Authentic and direct assessments of performances and products are conceptualized in terms of multiple distinctions having implications for validation. These include contrasts between performances and products, between assessment of performance per se and performance assessment of competence or other constructs, between structured and unstructured…

The organization of cognitive factors in a sample of older adults was investigated by a joint factor analysis of the subtests from the Woodcock-Johnson Psychoeducational Battery-Revised (WJ-R) and the Detroit Tests of Learning Aptitude-Adult (DTLA-A). Two extensive batteries were administered, following R. W. Woodcock's recommendation that in…

Issues and problems in assessment research are explored, with suggestions to help establish an acceptable correlation between student assessment scores and final grades. Topics include assessing instructor grading variation, instructor grade point average (GPA), success rates, and lack of linearity in grade scales. Solutions to these problems are…

Despite the increasing criticism of statistical significance testing by researchers, particularly in the publication of the 1994 American Psychological Association's style manual, statistical significance test results are still popular in journal articles. For this reason, it remains important to understand the logic of inferential statistics. A…

This study investigated the impact of task directions on the mathematical performance of high school students from six classes. Students analyzed data regarding school dropout by answering six short-answer questions and writing a letter discussing the trends and their predictions about school dropout. Tasks were scored using two methods: (1) trait…

The clinical inference process in test interpretation is described so that people can more easily communicate about it, teach it, and learn it. Chapter 1 compares different levels (concrete, mechanical, and individualized) of interpretation of the same test. Chapter 2 offers examples of an often-neglected kind of data necessary for individualized…

The limitations of objectives tests, the language skills needed for university work, and effective ways of appraising and communicating these skills to the university are discussed. The goals of university English as a second language (ESL) programs is to train international students in the linguistic and academic skills they will need in American…

Language testing is an area of applied linguistics that combines the exercise of professional judgment about language, learning, and the nature of the achievement of language learning with empirical data about student performance and, by inference, their abilities. The relationship between judgments and empirical data in language testing is…

Competency assessment is used for diagnostic purposes at the City University of New York (CUNY) Queens College. CUNY had decided that all students admitted after 1987 be tested. In addition, minimum competencies were required after the completion of 60 credits. Queens College chose to use the tests for entering freshmen for placement decisions,…

University-level mathematics placement examinations might yield summary measures that are differentially accurate due to individual differences in the recall of previously-learned material. In particular, test scores in algebra and trigonometry may be subject to sporadic recall of solution procedures, resulting in aberrant response patterns. The…

This paper analyzes the economic knowledge of high school students based on national data from 8,000 students who took the revised "Test of Economic Literacy," a nationally normed and standardized achievement test in economics. First, the validity and reliability features of the test are presented and then the test scores are broken down…

Three kinds of classificatory decisions that might be made using criterion-referenced tests (CRTs) are described, and methods to appraise the validity of each are subsequently discussed. Decisions that entail predictive, descriptive, and evaluative classifications comprised the three kinds of decisions described. Predictive classifications entail…

This paper briefly describes three studies in which the Paired Hands Test was used to assess the other-concept as a means of evaluating project or program objectives. The first study involved the use of the Paired Hands Test to evaluate an Afro-American Curriculum Project in which teachers recieved training in the development of a curriculum…

This study examined differences in student achievement on the 2000 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) mathematics test by their teachers years-of-experience teaching mathematics. Data examined were mean scale scores or and eighth grade national, national public school students, and eighth grade Kentucky, Tennessee, and Texas public…

The Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) curriculum was developed to engage beginning viewers in looking at works of art and has been used with children in many parts of the United States and Eastern Europe. The VTS was designed to develop critical thinking in viewing art and to enhance the function of the teacher as the facilitator of the reasoning…