The instrument designed by Patricia Kearney to measure communication style was chosen for a study of validity and reliability for three reasons: (1) the format of the instrument appeared to be more descriptive than evaluative, (2) its theoretical foundations encouraged the viewpoint that there is no one best communication style, and (3) it was…

As a response to the artificiality of the traditional reading comprehension test, this booklet provides alternative means of testing that are within the guidelines of the British National Criteria. Ideas for testing informative, persuasive, autobiographical, and literary materials are presented in the booklet--carefully chosen to provide material…

Difficulty and discrimination ability were compared between multiple choice and short answer items in midterm and final examinations for the internal medicine course at Louisiana State University School of Dentistry. The examinations were administered to 67 sophomore dental students in that course. Additionally, the impact of the source of the…

The Alaska Statewide Assessment Test is administered to fourth and eighth graders every two years in reading and mathematics. Assessment Report 7 describes how the assessment process works, analyzing results, test content, results for 1983, and statewide average scores. A question-answer format is used to discuss the following: (1) Was students'…

The work in second language education of the Assessment of Performance Unit, established by the Department of Education and Science of England and Wales to monitor certain areas of the public education curriculum is described. The focus is on the development of a rationale for testing, the elicitation procedures used in the assessment of speaking…

A discussion of foreign language education, evaluation, and communication in the context of the Finnish comprehensive school focuses on communication as a "graded" property that can be achieved at various levels of accuracy. Problems in designing summative tests for mixed-ability groups and shortcomings in the existing system are…

The reading objectives and measurement specifications in this paper are provided for teachers and other educators responsible for pupil instruction and for test development specialists involved with the preparation of the Texas Educational Assessment of Minimum Skills. Following lists of objectives and general specifications, the paper outlines a…

An attempt to improve high school teachers' integration of testing and instructional practice through inservice training failed to produce substantial results. In each of five districts participating, one high school used the intervention and one served as a control. Three science teachers were trained in each school, one as a lead teacher. Data…

This manual is designed to provide teachers with technically sound, easy-to-follow procedures for developing diagnostic tests to be used with their own students. The definition of diagnostic testing is broadened to include any tests systematically designed to provide information about skills that students have or have not mastered. A five-step…

An approach to testing reading comprehension among Dutch speaking university students of German for academic purposes is described. The test items were designed to reflect the most typical comprehension errors made by speakers of Dutch when reading German academic discourse. The most frequent errors were due to vocabulary and declension…

Almost all preschool screening programs depend entirely on information and observations obtained during a brief evaluative session with the child. However, the logistics involved in managing large numbers of parents and children, the use of volunteers having varying degrees of sophistication or competency in assessment, the reliability and…

The Dual Employed Coping Scales (DECS) were developed to measure coping behaviors and patterns of dual-employed families. The original DECS (58 self-report items) was administered to a sample of 60 individuals in dual-employed families. In another study, in which 69 dual-employed couples completed the DECS and the Family Adaptability and Cohesion…

Procedural documentation is presented for administering, scoring and analyzing data gathered to examine the construct validity of a set of superitems developed to assess student levels of mathematical reasoning ability. Each superitem includes a mathematical situation and a structured set of questions about that situation. The questions were based…

The evaluation aimed to develop and field test measurement instruments to assess student achievement and program performance. The former evaluation goal was designated greater priority during the 1980 summer term, with the intent of shifting priority to program performance the next year. A mastery test, designed to assess student performance, was…

The Koppitz Minibattery, that is, the Bender Gestalt Test, the Visual Aural Digit Span Test (VADS), and the Human Figure Drawing (HFD), was adopted and extended for use with middle school pupils (aged 11 to 14). Similarities and differences for older and younger children are described in behavior observation, objective scores and the qualitative…