Cambium Test Assessment Design 5 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Which of the following is the BEST example of a performance-based assessment?
- A 50-item multiple-choice science test
- A student demonstrating a laboratory experiment (Correct answer)
- A fill-in-the-blank vocabulary quiz
- A true/false reading comprehension check
Correct answer: A student demonstrating a laboratory experiment
Performance-based assessments require students to demonstrate skills or knowledge through real-world tasks rather than selecting responses.
Question 2: A test blueprint specifies that 40% of items should address higher-order thinking skills. This reflects which aspect of assessment design?
- Item banking
- Cognitive complexity weighting (Correct answer)
- Standard error of measurement
- Passage dependency
Correct answer: Cognitive complexity weighting
Cognitive complexity weighting in a test blueprint determines what proportion of items target each level of thinking, such as recall versus analysis.
Question 3: Which of the following BEST describes the purpose of a cut score in an assessment?
- To identify the average score of the norm group
- To determine the minimum score required to pass or be classified at a performance level (Correct answer)
- To measure the spread of scores in a distribution
- To calculate the correlation between two test forms
Correct answer: To determine the minimum score required to pass or be classified at a performance level
A cut score is a threshold score used to classify examinees into categories such as pass/fail or performance levels like Basic, Proficient, and Advanced.
Question 4: Which method is MOST commonly used to establish inter-rater reliability for constructed-response items?
- Test-retest correlation
- Coefficient alpha
- Cohen's kappa or percentage agreement between scorers (Correct answer)
- Split-half reliability
Correct answer: Cohen's kappa or percentage agreement between scorers
Cohen's kappa and percentage agreement are standard statistics for measuring the degree to which two or more raters assign the same scores.
Question 5: In Item Response Theory (IRT), the discrimination parameter (a) indicates:
- The probability that a low-ability student guesses correctly
- How well an item differentiates between high and low ability examinees (Correct answer)
- The difficulty level of the item
- The number of answer choices in the item
Correct answer: How well an item differentiates between high and low ability examinees
The discrimination parameter reflects how steeply an item's item characteristic curve rises, indicating how well it separates higher- from lower-ability examinees.
Question 6: Which scenario represents a threat to the internal validity of an assessment program?
- Using multiple test forms with different items
- Students receiving coaching on specific test content before administration (Correct answer)
- Administering the test under standardized conditions
- Reporting scores as scaled scores
Correct answer: Students receiving coaching on specific test content before administration
When students receive coaching specific to test content, scores may reflect familiarity with test material rather than the intended construct, threatening validity.
Question 7: An assessment designed to diagnose specific learning gaps before instruction begins is called a:
- Summative assessment
- Benchmark assessment
- Diagnostic pre-assessment (Correct answer)
- Norm-referenced test
Correct answer: Diagnostic pre-assessment
Diagnostic pre-assessments identify individual students' strengths and gaps before instruction so teachers can tailor their approach accordingly.
Cambium Test Assessment Design 5
Which of the following is the BEST example of a performance-based assessment?