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Book reviews
© 2008 SAGE Publications (Los Angeles, London, New Delhi and Singapore) DOI: 10.1177/0265532207086784
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craft of designing items. These chapters can be seen as the heart of the
book, and instructors will want to spend considerable time reviewing
the types of items presented and guiding students through item writ-
ing practice sessions. Readers will find the example items quite help-
ful, especially the multiple picture-description and picture-cue tasks,
which can be used as guides in finding or designing other picture-
based prompts for oral or written test tasks at multiple levels, and
which are very beneficial as a testing task for more visual learners.
Chapter 10 is an example of H. D. Brown’s commitment to treat-
ing standardized testing issues and alternatives in assessment equally
and objectively. Here he explains the history of ‘alternative’ assess-
ment. This history involves a discussion on how standardized tests
have shortcomings and that other options (portfolios, journals, obser-
vations, self-assessments, peer-assessments) hold more ‘ethical
potential’. The chapter goes on to explain the pros and cons of vari-
ous types of alternatives in assessment with helpful comparisons
between large-scale standardized tests and portfolios, journals, and
conferences. Another useful topic in this chapter is a discussion of
performance-based assessment. H. D. Brown continues with benefits
and guidelines for using portfolios, journals, conferences/interviews,
observations, and self-/peer-assessments. There is also a nice com-
parison table (Table 10.1, p. 278) of all the above assessment forms
at the end of the chapter that rates each form of assessment accord-
ing to the principles of practicality, reliability, face validity, content
validity, washback, and authenticity.
Chapter 11 is enlightening for its frank discussion of the impact
grades have on students’ lives and for its treatment and attention to
the topic of assigning grades, which is often a central issue of concern
for new teachers. There are sections referring to guidelines for select-
ing grading criteria, a discussion of absolute versus relative grading,
teachers’ perceptions of appropriate grade distributions, institutional
expectations and constraints, the question of difficulty from a cross-
cultural perspective, and the eternal question: what do letter grades
mean? This chapter is a useful reference for new teachers as they
design their first syllabus and form their grading philosophies.
Another excellent feature of chapter 11 is its reference to the
issues covered by the National Center for Fair and Open Testing, also
known as Fairtest, a non-profit watchdog of large-scale, standardized
tests in the USA. Knowledge of the goals of this organization and
knowing how to interpret and use the information stemming from it
will be of particular benefit to US-based MA TESOL students long
after they graduate. On the other hand, since Fairtest is a US-based
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level, yet armed with a spreadsheet program such as Excel, can work
through J. D. Brown’s book and teach him or herself the basics in
test statistics, such as (in chapter 4) calculating item facility (IF) and
item discrimination (ID), calculating an item’s difference index
(with pre- and posttesting) (DI) or calculating an item’s B-index.
J. D. Brown takes pains to provide screen shots of an Excel spreadsheet
showing how data can be organized for these statistical analyses, and
describes in detail each and every step, from how to open Excel and
how to enter data, to how to find and use formulas in Excel to auto-
matically calculate IF and ID, so that readers cannot get lost and, at
the end of the chapter, can calculate the statistics explained and
understand what they mean.
Chapters 5 and 6 discuss test results and explain descriptive stat-
istics associated with the interpretation of test results. In addition,
J. D. Brown refers to large-scale tests, such as the SAT, GRE and
TOEFL to help explain standardized scores, thus giving theoretical
points a very concrete reference point.
Chapters 7, 8, 9, and 10 respectively outline the book’s strongest
point in a review of statistical procedures for demonstrating a test’s
(a) correlation with other variables, (b) reliability, (c) dependability,
and (d) validity. These four chapters are the core of the book in that each
chapter explains not only important test theories and their constructs,
but also ways to quantitatively measure these important constructs.
J. D. Brown spends considerable time addressing the different test sta-
tistics not just from a mathematical perspective (all formulas are
presented in nicely contained boxes), but also from theoretical and
practical perspectives. Again, as in chapter 4, the statistics themselves
are taught to the reader through clear examples, screen shots of actual
data sheets, and step-by-step instructions on how to do the calculations
using formulas in Excel. J. D. Brown also teaches readers how to use
Excel’s Chart Wizard, and shows which charts best present data from
which types of statistical analyses. For example, in chapter 7, J. D.
Brown (a) explains what a Pearson product–moment correlation co-
efficient theoretically can do, (b) explains what to do with missing data,
(c) provides the formula for calculating the Pearson product–moment
correlation coefficient with a key to all mathematical symbols used in
the formula, and (d) provides a screen shot of what data should look
like in Excel prior to calculation. Assumptions of the coefficient are
discussed, diverse scatterplots showing positive and negative correla-
tion coefficients are explained, and finally, following J. D. Brown’s
detailed directions, readers use sample data in Excel to calculate the
Pearson correlation coefficient and create a scatterplot.
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References
ACTFL. (2006). Standards for foreign language learning in the 21st century
(3rd ed.). Lawrence, KS: Allen Press.
Bachman, L. F. (2000). Modern language testing at the turn of the century:
Assuring that what we count counts. Language Testing, 17(1), 1–42.
Davies, A. (1997). Demands of being professional in language testing.
Language Testing, 14, 328–339.
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