To assess teachers' grading and other evaluation practices and policies in Ohio, a 79-item questionnaire was administered to 258 elementary and secondary school teachers, and 137 other teachers were interviewed by college students taking an educational assessment class. The typical teacher assigned term grades of "A" or "B" to…

Intended for educators seeking information on direct writing assessments, this monograph describes general procedures for planning and conducting a writing assessment and strategies for tailoring that assessment to local needs. The introductory chapter offers a brief comparison of direct and indirect writing assessment methods, highlighting those…

Several methods of assessing test item bias are described, and the concept of fair use of tests is examined. A test item is biased if individuals of equal ability have different probabilities of attaining the item correct. The following seven general procedures used to examine test items for bias are summarized and discussed: (1) analysis of…

Clearly stated educational objectives can help in educational evaluation. Because objectives sans assessment are little more than rhetoric, criterion-referenced tests are advocated for assessing objective-attainment. Performance standards are viewed as appropriately separable from objectives. Five guidelines regarding objectives are suggested for…

Defines test bias as a phenomenon in which test scores result in negative outcomes for certain groups, often lower socioeconomic groups and minorities. Discusses three manifestations of test bias including content, atmosphere, and use bias and presents recommendations for remedying bias problems in testing the culturally different. (JAC)

In recent years there has been an increased interest in developing the basic reading and writing skills of primary students at risk for academic failure. Problems associated with typical evaluations of programmatic impact on students' literacy skills include the amount of testing time, sensitivity to smaller levels of growth, or, as in the case of…

This handbook presents an overview of the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment and a description of the Writing Assessment. Districts are encouraged to use the procedures and methods described to create prompts and score writing samples as part of their district-level assessment program. After an introduction and overview of the Pennsylvania…

This paper addresses the controversy about use of "out-of-level" testing, the practice of assessing students (usually those with disabilities) with a lower-level version of a test. The controversy pits unintended instructional consequences against "accurately" measuring performance and avoiding student frustration. Introductory…

A school and community must state their goals for students and then, avoiding the use of commerical tests, design a means of evaluation to determine if those goals have been met. (Author/JM)

Reviews risk assessment procedures and instruments used by child protection agencies. Discusses methodological deficiencies that limit the utility of instruments in predicting abusive behavior. Offers suggestions regarding the use of risk assessment in various decisions made during the course of child protection investigations. (BG)

Describes four constructs of patterns of abusive and neglectful parenting and child rearing and the development of the Adult-Adolescent Parenting Inventory. The inventory is discussed in terms of discriminant analysis, diagnostic and discriminatory capabilities of the inventory with adults, and practical applications. (RJC)

Diagnostic assessment combining cognitive science and psychometrics, cognitively diagnostic assessment (CDA), is characterized in terms of the intended use of the assessment and methods of developing and evaluating assessments. Societal trends motivating the development of CDA and efforts to develop a five-step methodology for CDA are outlined.…

This paper seeks to identify ways of making measurement more relevant to classroom teachers, and making classroom realities more apparent to measurement specialists. Measurement elements of teacher education textbooks and courses, nontraditional assessment topics, informal classroom measurement techniques, terminological issues, and three types of…

Contains a summary of the measurement strategies developed and used by the Technical Analysis Group on behalf of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. Also describes some remaining measurement dilemmas in the context of the National Board's assessments and suggests some areas for further research. (SLD)

In this article, the author offers a new vision of assessment that has the potential of bringing about remarkable gains in student achievement. The time has come to take advantage of the new understanding of the potential of assessment and to fundamentally rethink the relationship between assessment practices and effective schools in the United…