A Survey of Issues and Item Writing in Language Testing

This paper traces developments in educational psychology and measurement that led to the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) and the test of English for International Communication (TOEIC) and the application of educational measurement terms such as validity and reliability to testing. Use of a table of specifications for planning language tests, procedures for obtaining greater interand intra-rater reliability on composition tests are noted. An overview is given of recent criticisms of language testing in Japan. Considerations for item writing are examined briefly, and the major item types in language testing are described and discussed, including multiple choice (in reading and listening), matching (reading), a variety of cloze procedures (reading and grammar), scanning (reading), paraphrasing (reading and grammar), information transfer (reading and writing), editing, guided paragraph writing, paragraphs and essays, question and response (listening and speaking), paraphrase (listening), short talks (listening), and using a table (listening). Some simple statistical procedures for determining item difficulty and for discriminating top-scorirg and low-scoring students are also offered. Contains 30 references.