This report describes the development, construction, and validation of the Preliminary Chinese Proficiency Test (Pre-CPT), a standardized, nationally-normed test of listening and reading comprehension for beginning-level native English-speaking learners of Chinese as a second language. The Pre-CPT was designed as a lower-level version of the commonly-used Chinese Proficiency Test (CPT). It is intended to accompany the CPT and Pre-CPT combined test interpretation manual. The report's eight chapters describe: the project's background, test structure and content, test administration time, and test materials; the initial phase of the test development process, focusing on committee membership and deliberations; development of the field test form of the Pre-CPT and the subsequent field testing; the nationwide norming administration in Chinese language programs nationwide; construction of a common scale for the Pre-CPT and CPT; the final form of the Pre-CPT and final norming means and item difficulty results; and psychometric properties of the test (reliability, precision of measurement, validity, test subscore intercorrelations). A brief list of references is included. Appended materials include lists of field tests and norming participants, a field testing examinee background questionnaire, norming tables for the Pre-CPT and CPT, and sources for test content. (MSE)