This guide is designed to give the student helpful information about Arizona's Instrument To Measure the Standards (AIMS) for grade 8. The guide provides examples of the type of questions students see on AIMS and explains how items are scored. It does not teach what the student needs to know to do well on AIMS, but it will help the student know…

The differences between the testing practices at the University General Requirements Unit (UGRU) of United Arab Emirates University and the Higher Colleges of Technology (HCT) were studied, focusing on the differences in styles of grading written English examinations. The UGRU always uses norm- referenced testing in their 1-year foundations…

To add to previous research on gender differences in mathematics ability and achievement, this study was designed to investigate gender differences in problem-solving strategies for two extended constructed-response mathematics questions in grade 3. It is a followup to a study of gender differences on constructed-response and multiple-choice items…

The hypothesis that task-specific criterion-referenced self-assessment can have a positive effect on students' metacognitive engagement and learning was tested. Seventh graders (n=47) were asked to invent, apply, and explain a classification system for a group of animals. Treatment subjects periodically assessed their performance in terms of a…

The primary objective of this research was to examine the effect of scoring items known to be multidimensional using a unidimensional model. Although several simulation studies have examined this, few studies have been conducted using data obtained from actual test administrations. In this study, open-ended mathematics items from a mandated state…

This manual documents the technical aspects of the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS). In May 1999, Massachusetts public school students in grades 4, 8, and 10 participated in the second annual administration of the MCAS tests in English Language Arts, Mathematics, and Science & Technology. This report provides information…

Rural Trust schools and communities embrace an education that values what is unique to a particular place in an effort to promote mutual school and community well-being. This local focus engages students academically, pairing real world relevance with intellectual rigor. It also develops skills that promote citizenship, such as decision making,…

Over the past decade, developers of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) have changed substantially the mix of item types on the NAEP assessments by decreasing the numbers of multiple-choice questions and increasing the numbers of questions requiring short- or extended-constructed responses. These changes have been motivated…

The SAT® I: Reasoning Test is administered seven times a year. Primarily for security purposes, several different test forms are given at each administration. How is it possible to compare scores obtained from different test forms and from different test administrations? The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the statistical…

Over 2,000 writing samples were collected from four undergraduate institutions and compared, where possible, with scores on a multiple-choice test. High correlations between ratings of the writing samples and multiple-choice test scores were obtained. Samples contributed substantially to the prediction of both college grades and writing…

To help ninth-grade students become critical users of the Internet, an English teacher and a library media specialist developed an open-ended debate assignment to be assessed with a rubric. This article describes the implementation of the project and includes the assessment rubric, evaluating performance, logical arguments, support statements,…

Examined the validity of the pragmatic approach to test difficulty put forward by Child (1987). This study investigated whether the Child discourse-type hierarchy predicts text difficulty for second-language readers. Results suggested that this hierarchy may provide a sound basis for developing foreign-language tests when it is applied by trained…

Focuses on the efficacy of computer use for learning Kanji characters and improving Japanese vocabulary levels, with reference to software designed to improve Kanji learning in a self-access learning mode. Findings reveal that all the students in an Australian university using the computer to learn Kanji increased their grades and that those most…

Reviews Bialystok's (1990a) analysis of communication strategy work and describes two studies in which products are interpreted within frameworks illuminating underlying processes of second language (L2) learning. Concludes that products, appropriately analyzed, can provide important insights into the processes of L2 learners. (73 references)…

The effects of using recommended data collection procedures on median recommended test standards, variability of recommended test standards, and reliability of recommended standards for 7 subtests of the National Teacher Examinations Communications Skills and General Knowledge Tests were explored, using 236 evaluators (75 public school teachers…