The literature on essay testing, and particularly the selection of topics which will stimulate the writing of essays, was reviewed in order to recommend a set of specifications that will produce topics that are maximally fair to all teacher certificate candidates. It was found that by far the greater part of the research relating to writing…

The Spanish/English Language Performance Screening (S/ELPS) was designed to assist the preschool and early elementary classroom teacher in objectively determining each child's dominant oral language for initial instruction. This report summarizes the development and testing performed in order to revise and validate the measure. After an intensive…

The Pupil-Perceived Needs Assessment (PPNA) is designed to assist school personnel in collecting information on pupil attitudes, reactions, and feelings towards new and existing curricular and extracurricular programs or towards education in general, and to assess pupils' needs from the pupils' perspective. The package is not meant to be used as…

This paper discusses some of the problems involved in the testing of minority group children, focusing on the testing of bilingual minorities and emphasizing the special problems involved in testing Hispanic children. Considered are a variety of ways in which tests have been misused and misinterpreted in working with these children. It is…

A summary, prepared from notes and tape recordings, is presented of the 1979 conference of the National Consortium on Testing. Panel descussions on the following topics are included: (1) introduction; (2) update--recent and upcoming events concerning testing; (3) test preparation and coaching; (4) minimum competency testing; (5) program evaluation…

A twenty-four item inventory was constructed and standardized in order to develop an instrument which measures the degree to which a preschool teacher adheres to Piaget's epistemological belief system. Using two criterion groups of teachers and graduate students--one Piagetian and one behaviorist--the inventory exhibited the ability to…

This study determined whether item forms ( rules for constructing items related to a domain or set of tasks) would enable naive item writers to generate multiple-choice items at three taxonomic levels--knowledge, comprehension, and application. Students wrote 120 multiple-choice items from 20 item forms, corresponding to educational objectives…

Simulated tailored tests were used to investigate the relationships between characteristics of the item pool and the computer program, and the reliability and bias of the resulting ability estimates. The computer program was varied to provide for various step sizes (differences in difficulty between successive steps) and different acceptance…

The strengths and weakness of standardized tests, and trends in achievement testing in the last 15 years are examined. The discussion of achievement tests includes survey, instructional, diagnostic, and basic skills tests, as well as tests used for formative and summative evaluation. Minimum competency tests are not examined in detail. Advantages…

The Student Learning Scales (SLS) were intended to supplement or replace existing college instructor performance scales, by focusing on the actions of learners and by providing students with an instrument for assessing their own learning reactions in a variety of instructional contexts. Factor analyses and validity studies were conducted to…

The Southern Illinois University School of Medicine applies mastery learning concepts to an objectives-based curriculum and uses the Nedelsky method to assess mastery of core objectives. Provisions are made for remediating deficiences. The Nedelsky technique is used for determining an acceptable level of performance in multiple choice examinations…

THIS DOCUMENT IS A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF PAPERS COVERING WORK DONE UNDER OEO CONTRACT 510. THE PAPERS ARE INDIVIDUALLY ABSTRACTED UNDER THE FOLLOWING ACCESSION NUMBERS. PS 000 983, "THE EFFECT OF HEADSTART ON DEVELOPMENTAL PROCESSES." PS 000 984, "THE EFFECT OF TEACHER BEHAVIOR ON VERBAL INTELLIGENCE IN OPERATION HEADSTART CHILDREN."…

This study investigates the feasibility of using cloze procedure test items (in which a student supplies a word, letter, or phrase to fill a gap in a continuous text) for the written College Board foreign language achievement tests. An introduction which defines the problem, traces its history, and presents the overall design of the study is…

The military utilizes tests extensively and should be aware of current testing problems. A conference composed of members from the business, educational, and military communities, both foreign and domestic, was held and these major issues addressed: (1) The Development of Training Requirements; (2) Personnel Assignment Using Interest Inventories;…

The report describes the development of an alternative performance assessment procedure for certifying adults at the secondary school level in the New York External High School Diploma Program. Unlike standardized group tests, the alternative method is characterized by such features as flexibility in time and location of testing, variety of…