ABSTRACT
Very few instructors working in higher education-and, for that matter, instructors working at any level of education-receive much, if any, formal training in the construction of classroom tests and their uses. This training, if it were provided, might include topics such as the development of test plans (e.g., the content emphases, test length), sometimes called “test specifications,” preparation of various types of test items such as multiple-choice, true-false, short answer questions, and extended answer questions (sometimes called “constructed response items”); item analyses; test scoring; grading; and the evaluation of tests including the investigation of their test score reliability and validity (see, for example, Gronlund & Waugh, 2009). This lack of test development training is unfortunate because achievement tests for assessing student knowledge of test content are common in higher education and as a result these tests all too often fall short of the technical requirements that are needed to ensure that the scores produced by these tests demonstrate the properties of test score reliability and validity.
