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Occasionally, inquiries about scoring
multiple choice tests begin with the more basic question:
"Can you suggest some references that provide advice
on construction of multiple choice tests?" There
are many such textbooks including the following:
- Haladyna, Thomas M. Developing and Validating
Multiple-Choice Test Items. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence
Erlbaum Associates, 1994.
-
Haladyna, Thomas M. Writing Test Items to Evaluate Higher Order Thinking. Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon, 1997.
-
Jacobs, Lucy Cheser & Chase, Clinton
I. Developing and Using Tests Effectively: a
Guide for Faculty. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass
Inc., 1992.
Osterlind, Steven J. Constructing
Test Items. 2nd ed. Boston: Kluwer Academic
Publishers, 1998.
See also:
Two generalized programs are available
for scoring teacher-developed multiple choice tests.
Each of these programs may be used to score tests when
the students' responses have been recorded on one of
the three types of General Purpose
Answer Sheets that are stocked on campus.
GPSCOR
is used for scoring tests when students are expected
to respond with only one answer per question. This is
the preferred method for which the OMR machines were
designed and, thus, for which the reading of responses
is most accurate. In order to score a test, you must
supply a key sheet which is simply one of the above
General Purpose Answer Sheets on which is marked the
correct answer for each question that is to be scored.
It is helpful if you write 'KEY' on this sheet so that
the operators can easily identify which sheet should
be used as the key sheet.
GPSCOR provides a number of scoring options:
- Up to 8 key sheets may be used to generate scores,
or sub-scale scores, on various sets of items in
the test. Scores may be computed as the sum of the
number of correct answers or the sum of the number
of incorrect answers. Incorrect answers are only
counted for those items having a correct answer
indicated on the key. The absence of a response
to an item is not counted as an incorrect answer.
- The scores from the above keys may be combined
into as many as 6 different composite totals. Each
score may be weighted by an integer between 0 and
9 before accumulating it to the composite total.
- This allows one, for example, to obtain a
total score that is the sum of the score on
one key plus double the score on a second key.
- It also provides a way of allowing several
possible correct answers on a particular item
(provided that the student only gives one answer).
In this situation, the first key sheet could
contain the first correct answer to all the
items while a second key sheet could contain
only the 'second-choice' correct answers to
those items that require that provision.
- Scores may be computed from as many as 4 key sheets
using formula scoring (often called correction for
guessing). The formula used is R - W/d where
- R is the sum of the correct responses
- W is the sum of the incorrect responses (omits
are not counted)
- d is the number of response alternatives minus
1.
Please refer to the instructions for completing
the Optical Mark Reader Request for Service Form for
further information about GPSCOR.
MRSCOR
is provided for situations where students are allowed
or expected to respond with more than one answer per
question.
MRSCOR also provides a variety of scoring
options (in all cases, only a single key sheet is used):
- Scores may be computed by only focusing on the
responses that the student made. In this case, the
number of correct responses is counted, the number
of incorrect answers is counted and a final score
is reported which would normally be R - W but the
option is provided to apply a weight other than
one to either R or W. The total, unweighted, score
possible in this case is equal to the number of
answers marked on the key sheet. Note that this
means that the possible score for a question depends
on the number of responses marked for that question
on the key.
- Scores may also be computed by summing the number
of correct behaviors performed by the student, i.e.,
summing both the number of times that a correct
answer is marked and the number of times a choice
is correctly left blank. The total, unweighted,
score possible in this case is equal to the number
of questions on the test multiplied by the question
length (the number of response choices) of each
question.
- A third alternative is a two step process. After
using the second option (above), a program can be
run that converts the output file into a GPSCOR
file. In the conversion process, complete questions
are marked right or wrong depending on whether or
not the complete pattern of responses and omits
matches the key that has been provided. In this
case, the total score possible is equal to the number
of questions on the test.
Please refer to the instructions for completing
the Optical Mark Reader Request for Service Form for
further information about MRSCOR.
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