This book offers specific how-to advice to college faculty on every stage of the testing process, including planning the test and classifying objectives to be measured, ensuring the validity and reliability of the test, and grading in such a way as to arrive at fair grades based on relevant data. The book examines the strengths and weaknesses of…

This first test and technical manual explains the development, purpose, use, validity, and reliability of the criterion-referenced final examination for the Chemistry of Hazardous Materials course of the National Fire Academy in Emmitsburg (Maryland). Because of possible diversity in the testing knowledge and background of readers, the manual…

The construct underlying simple paper-and-pencil logical operations tasks administered to young children in group settings was examined. The logical operations, number concepts, and visual discrimination subtests of the Early School Assessment (ESA) were administered as part of the Fall 1987 national tryout of the ESA. The mathematics concepts and…

Florida requires all students in grades 3, 5, 8, and 11 to demonstrate mastery of minimum performance standards using the Florida Student State Assessment Test (SSAT) forms for the appropriate grade level. The tests are administered in October and cover reading, writing, and mathematics. Current practices used to prepare students for the SSAT…

The operational preparations for the Dutch national assessment program in education started in 1986. The program's aim is to periodically describe the contents of the curriculum in use and the attainment of 8-year-old and 11-year-old students on a national basis by means of surveys. In this paper some of the guiding principles in instrument…

This paper demonstrates the relationship between the concept of unidimensionality and direction of an item in a multidimensional space. The basic premise is that if items that measure in the same direction are combined to form a test, that test will meet the item response theory requirements of unidimensionality. This will be true even if the…

This study hypothesized that items in the one-question-per-passage format would be less easily answered when administered without their associated contexts than conventional reading comprehension items. A total of 256 seventh and eighth grade students were administered both Forms 3A and 3B of the Sequential Tests of Educational Progress (STEP 11).…

The Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills, Expanded Edition (CTBS), was administered in 1984 to students in the District of Columbia Public Schools. This report includes: (1) an overview covering the purpose of testing, a description of the subject areas tested by the CTBS, and a glossary of technical terms; (2) a narrative and tabular summary of…

The Nevada Department of Education implemented a standard setting study of the Pre-Professional Skills Tests. The tests constitute a secure test battery developed by the Educational Testing Service to assess basic proficiency in reading, writing, and mathematics via three multiple-choice tests and a written essay test. The Nevada study, in the…

One question regarding the utility of adaptive testing is the effect of individualized item arrangements on examinee test scores. The purpose of this study was to analyze the item difficulty choices by examinees as a function of previous item performance. The examination was a 25-item test of basic algebra skills given to 36 students in an…

When test questions are not intended to measure language skills, it is important to know if language is an extraneous characteristic that affects item performance. This study investigates whether certain stylistic changes in the way items are presented affect item performance on examinations for a health profession. The subjects were medical…

This report presents an analysis of a student evaluation survey, the Uniform Student Evaluation Survey (USES), used to provide a systematic, campus-wide basis for meaningful feedback on the instructional effectiveness of college teaching at Christopher Newport College (Virginia). This study addressed three issues as to the reliability, validity,…

Work on the development of the intensive time-series design was initiated because of the dissatisfaction with existing research designs. This dissatisfaction resulted from the paucity of data obtained from designs such as the pre-post and randomized posttest-only designs. All have the common characteristic of yielding data from only one or two…

The materials presented were developed for use in a series of conferences on testing and instruction sponsored by the National Institute of Education, with the United States Office of Education, the UCLA Center for the Study of Evaluation, and a network of research and development agencies. They are intended for use by school practitioners and…

The "B" testing program of the Beginning Teacher Evaluation Study, Phase III-B, is summarized. A sample of 146 second grade and 128 fifth grade students completed the reading and mathematics achievement battery, as well as affective scales pertaining to reading, mathematics, and school. The administration procedures, test results, and psychometric…