With reports of declining enrolments in mathematics related degrees and low female participation rates in these degrees, the issue of gender differences in mathematics remains relevant. Results of recent studies suggest gender differences in mathematics are nuanced and that small differences in the early years can manifest as larger differences in…

While most educators assume that not all students try their best on achievement tests, no current research examines if behaviors associated with low test effort, like rapidly guessing on test items, affect teacher value-added estimates. In this article, we examined the prevalence of rapid guessing to determine if this behavior varied by grade,…

Problem Statement: Learning-teaching activities bring along the need to determine whether they achieve their goals. Thus, multiple choice tests addressing the same set of questions to all are frequently used. However, this traditional assessment and evaluation form contrasts with modern education, where individual learning characteristics are…

Students bring with them their own misconceptions to the science classes and it becomes a barrier in developing new concepts. Therefore, identifying misconceptions is an essential component in teaching science. The objective of this study was to identify 10th grade students' misconceptions on plant transport with the use of two-tier diagnostic…

The current study applied the person-fit statistic, l[subscript z], to data from a Canadian provincial achievement test to explore the usefulness of conducting person-fit analysis on large-scale assessments. Item parameter estimates were compared before and after the misfitting student responses, as identified by l[subscript z], were removed. The…

Because the relationship between computer use and achievement is still puzzling, there is a need to prepare and analyze good quality datasets on computer use and achievement. Such a dataset can be derived from TIMSS data. This paper describes how this dataset can be prepared. It also gives an example of how the dataset may be analyzed. The…

In multiple-choice items, differential item functioning (DIF) in the correct response may or may not be caused by differentially functioning distractors. Identifying distractors as causes of DIF can provide valuable information for potential item revision or the design of new test items. In this paper, we examine a two-step approach based on…

The No Child Left Behind Act requires state assessments to report not only overall scores but also domain scores. To see the information on students' overall achievement, progress, and detailed strengths and weaknesses, and thereby identify areas for improvement in educational quality, students' performances across years or across forms need to be…

This study compares four item selection criteria for a two-category computerized classification testing: (1) Fisher information (FI), (2) Kullback-Leibler information (KLI), (3) weighted log-odds ratio (WLOR), and (4) mutual information (MI), with respect to the efficiency and accuracy of classification decision using the sequential probability…

This study analysed the distribution of questions from the gas law chapters of four high school and four college chemistry textbooks based on six variables--Book Type (secondary "versus" introductory college), Cognitive Skill (lower-order "versus" higher-order), Question Format (calculation "versus" multiple-choice…

Constructed-response (CR) questions are a mainstay of introductory physics textbooks and exams. However, because of the time, cost, and scoring reliability constraints associated with this format, CR questions are being increasingly replaced by multiple-choice (MC) questions in formal exams. The integrated testlet (IT) is a recently developed…

Coursebook evaluation helps practitioners decide on the most appropriate coursebook to be exploited. Moreover, evaluation process enables to predict the potential strengths and weaknesses of a given coursebook. Checklist method is probably the most widely adopted way of judging coursebooks and there are plenty of ELT coursebook evaluation…

This study investigated the effects of online drill-and-practice activities using student-generated questions on academic performance and motivation as compared with online drill-and-practice using teacher-generated questions and no drill-and-practice in a student question-generation (SQG) learning context. A quasi-experimental research method was…

Item bank is one of the main components of adaptive tests. In this research, a test was made in order to design and calibrate items for Homogeneous Second Order Differential Equations. The items were designed according to the goal-content's table of the subject and the Bloom's taxonomy learning domain. Validity and reliability of these items was…

This study investigated the performance and reasoning of 143 Australian students who completed mathematics tasks sourced from their national test. Specifically, this study examined changed student performance and reasoning on items where the graphic component was modified. The results of the study revealed significant performance differences…