CRI Student Assessment & Mentoring 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: When a student consistently produces 95% accuracy on dictation but freezes during mock depositions, the most appropriate mentor response is to:
- Increase dictation speed to build confidence
- Introduce graduated real-world simulation exercises (Correct answer)
- Require the student to repeat the current speed level
- Refer the student to a psychologist immediately
Correct answer: Introduce graduated real-world simulation exercises
Graduated real-world simulations help bridge the gap between controlled practice and authentic performance environments.
Question 2: A formative assessment in court reporting education is BEST described as:
- A final speed examination used for program completion
- An ongoing evaluation used to guide instruction and student development (Correct answer)
- A one-time diagnostic test administered at program entry
- A certification exam administered by a credentialing body
Correct answer: An ongoing evaluation used to guide instruction and student development
Formative assessment is continuous and informs instructional decisions throughout the learning process.
Question 3: Which rubric criterion is MOST critical when evaluating a student's realtime transcript?
- Number of untranslates per page (Correct answer)
- Font style and margin settings
- Speed of delivery during dictation
- Student's emotional state during the test
Correct answer: Number of untranslates per page
Untranslates directly measure the student's dictionary development and theory application accuracy in realtime.
Question 4: An instructor notices a student plateauing at 160 wpm for three consecutive months. The FIRST step should be to:
- Dismiss the student from the program
- Conduct a thorough analysis of the student's practice habits and theory weaknesses (Correct answer)
- Immediately enroll the student in a remediation course
- Change the student's steno machine
Correct answer: Conduct a thorough analysis of the student's practice habits and theory weaknesses
Diagnosing the root cause of a plateau — whether practice habits, theory gaps, or psychological barriers — is essential before prescribing interventions.
Question 5: Portfolio assessment in a court reporting program PRIMARILY serves to:
- Replace standardized speed examinations
- Document a student's progress and growth over time (Correct answer)
- Rank students against national percentile norms
- Satisfy accreditation requirements only
Correct answer: Document a student's progress and growth over time
Portfolios capture longitudinal growth and provide evidence of developing competency across multiple performance dimensions.
Question 6: When providing written feedback on a student's transcript, an instructor should ensure the feedback is:
- General enough to apply to all students
- Focused solely on errors with no mention of strengths
- Specific, actionable, and tied to observable transcript evidence (Correct answer)
- Delivered only at the end of the semester
Correct answer: Specific, actionable, and tied to observable transcript evidence
Effective feedback is specific and actionable, pointing directly to transcript evidence so students know exactly what to correct.
Question 7: A student reports feeling overwhelmed by the volume of vocabulary required for court reporting. The mentor's BEST strategy is to:
- Tell the student that struggle is normal and no adjustment is needed
- Prioritize high-frequency legal and medical terms and scaffold vocabulary in manageable clusters (Correct answer)
- Reduce the overall program vocabulary requirement for this student
- Assign the student extra hours without strategic guidance
Correct answer: Prioritize high-frequency legal and medical terms and scaffold vocabulary in manageable clusters
Scaffolding vocabulary by frequency and clustering related terms makes the learning load manageable and strategic.
CRI Student Assessment & Mentoring 2
When a student consistently produces 95% accuracy on dictation but freezes during mock depositions, the most appropriate mentor response is to: