Got it. I have found this thread supportive, nonetheless, even if only to alleviate some of the test anxiety. Your answer is helpful, and makes sense. Thank you!
Looking at the manual examples is what has me concerned! I was unsure if drawing and woodcut were too close, since both are on paper. I do also have some paper sculpture and an example of monotype with embroidery. Not sure if these are too similar too though, with the paper in common. I wish I wasn't overthinking this! I also wish I had the ability to work more 3D. That would certainly make it easier....
The paper's in common, yes, Mcoit, but surely the processes involved, and the problems that the artist must solve, differ radically. If your focus early in each response is on those differences, you should do fine. (Again: it's not awful to mention the similarities, but just don't begin there.)
Hi all! What books do you recommend to brush up on the elements and principles? I remembered reading Preble's Art Forms mentioned here but are there any others?
I just got my test results and passed both subtests! I am so relieved and happy. I did the best on the constructed response questions on subtest II I got ++++ on all of them! That was such a pleasant surprise. I know tests are dreaded but that part to me was fun so I am glad maxing out the allowed characters on those answers didn't hurt me. So if you pass you only get the + sign scores? I am trying to figure out if I barely passed or did well- I know you just need to pass it but I still like to know how I preformed.
Teacher Groupie and friends, I passed subset 2! I wanted to say thank you for this thread and all the advice and encouaragement! It really helped guide me to find study materials to pass! Yeah!
Looks like you did very well on your constructed responses: ++++ across the board is quite impressive. (The scale runs from + (pretty dismal) to ++++ (pretty wow).) I'm delighted for you, and happily unsurprised. CSET doesn't report numerical scores for test passers, on grounds that specific test scores shouldn't be used in hiring decisions.
This is the BEST forum I could have found! I'm so lucky! Teacher Groupie ROCKS!!! I take both tests on 3/29... I'm not planning on passing but I'm studying my tush off, just in case! I have two questions for now: 1. Can anyone tell me about the drawing portion of the test? 2. I did not see any test dates available after March... Do they not test during summer? I currently teach Drawing and Painting at an alternative high school for kids who have been removed from their home high schools for one reason or another, and some kids are just out of jail/camp. I love, love LOVE my job but I will be moved to a middle school if I don't pass the CSET within the next 12 months. I think I am really good at making these kids enjoy art when they never have before and I do not want to leave!!! Thank you Teacher Groupie and everyone else! I feel like I am not in this alone!!!!
What do you mean by "the drawing portion of the test"? Do you mean the constructed response for which the test taker is instructed to draw something, or the constructed responses that concern the test taker's submitted art portfolio?
Hi Teacher Groupie! I am referring to the constructed response for which the test taker is instructed to draw something. What type of thing do they want us to draw? Thanks for responding!
It's likely to vary, but the question runs to a combination of shapes that are individually fairly straightforward to draw if one knows what one is doing, and it will usually specify elements that the completed drawing should show (placement, shadowing, and the like). Think of this as art's answer to the CBEST essays: as long as the product reflects the prompt, there's a good deal of leeway. Given that you're teaching drawing and painting, I think you should do fine if you don't overthink this.
As for the test dates after March, the CSET testing year begins in August. I think you can expect to see a testing window beginning early in August 2018, and chances are good that next year's test schedules will be released soon.
Thank you for the advice! I can copy anything, and copy it well, but it's hard for me to see things in my head... I think I can manage shapes!!!
Hello, I just want to check if I would fit to the CSET' requirements with my portfolio. My Concentration: - Pencil Drawing My Breadth: - collage - installation art Does site-specific installation would satisfy the requirements? - digital photography I am going to submit: two combined images on one canvas as a diptych. Does it work? (or I should use only one image? )
I don't see why installation art wouldn't work for your portfolio. As for the diptych, I'm not sure what you mean by "one canvas". If the artwork works as a diptych, see if/how you can submit it as a single image; then make sure in the relevant breadth question(s) that you discuss it as a diptych.
Teacher Groupie! I need you!!! I passed Subtest 1 in March but have to retake Subtest 2 next week! I knew I wouldn't pass but came surprisingly close: 216/220! I am weak (++) in Creative Expression and Connections, Relationships, Applications. What do I study in order to do better!?!
Hugs and hugs, BJ Athens. CSET Art Subtest II features 50 multiple-choice and four constructed-response questions. From the information you've given I can't tell whether your issues are in multiple choice or constructed response or both. Break things down a little more for me, and please supply the performance indicators (p, k, s, d, checkmark) for each of your constructed responses.
I passed all the constructed-response questions! I just don't know what to study for the multiple choice portion of Creative Expression and Connections, Relationships, Applications. I only know about drawing and painting and nothing about printmaking, ceramics, photography, performing art, etc!
