The 2018 NAEP Oral Reading Fluency (ORF) study is conducted by NCES to examine fourth-grade students' ability to read passages out loud with sufficient speed, accuracy, and expression, as well as foundational skills to gauge underlying sources of poor fluency. Oral reading fluency and foundational skills are important components of reading that…

The first of two studies reported examined the factors that predict differences in item responses for black and white matched examinees to analogies on the Graduate Record Examinations (GRE). Data were taken from 13 forms of the GRE Verbal Test, with a median sample size of 21,000 whites and a median sample size of 1,400 blacks for the purpose of…

Whether the shaping of test items can itself result in qualitative differences in examinees' comprehension of reading passages was studied using the Pearson-Johnson item classification system. The specific practice studied incorporated, within an item stem line, references that point the examinee to a specific location within a reading passage.…

In 1985 the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) assessed the literacy skills of America's young adults. The survey stressed the complexity and diversity of literary tasks in American society rather than using a simplistic single standard for literacy. NAEP convened panels of experts whose deliberations led to this definition of…