Suggests that test performance can be improved through test administration procedures that inform students when they are responding to instruments that assess socially desirable attributes (such as aptitude and achievement) and that take into account children's feelings about school tasks. (Author)

Productive language is where both recent innovative efforts and the most severe problems are. Two problems to be answered are decisions about the assessment situation and about focal aspects of communicative competence to be assessed in them. Two examples of current work are inserted from papers prepared by the staff of the High/Scope Educational…

The purposes of this paper are: (1) to review some of the major studies of applications of item response theory (IRT) methodology to test equating and synthesize their results; (2) to discuss what questions are as yet unanswered and what problems exist with research methodology; and (3) to provide direction for future research. (Author/LMO)

Explores the history of testing, motivations for testing, testing procedures, and the inevitable limitations of testing. Argues that writing program faculty and administrators must clarify and profess their values, decide what they want students to know and what sort of thinkers they should be, and develop tests reflecting those needs. (SR)

Discussion of how computer technology can be integrated into elementary school instruction focuses on evaluating student learning through test scoring. Highlights include descriptions of a computer-based instructional delivery system, modified confidence weighted admissible probability measurement (MCW-APM), and computer-managed instructional…

The Presidential Address at the 1986 National Council on Measurement in Education Annual Meeting argues that measurement specialists have tended to set unrealistic aspirations for the role tests play. The conjunctive decision making model is discussed and the use of data in the conjunctive and compensatory decision making models is examined. (JAZ)

This reply to William A. Mehrens argues that test validity is the central issue in discussing the appropriate role of tests. It states that the procedures used to establish the validity of tests are inadequate because they depend primarily on content validity and not on construct and criterion validity. (JAZ)

The President of the National Council on Measurement in Education replies to his critics. He argues that the concept of measurement error should not be used to make cut-scores more valid and that grade point averages have not been demonstrated to be valid indicators of teachers' subject matter competence. (LMO)

Discrepancies between the K-ABC and its theoretical base of simultaneous and sequential mental processing; technical and design problems related to disproportionate subtest contributions of the Simultaneous Scale to the Mental Processing Composite; the method of subtest-specific variance computation and use in interpretation; and utility with…

Discusses problems with the ACTFL/ETS Oral Proficiency Guidelines and examines inconsistencies relating to three assumptions of oral proficiency (OPT)--hours of study, accuracy/interest, and errors. Further, it is argued that the main problems with OPT arise from an analytic approach and the native speaker yardstick. (SED)

Description of an objective method for assigning weights to questions on examinations includes discussions of classical test theory, knowledge organization, and how task analysis can be used to identify knowledge elements required to solve specific problems, rank them, and assign objective weights to exam questions using a Pareto distribution (7…

This response to Batsche and Peterson's article discusses the theoretical, empirical, and pragmatic merits of projective assessment when performed in the context of a comprehensive personality assessment battery. The projective measures should not be considered in isolation. The author concludes projective techniques are not incompatible with…

Grade equivalent (GE) scores for elementary school achievement tests are defended in response to efforts to ban their use. Equal interval developmental scoring methods for the Sequential Tests of Educational Progress and the Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills are criticized. (BS)

Discusses the problems associated with "grading on a curve," the approach often used for standard setting on language proficiency tests. Proposes four main steps presented in the setting of a non-arbitrary cut-score. These steps not only establish a proficiency standard checked by external criteria, but also check to see that the test covers the…

The present study hypothesized and found that test-anxious subjects can learn to redirect their attention to the task, and away from the internal stimulation resulting from anxiety. Observation of a model successfully coping with anxiety and subsequent role playing of such behavior produced the desired results. (Author/NG)