Checkmark on a constructed response doesn't necessarily mean that a test taker aced that response so much as that the response doesn't exhibit egregious errors in purpose, knowledge, and support (and, for the extended response, breadth and depth of knowledge). If your overall performance in constructed response is +++ or less, there's more than enough room for improvement to put you over the top. In fact, one passes or doesn't pass the whole of the subtest: it doesn't matter that one didn't do well in one part of the subtest as long as one has collected enough points elsewhere in the subtest. As for printmaking, ceramics, photography, performance art, etc., I think you've just started to answer your own question. Go pick up a cocktail-hour-at-the-gallery-opening level of awareness of those areas and others that are mentioned in the state content standards and framework for visual art. Wikipedia, ho! (Seriously. Wikipedia is one of the world's best tools for what you need. It doesn't hurt that a proper Wikipedia article mentions both (a) relevant equipment, techniques, works, and critics and (b) related or contrasting types of visual art: a person can cover a lot of ground by hopscotching from article to article.) If you need a checklist, see the California content standards and framework for Visual and Performing Arts; both docs, or to be precise the pieces of which each doc consists, are free to download from www.cde.ca.gov, via the Curriculum and Instruction page.
You make such a good point about the check marks on the constructed response questions... And I should not take for granted that I will get those checks again seeing as though I only got +++ !!! What should I study for the constructed response question for that performing arts question... Mine was about ballet. doesn't dance have a whole separate list of elements and principles? Also, what do I study for the "connections, relationships, and applications?" I am surprised but so happy about your suggestion to use Wikipedia! That is great advice! THANK YOU TEACHER GROUPIE!!!!
(Okay, you DID mean "performing arts" and not "performance art".) Dance has its own terminology, yes. But you're taking a test in art, so you're expected to bring an artist's sensibility to dance, rather than a dancer's sensibility. And the design principles work across all of the arts, even though the elements by which they're instantiated differ. If you can identify contrast or repetition in a dance, you can talk about it as an artist does (though, if a dance term is relevant and you happen to know it, use it). For the most part, this will mean focusing more on what the viewer sees than on what the dancer is up to. (And behold: connections and relationships!) For more on connections and relationships, please download the visual and performing arts framework as recommended above and leaf through it for bits that are relevant. Bear in mind that the framework is the document that fleshes out the state content standards: as a teacher, you'll be expected to know the doc, so you may as well start getting acquainted with it now. As for applications, that's in part where your own artwork and your discussion of your own artwork come in.
Hello, I am planing to re-take the CSET Art Subtest II and I didn't pass it the first time. Is there anyone that can give me pointers and how to improve my score. I was off by 9 points.
Welcome to A to Z, Just Art! 9 points off is pretty close to passing. What do your performance indicators show?
Hi Teacher Group, My performance for Multiple Choice was: Creative Expression ++ Connections, Rel,Appl + History & Theories ++ Overall ++ My Performance for Constructed-Response was: Overall +++ By the time I reached the Constructed Response I didn't have much time and I feel like I didn't respond well in this section. Any advice would be great
Hugs, Just Art. There should be additional information on your score report: a checkmark or some combination of the letters p, k, s, d beside each constructed response. Tell me what you see, and I can give you a better idea whether your +++ in constructed response was high in the +++ range (in which case it would correlate to a pretty respectable numerical score) or low. At the same time, I'll unpack p, k, s, d, and checkmark for you. Having said which, let me point out that, according to Pearson's current score report insert, http://www.ctcexams.nesinc.com/content/docs/CS_ScoreReport_Insert.pdf, the standard weighting of multiple choice vs. constructed response for CSET subtests is 70% to 30%: that is, raw scores get rendered into scaled scores in such a way that constructed response points account for just 30% of the overall score. CSET Art isn't named under any of the less usual weightings, so it follows that CSET Art Subtest II is a 70%/30% subtest. That being the case, it's the multiple choice questions that most need your attention. ++ in a domain most likely translates to getting half or fewer of the questions in that domain right - and of the 50 multiple choice questions, 30 are in the domain of creative expression, so that's a domain in which one definitely doesn't want to be leaving half or more of available points unclaimed. "Creative expression" is the domain into which CSET Art tucks its questions about the art-producing process; how an artist designs and composes an artwork, how the medium and techniques shape what can be done, and what media and techniques count as two-dimensional, three-dimensional, media art, and new-and-emerging art forms. Consult the Subtest II subtest description for details to look up, especially as regards art forms you're not familiar with, and use it as a checklist of terms to look up on Wikipedia and/or the art-education webpages of any major art museum such as the Met or the Getty. Given that your constructed response overall score is stronger than your multiple choice overall score, I'd also recommend working on your multiple-choice chops. The correct answer to any question is the answer that fits the question best (or the answer that fails less than the other three answers do): while a painting technique could theoretically be relevant to performance art, the possible answer that focuses on the painting technique will be the right answer for a performance-art question only if (a) the work of performance art really does make room for paint and (b) none of the other possible answers invokes a technique more conventionally associated with performance art that's relevant to the work under consideration.
Checkmark doesn't necessarily mean that one got full points on a response, but it does indicate that the response was at least adequately on target (p), was at least adequately well supported by reasoning and/or relevant examples (s), and showed at least adequate grasp of the concepts and terminology of the field (k). Your s,d would have been for the extended response in which you discuss your own art, and that's consistent with your report of having run out of time. In short, I'm pretty sure that, as far as constructed response is concerned, you didn't embarrass yourself. How are you generally as a taker of multiple-choice tests?
