Educational Psychology

11. Teacher-made assessment strategies

answer and so there is no variability in scoring but unless the question is phrased very carefully, there are
frequently a variety of correct answers. For example, consider the item

Where was President Lincoln born?....................
The teacher may expect the answer “in a log cabin” but other correct answers are also “on Sinking Spring Farm”,
“in Hardin County” or “in Kentucky”. Common errors in these items are summarized in Table 38.

Table 38: Common errors in constructed response items

Type of item Common errors Example

Completion

and short answer

There is more than one

possible answer.

e.g. Where was US President Lincoln born? The answer could

be in a log cabin, in Kentucky etc.

Too many blanks are in

the completion item so it is

too difficult or doesn’t

make sense.

e.g. In ..... theory, the first stage, ...... is when infants process

through their ....... and ..... .........

Clues are given by

length of blanks in

completion items.

e.g. Three states are contiguous to New Hampshire:. ....is to

the West, ......is to the East and ............... is to the South.

Extended

Response

Ambiguous questions e.g. Was the US Civil War avoidable?

Students could interpret this question in a wide variety of

ways, perhaps even stating “yes” or “no”. One student may

discuss only political causes another moral, political and

economic causes. There is no guidance in the question for

students.

Poor reliability in

grading

The teacher does not use a scoring rubric and so is

inconsistent in how he scores answers especially unexpected

responses, irrelevant information, and grammatical errors.

Perception of student

influences grading

By spring semester the teacher has developed expectations of

each student’s performance and this influences the grading

(numbers can be used instead of names).

The test consists of three constructed responses and the

teacher grades the three answers on each students’ paper before

moving to the next paper. This means that the grading of

questions 2 and 3 are influenced by the answers to question 1

(teachers should grade all the 1st question then the 2nd etc).

Choices are given on Testing experts recommend not giving choices in tests

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