Hi guys, it's Ariana. Another year brings another graduate assistant, and this time it's me! I'm here to give you a brief summary of my experience with the Praxis and offer some helpful tips that will help you approach this test with confidence.
Before your internships in January, you're required to take the Praxis II: Art Content and Knowledge exam. If you've just graduated with a studio art degree the study material won't seem awfully intimidating for you, and the knowledge you've learned in the last four years of collage should come swiftly back to you when you skim the online study guides I'm going to include. However you should take care in reviewing all the mediums and processes to familiarize yourself with the tools and techniques. Printmaking, photography, film, and digital media was represented heavily in my multiple choice questions, so take a few minutes and refresh yourself on those. However don't forget about our old friends sculpture, painting, drawing, and ceramics.
Sprinkled among the exam are questions that relate to your knowledge of art history, I hope you've saved all those power points from your art history classes! They will help immensely, but if not don't fret. Go online and do some research and review your art history and make sure to include areas such as impressionism, modernism, Byzantine, early roman and greek sculptures, and architecture.
Once you've completed them multiple choice questions you're then prompted to respond to 3 constructed response questions. One of these responses is art history based, and the last two are questions that you answer about your submitted work. When I picked the work I submitted I made sure that they were pieces that I could write a decent bit about. The questions ask you about things like process and content. I chose a self portrait I painted in my last painting class to discuss process, because it was fresh in my mind and could discuss the entire process of painting it from the underpainting to the final details. For the content question, I chose a piece that was very heavily conceptual. I chose the piece that I could talk about how the concept, materials, and process, are all linked.
Below I'm going to link some sites and books I found helpful for studying.
https://quizlet.com/94664118/praxis-art-content-knowledge-flash-cards/
https://www.ets.org/s/praxis/pdf/5134.pdf
https://www.theartofed.com/2015/04/10/the-ultimate-guide-to-acing-the-praxis-ii-art-test/
https://www.amazon.com/Annotated-Mona-Lisa-Prehistoric-Post-Modern/dp/0836280059
https://www.amazon.com/Art-Teachers-Book-Lists/dp/0787974242
Don't let the stress get you down, you're gonna do awesome on the Praxis. And if you need to take it one more time, there will be time for that too. Best of luck!
