1. DESIGNING CLASSROOM TESTS (Continued)
TSL3112 LANGUAGE ASSESSMENT
PISMP TESL SEMESTER 6
IPGKDRI

2. GUIDELINES FOR CONSTRUCTING TEST ITEMS
TEST SPECIFICATION GUIDELINES:
Aims of the test
Range of topics to be tested
Range of skills to be tested
Decide on test formats for each skill
Types of test items
Number of items by topic, skill and types
Level of difficulty of test items
Allocation of marks

3. Decide on test formats for each skill:
Elicitation and response modes in test construction
Elicitation mode:
Oral (student listens)
Written (student writes)
administration directions;
sentence(s), question;
word, pair of words;
monologue, speech;
prerecorded conversation;
interactive (live) dialogue.
word, set of words;
Paragraph;
essay, excerpt;
short story, book.

4. Decide on test formats for each skill:
Elicitation and response modes in test construction
Response mode:
Oral
Written
repeat;
read aloud;
yes / no;
short response;
describe;
role play;
monologue (speech);
interactive dialogue).
mark multiple-choice option;
fill in the blank;
spell a word;
define a term (with a phrase);
short answer (2 to 3 sentences);
essay.

5. Types of test items:
Select the item type that provides the most direct measure of the intended learning outcome (Linn &Miller, 2005).
For example – if the intended learning outcome is writing, naming, listing, or speaking, the task should require the students to supply the answer.
In cases where the learning outcome does not make clear which item type to use, selection-type items would be favoured because of the greater control over the student’s response and the objectivity of the scoring.

6. The objective test item:
Types of test items:
The objective test item:
the great variety of different type of objective test items can be classified into those that require the student to supply the answer and those that require the student to select the answer from a given number of alternatives.

7. Types of test items: Supply types: Selection types: short-answer items
completion
Selection types:
multiple-choice items
true-false items
matching items

8. Types of test items:
Designing multiple-choice items: