Puzzles
What is the difference between a soldier and a young girl?
2. Which can you keep after giving it to your friends?
4. Which 2 letters of alphabet have eyes?




Key
The young girl powders the face ,the soldier faces the powder.
Promise
A and B
Background in
Tests and Test Preparation
Reporter: Doan Minh Phuc
Tasks
Please give some reflection on your own test construction in your teaching.
What testing principles such as content or objective do you base your tests on?
Do you write your own test questions or do you use outside sources? If so, what are the criteria for selection?
Types of tests
Proficiency tests: TOEFL; IELTS; FCE; CAE; CPE, etc. No specific course based, general knowledge and skill based. Independent of teaching. Measure general language ability.
How many types of tests do you use?
Achievement tests: directly related to classroom teaching and learning. Content based or objective based. Final or progressive.
Types of tests
Diagnostic tests: to identify students’ strengths and weaknesses
Placement tests: to classify students according to their language ability
Approach to testing
Direct versus Indirect testing: written transcripts of word are supposed to test pronunciation
Discrete point versus integrative testing: one element at a time, item by item versus a combination of many language elements.
Approach to testing
Objective versus subjective testing:
Objective testing means no judgement is required from the scorer, the more objective the test, the more reliability the test may bring.
Communicative language testing:
Ability of partaking in communication is measured.
A.Writing vocabulary test items
Where can we select the words?
How can we choose the question types?
What is the implied skill or purpose in selecting the item?
1.Multiple-choice completion
(1) Select the words to be tested.
(2) Get the right kind of sentence to put each word in (this sentence creating the context is called the stem).
(3) Choose several wrong words to put the right word with (these wrong words are called distractors). Three distractors plus the right word are enough for a written item.
(4) Finally, prepare clear and simple instructions.
Context Preparation
With suitable words selected, our next step is to prepare contexts for them. Sometimes –especially for beginning students – more than one sentence is needed to help clarify meaning. You can prepare a two-line mini-dialog like those in the students` books to check the meaning of a word such as (paint) brush:
E.g.: "I want to paint, too!”
"All right. Use that _________ over there!`
*A. brush B. pencil C. broom D. spoon
Distractor Preparation
1. Make sure the distractors are the same form of word as the correct answer.
E.g. (A poor example)
She had to help the old man up the stairs.
A. weak B. slowly C. try D.wisdom
Distractor Preparation
2. Also be sure you don’t give away the right answer through grammatical cues. Notice the effect of the article in the following examlpe.
E.g. She needs to get up early so she’s buying
an clock.
A. time B. alarm C. watch D. bell
Distractor Preparation
3. Multiple choice items for any one question should be about the same level of difficulty, and ideally, the sentence context should not be difficult for students to read.
E.g. They needed lots of training to operate such equipment.
A. easy B. sophisticated C. blue D. wise
Distractor Preparation
4. Also be sure not to include more than one correct answer.
E.g.: She sent the _______ yesterday.
A. letter B. gift C. food D. books
Instruction Preparation
The instructions for your test should be brief; students shouldn`t have to spend a lot of time reading them. And they should be clear, anxiety can come from poorly worded questions, and resentment from misunderstood directions. Some teachers prefer to give instructions orally, but if any students come late, repeated instructions can distract those working on the exam. Keep in mind that instructions can really become a kind of "test," and oral instructions can amount to an unintended "listening test."
Instruction Preparation
If you have used multiple-choice sentence-completion exercises in class, instructions can be very short: "Circle the letter of the right answers" (or) "Circle the letter of the word that best completes each sentence!` Naturally the kind of directions given depends on your students` reading ability and how you want them to mark the test paper. Consider the following:
Read each sentence carefully. Then look at the four words below it. Choose the one that completes the sentence correctly. Put the letter of that word (A, B, C, or D) in the blank at the left.
Instruction Preparation
One final note: Instructions can be made clearer by one or two examples. They are not given for practice. They are given to show how to answer the questions. Therefore, they should be simple enough that everyone can do them without any difficulty.
E.g.: They drove to work in their new _______.
A, house B. car C. office D. street
If needed, a short explanation can follow the example: `We circle `B` because `car` is the only word that fits into the sentence."
Advantages of Multiple-Choice Completion
1. It helps students see the full meaning of words by providing natural contexts. Also, it is a good influence on instruction: It discourages word-list memorization.
2. Scoring is easy and consistent.
3. It is a sensitive measure of achievement.
Limitations of Multiple-Choice Completion
1. It is rather difficult to prepare good sentence contexts that clearly show the meaning of the word being tested.
2. It is easy for students to cheat by copying what others have circled.
2.Word formation
Word-formation items require students to
fill in missing parts of words that appear in sentences. These missing parts are usually prefixes and suffixes-for example, the un- in untie or the -ful in thankful. A related task is to use words like the following in a sentence and have students supply missing syllables of any kind, such as the rel- in relative or the -ate in deliberate. We can see, then, that there is a different emphasis in simple-completion tests than in those we have just looked at. Context is still useful, but the emphasis is on word building. Moreover, this is a test of active not passive skills.
Word formation
The steps of words formation: (No distractors)
(1) List the prefixes and suffixes that you have taught to your students. Then match these with content words that they have studied (including even their passive vocabulary).
(2) Prepare sentences that clarify the meaning of these words.
(3) Then write your instructions and examples. If the test is quite important, try it out ahead of time. You can have other teachers take it, or possibly native English speakers. Then revise it and use it in your class.
Word formation
One of the very popular vocabulary test type is stem-first produce. An advantage of this type is that many words need spelling changes when suffixes are added. Following is an example:

She has a beautiful new dress. (BEAUTY)
Word formation
Advantages
1. It reflects teaching approaches.
2. It is generally faster and easier to construct than are items with distractors.
Limitations
1. Fewer words can be tested this way than with multiple choice.
2. There is some difficulty in avoiding ambiguous contexts.

- The end -
Tasks
Work in groups of 2 to 3 to complete the tasks. Refer to the material if needed.
1. The following sentences contain examples of distractor difficulties. Identify the weakness in each item. Then correct it.
a. Do you need some to write on?
A. paper B. pen C. table D. material
b. The mouse quickly away.
A. very B. little C. baby D. ran
c. I think he’ll be here in an .
A. hour B. day after tomorrow C. weekend D. soon
d. They me to get up right away.
A. asked B. needed C. told D. wanted
e. Choose the odd one out.
A. pleased B. nervous C. study D. interesting

a. For each word write a sentence context that reflects the meaning of the word as clearly as possible.
b. Prepare three good distractors for each test item.
c. Write simple, clear instructions, and include an example.
2. Prepare five test items from words in your students` text, or use the following vocabulary words: truth/weekend/secret/ridiculous/perfume.
1. When you write your check, make it _______ to my sister.
2. Please wipe your _________ hands on that cloth.
3. The police arrested him for _________ the riot.
4. The __________ of the volcano destroyed several villages.
5. The boy didn`t __________ his shoelaces before taking off his shoes.
3. First, supply a word with a prefix or suffix for each blank in the following sentences. Then prepare word completion items.
Example: It was a most ________ mistake.
(Answer: deplorable/regrettable/ inexcusable, etc.)
(It was a most deplor ________ mistake)
Wh- question Making
In 3 minutes, write as many Wh-questions with the only answer: ‘Bananas’ for all your questions as you can.
E.g. A: What’s your favorite fruit?
B: Bananas.