Developing Great Social Studies Test Items Nancy Hester, RESC XIII

You should attempt to write these types of items to include on every test: Lower Level Easy (LLE) Lower Level Difficult (LLD) Higher Level Easy (HLE) Higher Level Difficult (HLD)

United States History - LLE The policy of acquiring colonies and building empires is known as: A. Isolationism B. Industrialism C. Anti-colonialism D. Imperialism

United States History - LLD Which of the following would describe the foreign policy of the U.S. immediately after the Spanish-American War? A. Imperialism B. Isolationism C. Militarism D. Socialism

United States History - HLE Which of the following actions by the U.S. Government would have been endorsed by imperialists? A. Building the Panama Canal B. Granting independence to the Philippine Islands C. Passing low protective tariffs D. Reducing military forces

United States History - HLD Imperialism : ________ :: Isolationism : ________ A. Spanish-American War Period – 1920’s B. Gilded Age – WWI Period C. Spanish-American War – WWI Period D. Gilded Age – 1920’s

Plan Your Test 70 % Easy to Medium 30% Difficult 50% Lower-Level Content 50% Higher-Level Content

Test Specification Chart Content Obj.LLELLDHLEHLD 1//// 2 3/

Examples of Higher Level Stems Which is an example of….. Who would most likely have written (asked, said…) followed by a quote Analogies Fill in the missing part of this graphic organizer Sequencing by Roman numeral Who would have been helped by (law, invention, organization, reform)

Test Item Development Direct word associations in the stem and distracter Indirect word associations in the stem and distracter True, but doesn’t fit the time period or specified geographic area True, but not true in this case – doesn’t answer this particular question Am I teaching and assessing in my classroom at the same level that is expected in the TEKS?

Distracters Never make a distracter a throw-away If you use ALL, none, or except, do not capitalize, italicize or use bold face. Make all distracters parallel (verb phrases, nouns, proper nouns, etc.) Do not let one distracter stick out farther than others Do not repeat the same verbiage at the beginning of distracters. (They all had….They all had….)

Distracters Be sure if you are asking for a generalization all of the distracters are, in fact, generalizations and not simple inferences or main ideas. This is true of all of the skills to be tested. Be sure there is not more than one plausible answer. Avoid “Best Answer”

Distracters

Skills Prompts Cause/Effect Why did/would….? If you removed…..? Infer/Conclude The manufacturers must have….. Summarize Which best describes…..?

Skills Prompts What do you see? What does it mean? SeeMean

Skills Prompts Low-Level Map Skills Direction Key Location Identification of Physical Feature High-Level Map Skills Cause/Effect - Impact of above on lifestyle, work, climate, war, commerce, culture

Skills Prompts High-Level Map Skills, cont’d. Develop general conclusions supported by details from the map (You can tell by looking at this map that it must be [place] because…… Main Ideas/Summaries – break maps into parts; Describe and infer about each part…

Skills Prompts Graphs, Charts and Data Simple to complex Comparisons (more, less, most, least) Conclusions/Generalizations (based on the data, you can tell that) Predict from trends (line graphs) Main Idea/Inference – What do you think this graph is about?

Skill Prompts Graphs, Charts, and Data, continued…. Make justified decisions based on data (I would prefer to open a business in [place] because….) Connect cause/effect to trends or phenomena shown Transfer information from one form to another (chart to graph)

Study Item Types Study samples of items to get ideas. Include Prompts Graphic Organizers Readings Direct Content Questions Do not try to use one type of item over and over. Vary the stems.

Sources: Jan Moberly, Director of Curriculum and Instruction, Region 10 ESC Kosovo War Crimes – National Archives and Records Administration – Library of Congress American Memories – Texas A & M University Department of Education Empowerment Zone – l?id=16 l?id=16