. Scott Momaday are particularly useful in:

Which of the following events began the transition from Old English to Middle English?

One of the most recognizable novelistic genres in British literature is the comedy of manners, which is concerned with the conflict between characters formed by particular social and cultural conditions. Which of the following writers is best known for her work in this genre?

Read the excerpt below, from the poem “Nuyorican Lament” by Gloria Vando; then answer the question that follows. San Juan you’re not for me. My cadence quails and stumbles on your ancient stones: there is an inner beat here to be reckoned with— a seis chorreao, a plena, an inbred @Oyeeee! and @mira tú! against which my Manhattan (sorry wrong island) responses fell flat. @Vaya! How can I deal with that? And yet . . . once, long ago, your beach was mine; Luquillo was my bridle path to ride— back then, before the turning of the tide when Teddy’s blue-eyed shills secured the hill and tried in vain to blot the language out. . . In this poem, the poet moves back and forth between English and Spanish primarily to:

In a conversation, speakers can best adjust their message to improve its effectiveness by analyzing:

Which of the following sentences violates the principles of conventional syntax?

Read the excerpt below, from A Story A Story, An African Tale Retold, by Gail E. Haley; then answer the question that follows. “Oh Nyame,” said Ananse, bowing low, “here is the price you ask for your stories: Osebo the leopard-of-the-terrible-teeth, Mmboro the hornets-who-sting-like-fire, and Mmoatia the fairywhom-men-never-see.” Nyame the Sky God called together all the nobles of his court and addressed them in a loud voice: “Little Ananse, the spider man, has paid me the price I ask for my stories. Sing his praise. I command you.” “From this day and going on forever,” proclaimed the Sky God, “my stories belong to Ananse and shall be called ‘Spider Stories.’ ” “Eeeee, Eeeee, Eeeee,” shouted all the assemble nobles. So Ananse took the golden box of stories back to earth, to the people of his village. And when he opened the box all the stories scattered to the corners of the world, including this one. Which of the following commonly expressed themes in children’s literature is best exemplified by this passage?

Read the excerpt below from Rebecca Harding Davis’s Life in the Iron Mills; then answer the three questions that follow. A cloudy day: do you know what that is in a town of iron-works? The sky sank down before dawn, muddy, flat, immovable. The air is thick, clammy with the breath of crowded human beings. It stifles me. I open the window, and, looking out, can scarcely see through the rain the grocer’s shop opposite, where a crowd of drunken workers are puffing Lynchburg tobacco in their pipes. I can detect the scent through all the foul smells ranging loose in the air. . .
Can you see how foggy the day is? As I stand here, idly tapping the window-pane, and looking out through the rain at the dirty back-yard and the coalboats below, fragments of an old story float up before me,—a story of this old house into which I happened to come to-day. You may think it a tiresome story enough, as foggy as the day, sharpened by no sudden flashes of pain or pleasure.—I know: only the outline of a dull life, that long since, with thousands of dull lives like its own, was vainly lived and lost: thousands of them,—massed, vile, slimy lives, like those of the torpid lizards in yonder stagnant water-butt.—Lost? There is a curious point for you to settle, my friend, who study psychology in a lazy, dilettante way. Stop a moment. I am going to be honest. This is what I want you to do. I want you to hide your disgust, take no heed to your clean clothes,and come right down with me,—here, into the thickest of the fog and mud and foul effluvia. I want you to hear this story. There is a secret down there, in this nightmare fog, that has lain dumb for centuries. This passage best exemplifies which of the following types of fiction?

In this passage, the author primarily addresses which of the following nineteenth century issues?