This article addresses the capacity of high stakes tests to measure the most significant kinds of learning. It begins by examining a set of philosophical arguments pertaining to construct validity and alleged conceptual obstacles to attributing specific knowledge and skills to learners. The arguments invoke philosophical doctrines of holism and…

SIETTE is a web-based adaptive testing system. It implements Computerized Adaptive Tests. These tests are tailor-made, theory-based tests, where questions shown to students, finalization of the test, and student knowledge estimation is accomplished adaptively. To construct these tests, SIETTE has an authoring environment comprising a suite of…

There are indications that the new technologies could have radical implications for conventional teaching and learning processes. It notes that, in reconfiguring how teachers and learners gain access to knowledge and information, the new technologies challenge conventional conceptions of both teaching and learning materials, and teaching and…

This paper describes the development, implementation, and evaluation of an automated system for predicting the acceptability status of candidate reading-comprehension stimuli extracted from a database of journal and magazine articles. The system uses a combination of classification and regression techniques to predict the probability that a given…

Skill in reading diverse genres of scientific texts, including media reports, is an important aspect of scientific literacy that some experts argue should be included in the science curriculum. To understand current and potential uses of media reports in classrooms, we conducted research in three areas. First, we examined major science education…

Technology today offers many new opportunities for innovation in educational assessment through rich new assessment tasks and potentially powerful scoring, reporting and real-time feedback mechanisms. One potential limitation for realizing the benefits of computer-based assessment in both instructional assessment and large scale testing comes in…

The aim of this study was to develop a means of tracking the reading performance of low-progress readers on a weekly basis, so as to inform instructional decision-making. A representative sample of 261 primary school children from Years 1 to 5 were tested on 21 different text passages taken from a developing passage reading test, the Wheldall…

In this technical report, we describe the development and piloting of a series of mathematics progress monitoring measures intended for use with students in grades kindergarten through eighth grade. These measures, available as part of easyCBM[TM], an online progress monitoring assessment system, were developed in 2007 and 2008 and administered to…

The articles in this bibliography represent holdings to date in the area of assessment alternatives in mathematics. The annotated articles are intended mainly to stimulate thinking and provide ideas. Some of the entries are formal assessments and are intended mainly for the classroom. Other articles discuss performance based assessment and other…

This report describes three exploratory studies of the performance of males and females on the multiple-choice and constructed-response sections of four Advanced Placement Examinations: United States History, Biology, Chemistry, and English Language and Composition. Analyses were carried out for each racial or ethnic group with a sample size of at…

A new free-response item type for mathematics tests is described. The item type, referred to as the Student-Produced Response (SPR), was first introduced into the Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test in 1993 and into the Scholastic Aptitude Test in 1994. Students solve a problem and record the answer by…

This study provides information about the total and component scores of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). First, the study provides comparative global and component estimates of test-retest, alternate-form, and internal-consistency reliability, controlling for sources of measurement error inherent in the examinees and the testing…

In 1991 the Measurement and Evaluation Center of the University of Texas at Austin was asked to develop a test for credit by examination in four lower division courses in Japanese. The test (in Japanese) was constructed from locally developed items provided by instructors of Japanese. The developed test consisted of 80 items distributed among…

The development of an inventory to measure self-regulated learning is reported. The first step involved the generation of an item pool based on a literature review. A pool of items was developed based on the five identified factors of metacognition, learning strategies, motivation, contextual sensitivity, and environmental utilization and control.…

In recent years, a controversy has arisen about the advisability of allowing examinees to review their test items and possibly change answers. Arguments for and against allowing item review are discussed, and issues that a test designer should consider when designing a Computerized Adaptive Test (CAT) are identified. Most CATs do not allow…