Dear Teacher Group, I am usually better on multiple choice questions than response questions, but there was a lot of information that I had no idea what the answer was and I guessed on them. Is there any study materials that you recommend? Its been about 12 years since I graduated with a BA in Fine Arts and changed careers, so its like starting all over and trying to study everything. I am not to sure what is the new art out there now, and what to study.
Given your background and the subtest, you're almost certainly best off doing what I suggested above: use the subtest-description doc as a checklist of things to look up on Wikipedia and more generally online. For connections between ways of artmaking or art techniques, and to find sites that discuss more than one of them, try putting more than one in your search term (for instance, "printmaking ceramics" should bring up some sites that discuss the connections and some sites that discuss each).
Hello, I am looking for guidance on the test. I am taking it next week. It will be my 4th time on part 2. Passed part I 3 years ago with high score. I have not been passing by 8 points. This blog is helpful. I have been getting a k and d on my constructive response in one box. I just finished 9 units of art history and I hoping that it will help. I plan on upping the difficulty level of artwork vocabulary and dropping more artists names that I am have been influenced by. I teach drawing but recently completed ceramics and photography classes. I think that my when I used my drawings the response they have been getting rejected. I have a masters in art education, bs in child development, dance minor , so those questions have been easy. I completed 21 units in lower visual arts classes. I hoping the art history has been the missing link...
Hello! I am taking both subsets of the CSET in April. I am incredibly nervous but everything stated so far has been pretty helpful. If I don't pass, I unfortunately will have to take a semester off of school so I am really hoping I get it on the first try. I had a question about the portfolio. If I am submitting photography, do I submit the actual photograph or do I submit a picture of the photograph?
With k,d on your constructed response, working on the vocabulary sounds wise. CSETs as a class are much less about how to teach the subject matter than about the subject matter itself. If you're tempted to make an art-education observation on a question that isn't explicitly about art education, make sure you package that observation clearly as an aside and that you've dealt with the non-art-education issues that the question raises first.
Hello out there, Questions regarding Art Subtest II 1. Is The Annotated Mona Lisa book helpful for Subtest II or only Subtest I ?? 2. Regarding the portfolio, I am planning to use for my Concentration: ceramics and for my Breadth: Soft Pastel Drawing, Acrylic Painting and the third one is Graphite powder, which is rubbed on the whole paper than I erase away the graphite to create a drawing of a face. So its kind of drawing with an eraser. Would those choices good for the portfolio?? I have taken the test before but did not pass and my score for constructed response was all check marks and the overall was +++. How can I improve. Should I reuse the same mediums stated above for my portfolio, or if I change them will it help my score??
Oh one more question, regarding the constructed response portfolio, which one is more score points, the concentration or the breadth??
The Annotated Mona Lisa's obvious relevance is to Subtest I, but the analytical terminology and the ways of looking at art can certainly be helpful for Subtest II as well. Ceramics as concentration discipline looks good, and it should combine well with acrylic painting and soft pastel drawing. Graphite powder as you've described it may not be distinct enough from soft pastel drawing to satisfy the scorers: the goal is to show breadth, so you want a medium that imposes demands on you in terms of technique and handling of medium that are distinct from the demands imposed by your concentration medium and your other two breadth media. Could you muster something in, say, printmaking, or photography, or collage, or fabric art, or performance art, or... ? Bear with me: I'm going to inflict some math on you. CSET constructed responses are scored on a scale from 0 to 3 (in the case of a focused response) or 0 to 4 (in the case of an extended response) by two scorers each. CSET Art Subtest II features one extended response (the concentration response) and three focused responses (the breadth, drawing, and connections-and-relationships responses); the maximum possible raw score for CSET Art Subtest II is 26 (that is, 3 focused responses times 3 points per response times 2 scorers = 18 points; 1 extended response times 4 points per response times 2 scorers = 8 points; 18 + 8 = 26 possible raw points). The concentration response accounts for 8/26 of available raw points (though it's likely that its contribution to the scaled score is higher). Your raw score is the sum of the scores that your responses were given. It's plausible, since plus marks are on a scale from + to ++++, that each plus mark corresponds to a quartile band of scores: then your +++ overall suggests that you earned between 50% and 75% of available points in constructed response. Constructed response accounts for 30% of the overall scaled score, so that means you left between 7.5% and 15% of total available points on the table. (That's not a deal-breaker for CSET, however, as long as the multiple choice numbers are high enough.) Constructed responses are scored holistically. Checkmark and p, k, s, and d are diagnostic indicators, not scores as such. A checkmark doesn't indicate that a constructed response earned all possible points but rather that it managed not to come up egregiously short in p, k, s (and d). Choosing a third breadth medium that you can more easily contrast with the other two and the concentration medium might well help you come across as more knowledgeable and better able to support your answers.
