The ability to form a mental model of a text is an essential component of successful reading comprehension (RC), and purpose for reading can influence mental model construction. Participants were assigned to one of two conditions during an RC test to alter their purpose for reading: concurrent (texts and questions were presented simultaneously)…

The Korean College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT) aims to assess Korean high school students' scholastic ability required for college readiness. As a high-stakes test, the examination serves as a pivotal hurdle for university admission and exerts a strong washback effect on the educational system in Korea. The present study set out to investigate…

The statement stated in a multiple-choice question can be developed regarding two types of sentences: Interruptive (periodic) and cumulative (or loose). This study deals with different kinds of stems in designing multiple-choice (MC) items. To fill the existing gap in the literature, two groups of teacher students passing general English courses…

The use of digital environments for both learning and assessment is becoming prevalent. This often leads to incongruent situations, in which the study medium (eg, printed textbook) is different from the testing medium (eg, online multiple-choice exams). Despite some evidence that incongruent study-test situations are associated with inferior…

This study was to compare the processes that second language learners implemented when completing reading tasks in a multiple-choice question format (MCQ) with those in a short-answer question format (SAQ). Sixteen nonnative English-speaking students from a large Midwestern college in the United States were invited to complete MCQ and SAQ English…

Originally designed for students in Grades 3 through 5, MOCCA (formerly the Multiple-choice Online Causal Comprehension Assessment), identifies students who struggle with comprehension, and helps uncover why they struggle. There are many reasons why students might not comprehend what they read. They may struggle with decoding, or reading words…

Vocabulary's relationship to reading proficiency is frequently cited as a justification for the assessment of L2 written receptive vocabulary knowledge. However, to date, there has been relatively little research regarding which modalities of vocabulary knowledge have the strongest correlations to reading proficiency, and observed differences have…

Classroom practices, materials and teaching methods in language classes have changed a lot in the last decades and continue to evolve; however, the commonly used techniques to test students' foreign language skills have not changed much regardless of the recent awareness in Bloom's taxonomy. Testing units at schools rely mostly on multiple choice…

Background: This study aims to empirically answer the question of whether the role of sub-reading skills changes depending on the test format (e.g., multiple-choice vs. open-ended reading questions). The test format effect also addresses the issue of test validity--whether the reading test properly elicits construct-relevant reading skills or…

Writing multiple-choice test items to measure student learning in higher education is a challenge. Based on extensive scholarly research and experience, the author describes various item formats, offers guidelines for creating these items, and provides many examples of both good and bad test items. He also suggests some shortcuts for developing…

This study examines the effects of text length and question type on Korean EFL readers' reading comprehension of the fill-in-the-blank items in Korean CSAT. A total of 100 Korean EFL college students participated in the study. After divided into three different proficiency groups, the participants took a reading comprehension test which consisted…

Premised on Web 2.0 technology, the current study investigated the effect of facilitating critical thinking using the Collaborative Questioning, Reading, Answering, and Checking (C-QRAC) collaboration script on university students' science reading literacy in flipped learning conditions. Participants were 85 Taiwanese university students recruited…

Integrated reading/writing tasks are becoming more common in large-scale language tests. Much of the research on these tasks has focused on writing through reading; assessing reading through writing is a less explored area. In this article we describe a reading-into-writing task that is intended to measure both reading comprehension and language…

In the last 15 years or so, language testing practitioners have increasingly favored assessing vocabulary in context. The discrete-point vocabulary measure used in the old version of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) has long been criticized for encouraging test candidates to memorize wordlists out of context although test items…

Fifteen deaf students (18 to 24 years old) who received the standard written form of a reading comprehension test performed significantly better than 15 deaf Ss who received an American Sign Language version. There were no differences between Ss receiving the standard form and Ss receiving a Manually Coded English videotaped form. (CL)