Problems encountered in evaluating the effectiveness of an English elective program indicated the need for the development of a criterion-referenced diagnostic test for determining students' knowledge and understanding of certain basic language concepts in the field of English. A survey of 76 English elective programs throughout the United States…

This report describes the development and validation of the Weekly Activity Record (WAR), an instrument for the analysis and prediction of criminal behavior and recidivism. The 18 items on the instrument record the hours per week devoted to various activities: vocational, avocational, social, physical, antisocial, personal, and interpersonal. The…

A series of four vocabulary norming tests was used to develop a large, homogeneous pool of vocabulary test items for use in computer-administered adaptive testing research. Five hundred seventy-five unique vocabulary knowledge items were divided among the four norming tests, and administered to separate groups of college undergraduates. Norming…

The Student Evaluation of Teacher II (SET II), the new instrument presented in this manual, is designed for use in securing student evaluations of teachers below the fourth grade or, with disadvantaged students, through the sixth grade. The manual describes the history, nature, and difficulties of the student evaluation of teachers movement and…

The Colorado Evaluation Project was funded to field test the Common Status Measures concurrently with Colorado's pilot program in assessment and evaluation. The primary purpose is to determine Colorado's educational needs, and the secondary purpose is to test procedures for assessment which can be replicated or adapted by local school districts or…

This pilot project proposed to construct a test or battery of tests to measure (1) the music discrimination abilities of school children aged 12 and under; (2) children's understanding of such basic concepts as rhythm, melody, and harmony; and (3) the ability of children to apply these concepts in music listening. Musical excerpts representing a…

A series of studies were conducted to modify the General Aptitude Test Battery (GATB) and the Minnesota Importance Questionnaire (MIQ) for use with mentally retarded individuals. Modification of the GATB consisted of eliminating answer sheets, increasing practice, individual administration, untimed administration, removal of verbally loaded items,…

The suggestion that multiple-choice items can be converted to true-false items without essentially changing what the item measures and with possible improvement in efficiency is investigated. Each of the 90 four-choice items in a natural science test was rewritten into a pair of true-false items, one true, one false. The resulting 180 items were…

As part of a 2 year demonstration project to evaluate the effect on the mental health of physically handicapped children placed in organized group activities with their nonhandicapped peers, two research instruments were used. The monograph discusses one of the instruments, the Self-Image Evaluation. A synopsis of the project is provided; and a…

Equations are derived to enable the graphic approximation of the item parameters of the stochastic mental test models, i.e., the generalized normal ogive and logistic models. The item parameters for the models are discriminatory power, difficulty, and probability of chance success. Suggested uses for the approximations were to provide a basis for…

The development and validation of a test of science problem solving skills for use in grades one through three are described. Norms (grade placement scores) for children in urban, outer-urban, and suburban areas are provided for the total score on alternate forms of the test, each of which uses two physical science problems to assess (1) the…

An instrument, combining the advantages of Piaget's individual concept assessment and criterion-referenced testing, was developed to test area conservation, area measurement and area subdivision of primary grade children. This Test of Intuitive Area Concepts was included with the Primary Mental Abilities spatial relations subtest and the Minnesota…

This paper presents guidelines for valid and effective test preparation and presentation. Working on the assumption that teacher secrecy about tests and the subsequent student test-fear are pointless and harmful, this paper outlines some tools for test preparation, such as pretests, teacher file cards as to items covered in class and clearly…

The Perceptual Analysis Kindergarten Test is based on the rationale or thesis that learning is hierarchical. The test is used to help determine the level of the child in the hierarchy so that a remedial program can be devised to bring the child up to the level where he can develop the associative conceptualization required to be able to learn in…

Teacher educators have been plagued with the problem of devising useful instructional interventions, but often have been unable to assess the quality of their efforts because of the unavailability of satisfactory criterion measures. The application of teaching performance tests as (1) an instructional intervention, and as (2) a formative or…