The goal of the 1981-82 examination of the Evaluation Scale (ES) of the City University of New York's (CUNY) Writing Skills Assessment Test (WSAT) was to ascertain if the descriptive criteria of the original ES, instituted in 1978, might be refined in the light of CUNY's four years of experience with large-scale testing at a multicampus…

A study examined the relationship between types of miscues made by readers during oral reading and the errors made by the same readers on a cloze task. Subjects were 79 third and 78 fifth grade students in eight intact classrooms. Both the oral reading miscues and the cloze replacements were categorized using a modification of Y. Goodman's miscue…

In an effort to examine issues raised by the effort to assess the performance of educational institutions, a project focusing on the social purposes and intellectual foundations of assessment practices in education was initiated. The primary goal of the project was to explore the possibility of developing new, more appropriate educational…

The increasing interest in oral proficiency during the past decade prompted Educational Testing Service (ETS) to undertake the development of the Test of Spoken English (TSE), a standardized test of speaking proficiency of non-native speakers of English. The test has been validated for the selection of non-native teaching assistants applying to…

The purpose of this study was to review and evaluate the Basic Inventory of Natural Language (BINL) to help determine whether it should continue to be used in Honolulu's Students of Limited English Proficiency (SLEP) Program. The study looked at four critical aspects of the BINL: its content validity, its test-retest reliability, its effectiveness…

The lack of a German language testing instrument for economic literacy has led to problems for researchers in German-speaking countries to establish the level of economic literacy in those countries. The translation of the 23rd edition (1987) of the Test of Economic Literacy (TEL) into a German version, known as the Wirtschalfliche Bildung Test…

Legal employment test precedent cited by courts and employment-related law cited by plaintiffs during teacher certification test (TCT) decisions are discussed to determine their pertinence to test content validity issues. The two main documents involved in such litigation are the "Uniform Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures"…

The Measurement and Evaluation Center of the University of Texas (Austin) conducted a validity study to assist the Department of Management Science and Information (DMSI) at the College of Business Administration in establishing a program of credit by examination for an introductory course in electronic data processing--Data Processing Analysis…

In Arkansas, in reaction to complaints about traditional methods of selection for promotion, the civil service commission has chosen to base promotions in the police department solely on scores on locally-developed objective tests. Items developed and loaded into a computerized test bank were selected from six areas of responsibility: (1) criminal…

These two booklets, one for juvenile counselor candidates and one for test administrators, provide information about the examination developed as part of the evaluation procedures for juvenile counselor candidates in the Standards and Training for Corrections program in California. The candidate information booklet (1) provides background…

A study was conducted to develop a questionnaire for gauging student perceptions of the graphic climate (the extent to which students habitually use and construct appropriate graphics during the reading and studying process) in middle and high school history classes. The questionnaire was a 4-point Likert scale consisting of 18 questions, five of…

Reflecting changes in the focus and methodology of writing research over the past 20 years, this book provides a meta-analysis of studies on teaching approaches and focuses on composition instruction at the elementary, secondary, and college levels. The first chapter of the book examines general studies of the composing process, studies of process…

One solution to the problems of discrete-point testing are tests of reduced redundancy, that is, tests that introduce interference into the communication through actual introduction of noise or through deletion of text and that ask the learner to perform in spite of the noise. Three test types were originally developed to operationalize the…

This publication offers guidelines, practical suggestions, and examples for developing better teacher-made tests. It is divided into five chapters: (1) Planning Classroom Tests, (2) Guidelines for Developing Classroom Tests, (3) Assembling and Administering Classroom Tests, (4) Assessing Test Items, and (5) Desirable Characteristics of Tests.…

The use of motor ability tests to achieve sex-fair ability groups should be considered from three standpoints--task specificity, sex differences, and individual learning differences. Motor ability is frequently described as an individual's present ability to perform motor skills. Although several motor ability tests have been constructed for…