MTEL General Science Test Breakdown

History, Philosophy and Methodology of Science has four subareas with a total of 19 to 21 questions and count 16 percent of the final score.

Scientific Thought and Inquiry: history and importance of significant people, ideas, theories and discoveries, empirical data and verifiable reasoning, evidence and logic, science and technology in ancient China and Greece, development of science in the 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, and the impact of social, religious and economic factors on science and technology through the years.
Research and Experimental Design: principles, procedures and considerations, formulating hypotheses, planning research projects, setting up and conducting investigations, sampling techniques, and using control and experimental groups.
Gathering, Organizing, Interpreting, Evaluating and Communicating: strategies, tools and technologies, measurement methods, devices and formats, making predictions and drawing conclusions, and models and methods for communicating data.

Use of Tools, Equipment and Materials: practice, procedures and requirements for safe use, storage and disposal, procedures for preventing and dealing with accidents and injuries, and the use and care of chemicals and living organisms.

Chemistry has four subareas with a total of 19 to 21 questions and counts 16 percent of the final score.

Matter: atomic and molecular structure; the atom; how atomic structures explain chemical behavior; the periodic table; mixtures and pure substances; and symbols, formulas and equations.
Physical Changes in Matter: characteristics of the various states of matter; properties of common materials; energy, mass, conservation; and mixtures and solutions.
Chemical Changes in Matter: descriptions of properties and composition of reactants and products, using conservation to analyze reactions, characteristics and effects of chemical bonds, and factors that impact rates of reaction.
Kinetic Molecular Model of Matter: uses of kinetic molecular theory; and relationship between pressure, temperature and volume of gases and between temperature and kinetic energy.

Physics has four subareas with a total of 19 to 21 questions and counts 16 percent of the final score.

Force, Motion, Work and Power: Newton’s’ laws, mass and inertia, mass and weight, force, displacement, velocity, acceleration and momentum, distance versus time graphs, and the basics of simple machines.
Energy: concepts, conservations, forms, classifications, relationships, transfer and conversion, collisions, entropy. and thermodynamics.
Sound and Light Waves: transverse and longitudinal waves, waves and oscillations, speed and energy, properties of sound and light, properties, interactions and behaviors in various media, behavior of light in different situations, and the electromagnetic spectrum.
Electricity, Magnetism and Electromagnetism: static electricity, electron flow and electric current, components and diagrams of simple electric circuits, magnets and magnetic fields, and the principle of electromagnetism.

Biology has four subareas with a total of 19 to 21 questions and counts 16 percent of the final score.

Life Processes of Living Organisms: differences between living and nonliving organisms, basic plant and animal cell structure and functions, growth and reproduction, photosynthesis and cellular respiration, homeostasis and metabolism, and the organization, structure and functions of major biological systems and how they interact.
Inheritance of Characteristics: how characteristics are passed from one generation to the next, environmental factors, mutations, DNA, genes and chromosomes.
Biological Evolution: principles, theories, processes and scientific evidence concerning the origin and evolution of life, investigative methods, genetic and phenotypic variations, environmental influences, natural selection, and the correlation between evolutionary relationships and taxonomy.
Populations, Communities, Ecosystems and Biomes: biotic and abiotic factors, strategies used to obtain food, water, shelter and oxygen, relationship between all organisms in an ecosystem and their reaction to change, food webs and food chains, ecological succession, and factors that control and influence population size.

Earth and Space Science has 4 subareas with a total of 19 to 21 questions and counts 16percent of the final score.

Geologic History: theories of the origin and history of the earth, methods used to determine the relative and actual age of inorganic and organic material, structure, composition and layers of the earth, formation, types and characteristics of mineral, rocks and soils, plate tectonics, change in the earth’s crust, how glaciers, water and wind change the earth’s structure, topographic features, maps used in science, and the effects of catastrophic phenomena.
Hydrosphere: properties of oceans and surface and ground water and how the water cycle affects ground water, oceans, rivers, lakes and watersheds.
Atmosphere, Weather and Climate: characteristics of the atmosphere, how the uneven heating of the earth’s surface influences weather, energy transfer, air pressure, cloud formation and precipitation, equipment and techniques to monitor and predict the weather and climate change, and interpreting meteorological data.
Solar System and Universe: characteristics, movements and interactions of the planets, sun, moon, stars and other celestial objects, and theories of the origin and evolution of the universe.