The central purpose of this paper is to examine validity problems arising from the multiple-choice items and technical passages in the Test of English as a Foreign Language Internet-based Test (TOEFL iBT) reading section, primarily concentrating on construct-irrelevant variance (Messick, 1989). My personal TOEFL iBT experience, along with my…

Scores on essay-based assessments that are part of standardized admissions tests are typically given relatively little weight in admissions decisions compared to the weight given to scores from multiple-choice assessments. Evidence is presented to suggest that more weight should be given to these assessments. The reliability of the writing scores…

The current focus across the U.S. on student college and career readiness standards makes clear that both instruction and assessment of academic English will continue to be important for school-age English learner (EL) students. This article presents an overview and summary of key literature on academic language (usually academic English);…

Modified the three-parameter model to include an additional random effect for items nested within the same testlet. Fitted the new model to 86 testlets from the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) and compared standard parameters (discrimination, difficulty, and guessing) with those obtained through traditional modeling. Discusses the…

This study describes the reading and test-taking strategies that test takers used on the "Reading" section of the "LanguEdge Courseware" (2002) materials developed to familiarize prospective respondents with the new TOEFL. The investigation focused on strategies used to respond to more traditional "single selection"…

The usual assessment of speededness for rights-only scored tests does not account for the possibility that examinees respond in a random or patterned fashion to the items at the end of the test as the time limit approaches. This study represented an attempt to determine if Sections 2 and 3 of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) are…

The reliability of scores from four forms of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) was estimated using a hybrid item response theory model. It was found that there was very little difference between overall reliability when the testlet items were assumed to be independent and when their dependence was modeled. (Author/SLD)

Item content of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) is catagorized using 100 items from a half-length sample TOEFL published by Educational Testing Service (ETS), 120 items from Section II and 150 from the Section IV of Test of English as a Foreign Language (Gruber and Gruber), and 200 items from How to Prepare for the TOEFL by…

Several exploratory analyses of the fifths data generated by Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) item analyses were developed in order to evaluate the effects of options on the discriminability of difficult items and to identify difficult items with low, unreliable biserials that had been rejected by test developers, but for which…

The comparison of item response theory models for the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) was extended to an equating context as simulation trials were used to "equate the test to itself." Equating sample data were generated from administration of identical item sets. Equatings that used procedures based on each model (simple…

One of the item types in the Listening Comprehension section of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) test is the dialogue. Because the dialogue item pool needs to have an appropriate balance of items at a range of difficulty levels, test developers have examined items at various difficulty levels in an attempt to identify their…

This study provided an exploratory investigation of item features that might contribute to a lack of invariance of item parameters for the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). Data came from seven forms of the TOEFL administered in 1989. Subjective and quantitative measures developed for the study provided consistent information related…

The issue of what exactly is measured by different types of reading items has been a matter of interest in the field of reading research for many years. Language teaching and testing specialists have raised the question of whether a reading test for foreign students wishing to enter a university in the United States should include questions…

A history of the Test of Written English (TWE), a section of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL), describes its inception and development process. The new test is a thirty-minute essay test providing a measure of a non-native English-speaker's ability to perform academic writing tasks similar to those required of international…