Responds to a previous article in which the author of this article's work on reading subskills is critiqued. The author states that, despite the criticism of his work, he feels the critique offers a useful contribution to the debate about subskills and judgments. (JL)

Presents a repetition test that was found to be suited in measuring English language proficiency by German students. The construction and administration of the test are explained, and an analysis of its effectiveness is provided. (23 references) (GLR)

The validity of mean length of utterance (MLU) and a measure of syntactic complexity were tested against the language assessment, remediation, and screening procedure on spontaneous speech samples from 87 children, concluding that MLU is a valid measure of clausal complexity up to 4:5 and that the measure of syntactic complexity is more valid at…

Lists 10 conditions essential to a school's readiness to explore alternative assessment methods, including desire for better assessment information, insufficiency of current assessment method, staff and parent openness to innovation, conceptual clarity, assessment "literacy," clarity about desired student outcomes, unsuitability of present…

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill medical school uses an objective structured clinical examination as the final exam in physical diagnosis. Since 1987, students and evaluators have shown overwhelming acceptance and support of the test, partly because it is structured for teaching as well as assessment. (Author/MSE)

Students with severe/profound mental retardation performed functional tasks under training or probe conditions. Analysis of nine students' records indicated that students do not react to probe conditions as if they were extinction conditions; training data do not consistently reflect performance under probe conditions; and data collected under…

Reviewed are the issues of planning, student preparation, exam scheduling, student verification, and software security. Discussed are the effects on student scores of exam scheduling and of students' familiarity with computers, student evaluations of the exam, and security and technical difficulties. (Author)

Discusses the link between testing and the content of instruction and proposes a method for generating large numbers of objective-relevant test items for instructional programs in high schools, higher education, and training situations. Higher level thinking outcomes are discussed, item sets are described, and generic scenarios and questioning are…

In an excerpt from "Horace's School: Redesigning the American High School," Theodore Sizer states that what is needed is raised expectations within the various agencies that now affect standards rather than their demotion and replacement by a more centralized system. Public policy must address the two barriers to excellence--public…

In part one of a two-part essay, a broad view of foreign language testing and a comprehensive philosophy for meaningful pragmatic tests are advocated. (10 references) (JL)

A discussion of multifacet Rasch model analysis describes the Rasch model and its assumptions, then presents an extension of the model to include a facet for the influence of examiner severity. The model is illustrated with an application to an oral examination administered by a medical specialty board. (Author/MSE)

Describes the methods by which one teacher prepared eighth-grade language arts students for the Florida Writing Assessment exam. Considers the pros and cons of such activities. Advocates activities in which students are asked to evaluate each other's writing. (HB)

Considers teachers' research into adult/pupil dialog. Questions the way teachers converse with students. Asks how teachers listen to what children say and how teachers reciprocate. Studies language facility as an age-related phenomenon and considers whether conversation is led and developed in linguistic context by the adult. (HB)

Explored the relative contributions to Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) score dependability of various numbers of persons, items, subtests, languages, and their various interactions. Sampled 15,000 test takers, 1000 each from 15 different language backgrounds. (Author/VWL)

Studied children with word finding difficulties who were identified through a wider survey of educational provision for those with language and communication difficulties. (Author/VWL)