Computer Science Teacher License Test Content: 7 Domains, 16 Standards and Their Weights

Last verified: 30 October 2026. Sources: ETEC's applicant guide for the Computer Science professional license test, the Computer Science teacher standards and the Teachers' Professional License page on the Education and Training Evaluation Commission (ETEC) website. This is an independent study guide and is not affiliated with ETEC, Qiyas (the National Center for Assessment) or any government body.

The Teachers' Professional License is made up of two tests: the General Educational Test and the subject test in your own field. This guide covers the Computer Science subject test (subject code 6.10 in the standards document). It measures 16 standards in 7 domains, and the two heaviest standards are programming and computer applications at 14% each.

Test format at a glance

With 88 questions in 120 minutes you have about 80 seconds per question. Wrong answers cost nothing, so never leave a question blank.

The seven domains and their weights

The weights come from the table in ETEC's guide (p. 7).

Computer Science alone is about a third of the test (around 30 questions), and together with Computer Applications it makes up more than half.

The sixteen standards by weight

The sixteen standards hold 66 indicators, listed in the Computer Science teacher standards (pp. 8 to 11).

What comes up in each standard

These topics come from each standard's indicators and from what recurs in past exam questions:

• Standard 1 (4%): Converting between binary, octal, decimal and hexadecimal, two's complement, simplifying Boolean expressions, and matrix order and multiplication.
• Standard 2 (3%): Truth tables for logic gates, Karnaugh maps, flip-flops and counters, and multiplexers and decoders.
• Standard 3 (3%): The CPU and its registers, ROM versus RAM, virtual memory and buses. Many of the worked examples in ETEC's guide come from this standard.
• Standard 4 (8%): The seven OSI layers, TCP/IP protocols, network topologies, switches versus routers, IP addresses and optical fibre.
• Standard 5 (14%): Reading a code snippet and working out its output, object-oriented concepts, stacks, queues and trees, sorting and searching, artificial intelligence and robots.
• Standard 6 (8%): Reading an SQL statement and its result, primary and foreign keys, normalisation (1NF, 2NF, 3NF), ER diagrams, and database objects: table, form, query and report.
• Standard 7 (5%): Types of malware, symmetric and asymmetric encryption, digital signatures, firewalls, and the confidentiality, integrity and availability (CIA) triad.
• Standard 8 (8%): Process scheduling (FCFS, SJF, Round Robin) and working out waiting times, time sharing, virtual memory, and comparing Linux, Windows, Android and iOS.
• Standard 9 (14%): Spreadsheet formulas and functions, image file formats, the RGB and CMYK colour models, HTML tags and search-engine operators.
• Standard 10 (4%): Digital citizenship, the Saudi Anti-Cyber Crime Law, copyright and Creative Commons licences, and healthy posture at the computer.
• Standard 11 (7%): The Madrasati platform, Ain channels and the Noor system, learning management systems, synchronous and asynchronous learning, and the ADDIE instructional design model.
• Standard 12 (7%): Classroom scenarios where you pick the best approach: project-based learning, demonstration, cooperative learning, feedback and running the computer lab.
• Standard 13 (4%): How the current computing curriculum is built: Digital Skills in primary and intermediate school and Digital Technology in secondary school. Older course names are no longer the right answer.
• Standard 14 (3%): Organisations for computing education such as ISTE, ACM, CSTA, IEEE and the Saudi Computer Society, and the PCK and TPACK models.
• Standard 15 (4%): The four computational thinking skills (decomposition, pattern recognition, abstraction, algorithms), flowchart symbols, pseudocode, types of programming error and trace tables.
• Standard 16 (4%): Sorting and filtering in spreadsheets, choosing the right chart for the data, pivot tables and organising slides in presentation software.

What the questions look like

ETEC's guide has 10 worked examples with explanations and 25 practice questions with an answer key (p. 30). It says the questions measure three levels: recall, application and reasoning. In practice they fall into these shapes:

• Concept or definition: the question describes a function and asks for the component or term, such as a part of the processor or an OSI layer. The term may appear in Arabic or in English, so learn both.
• Reading code: a short Java or C++ snippet (the two languages in the guide's examples) and a question about its output or the final value of a variable. Trace it line by line on paper.
• Working by hand: converting between number systems, simplifying a Boolean expression or finding waiting times in process scheduling, without a calculator.
• Classroom scenario: a teacher in the computer lab faces a problem and you choose the best action or strategy. Pick the option that gets students doing the work and allows for differences between them.

A note from our own check: in the guide's answer key for the practice questions, question 6 (swapping two variables in Java) is keyed to option د (6 8), but tracing the code gives option ج (8 6).

Study tips

• Start with programming and computer applications (about 24 questions together), then databases, operating systems and networks.
• Do not skip the teaching standards: Teaching Strategies, Computing and Education and the curriculum standards add up to about 25 questions, and their scenarios reward understanding over memorising.
• Practise working by hand from the start, because calculators are banned on test day.

For steps, fees and dates read registering for the Computer Science subject test, and to plan your time read the study plan by weeks remaining. You can start with the free questions to see where you stand on each standard.