STANDARDIZED TESTING Understanding the Vocabulary

STANDARDS VS STANDARDIZED A test that is administered to a large number of students under the same conditions and makes comparisons between those students. “Expectations for teaching and learning” (Wilde, 2002, p. 76).

CRITERION-REFERENCED TESTS Standards-based testing

CRITERION-REFERENCED TESTS “Criterion-referenced tests measure an individual’s ability in regard to a criterion, that is, a specific body of knowledge or skill. The tests are used to determine what students know or can do in a specific domain of learning, rather than how their performance compares with other students.” (Ornstein, 1993, p. 32)

NORM-REFERENCED TESTS The Dreaded Bell Curve

NORM-REFERENCED TESTS Definition: “Standardized tests are norm-referenced—that is, the performance of sample populations has been established and serves as a basis for interpreting a student’s test performance by comparing it with other students’ performances. The idea of norms—especially if the norms are based on a larger population—is to compare the score of a student on a test with students from other schools.” (Ornstein, 1993, p. 29)

UNUSUAL CHARACTERISTICS OF NORM- REFERENCED TESTS  Aren’t designed so that every student can answer every question in the time allotted.  According to Wilde, the tests “aren’t meant to reflect any one curriculum” (2002, p. 78).  According to Ornstein: “Studying rarely helps students obtain a better score, although familiarity with the test seems to improve scores” (1993, p. 37)

SCORING What do those terms mean?

GAIN SCORES AND VALUE ADDED Definition: “Changes in an individual’s or school’s test scores from year to year” (Wilde, 2002, p. 26).

STANDARD ERROR OF MEASUREMENT “If a single student were to take the same test repeatedly (with no new learning taking place between testings and no memory of question effects), the standard deviation of his/her repeated test scores is denoted as the standard error of measurement.” (Texas Education Agency)

GRADE LEVEL EQUIVALENTS Definition: “In the context of standardized testing, grade-level equivalents are another way of reporting norm-referenced scores; that is, how a student compares to other students in the same grade of school” (Wilde, 2002, p.29)

FALSE PASS/FALSE FAIL  The student didn’t really know the answer to the question, but still picked the correct one.  The student did know the right answer, but somehow failed to fill in the correct bubble.

CONCLUSION Let’s review!

REMEMBER: The norm-referenced test favors average difficulty and omits easy or difficult items; the criterion- referenced test matches item difficulty to the difficulty of learning tasks and does not omit easy or difficult questions. (Ornstein, 1993, p. 34)

WORDS TO LIVE BY: “Students who are struggling in school are often humiliated by the poor scores they receive on standardized tests. The scores, of course, don’t even provide any new information about these students; they just make them feel bad and worry their parents. Students need to know that what matters is their own learning, not how they compare to others or to an external standard on a test. We therefore need to avoid emphasizing tests when we talk to students; instead, treat them as a necessary evil that has little to do with the real life of the classroom. (This approach will also benefit students who test well, who sometimes don’t value growing as learners when they know they can get high test scores with little effort)” (Wilde, 2002, p. 94)