The primary purpose of this leaflet is to assist the teacher of English in building good achievement tests, with special attention to planning and construction. Subjects covered are general considerations for planning a test, making a blueprint for the test, basic characteristics of effective tests and test questions, selecting the proper test…

The cultural achievements of Italy are utilized to spur interest in the study of Italian. A weekly, multiple-choice type quiz posted on the Italian bulletin board questions curious passers-by in the areas of fine arts, literature, science, geography, history, and miscellaneous items. Sample items of this motivational device follow a description of…

Three sets of instructional materials were prepared by third graders after working with and responding to similar experimental materials in reading and social science. The curriculum begins at a point when most children are able to read, however, supplementary listening passages and other readiness training and assessment is provided for those who…

Confidence testing has been used in varying forms over the past 40 years as a method for increasing the amount of information available from objective test items. This paper traces the development of the procedure from Hevner's beginning method up to the various methods in use today and describes both the testing procedures and scoring methods…

The development of a series of parallel single-topic tests for testing attainment of 14 objectives concerned with inquiry skill in biology is discussed. The series of eight two-part tests are called "Explorations in Biology" (EIB). (CK)

Various aspects of Confidence Weighting are examined. Variant of Confidence Weighting, its effect on test reliability, and the validity of Confidence Weighting are discussed. (DG)

The multiple choice technique can test written and oral comprehension and linguistic competence at beginning and intermediate levels. Examples of test items concerning sounds, stress, vocabulary, and structures are presented, and brief comments on the items are included. (SW)

A cubic spline method for smoothing equipercentile equating relationships under the common item nonequivalent populations design is described. Statistical techniques based on bootstrap estimation are presented for choosing an equating method/degree of smoothing. Smoothing decreases the estimate of random error but results in an increase in…

Describes the practical workup of a multiple choice examination system in electrical engineering. Discusses some of the pedagogical advantages obtained by statistical handling of the data. Provides some examples of items. (TW)

Describes a study designed to determine if the amount of time allocated for answering multiple true/false type questions affects the grades of the medical students taking the tests. Students who had 2-1/4 minutes to answer each question scored significantly better than those who had 1-1/2 minutes or 3 minutes. (TW)

Reviews some notions that have influenced the generation of comprehension questions, and describes a study that compared the knowledge sources third-grade students drew upon in answering text questions with the assumptions underlying the question hierarchies represented. (HOD)

No population exists where it is more important to produce information literate individuals than teacher candidates, yet few would suggest that practitioners newly entering the field are adequately prepared to model and teach information literacy to their students. Consequently, information literacy has recently been established as a key outcome…

In the school year 2000-2001 students in Grade 10 took the Graduation Exit Examination for the 21st Century (GEE 21) Language Arts and Mathematics tests for the first time. For GEE 21, student scores are reported in terms of five achievement levels: Advanced, Proficient, Basic, Approaching Basic, and Unsatisfactory. This booklet is part of a…

In this paper we draw on data from a large mathematics competition, for the years 1987 to 2000 and use two different but closely related measures to investigate possible gender differences in performance. Our analyses revealed that small gender differences in favour of males persisted but had decreased over time. Consistent with reports from…

This paper provides a historical review of the changes and improvements made in estimating numerical cutpoints for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). While reviewing the various methodologies used for collecting judgment data, the paper discusses: (1) the incorporation of Item Response Theory for setting standards; (2)…