Test and their Uses in

Educational Assessment
 The most important aspect of student
evaluation in most classrooms involves
the test teachers make and administer to
their students. Teacher, therefore , need
to understand the different types of test
and their uses in the assessment and
evaluation of students’ learning.
Test – a systematic procedure for measuring an
individual’s behavior. This implies that is has
to be developed following specific guidelines.
It is a formal and systematic way of gathering
information about the learners’ behavior,
usually through paper-and-pencil procedure.
 Uses of Test
1. School administrator utilize test result for
making decisions regarding the promotion or
retention of students; improvement or
enrichment of the curriculum and conduct of
staff development programs for teachers.
Through the test results, school administrators
can also have a clear picture of the extent to
which the objectives of the school’s
instructional program is achieved.
2. Supervisor use test results in discovering
learning areas needing special attention and
identifying teachers’ weaknesses and
learning competencies not mastered by the
students.
3. Teachers, utilize tests to gather information
about the effectiveness of instruction, give
feedback to students about their progress and
assign grades.
4. Parents determine how well their sons and
daughters are performing in school and how
well the school is doing its share in educating
their children.
 Types of Tests
Mode of response:
1. Oral test –
2. Written test
3. Performance test
Ease of quantification of response:
1. Objective test

2. Subjective test
As mode of administration

1. Individual test

2. Group test
As to test constructor
1. Standardized test – test prepared by an
expert or specialist
2. Unstandardized test – test prepared by
teachers for use in the classroom, with no
established norm s of scoring and
interpretation of results.
As mode of interpreting results
1. Norm-referenced test – test that evaluates a
student’s performance by comparing it to the
performance of a group of students on the
same test.
2. Criterion-referenced test- test that measures
a student’s performance against an agreed
upon or pre-established level of
performance.
As to the nature of the answer
1. Personality test – test designed for assessing
some aspects of an individual’s personality.
Some area test in this kind of test include the
following: emotional and social adjustment,
dominance and submission, value
orientation, disposition, emotional stability,
frustration level…
2. Intelligence test - test that measures the
mental ability of an individual.
3. Aptitude test – test designed for the purpose
of predicting the likelihood of an individual’s
success in a learning area or field of
endeavor.
4. Achievement test – test given to students to
determine what a student has learned from
formal instruction in school.
5. Summative test – test given at the end of
instruction to determine students’ learning
and assign grades.
6. Diagnostic test – test administered to
students to identify their specific strengths
an weaknesses in past and present learning.
7. Formative test – test given to improve
teaching and learning while it is going on. A
test given after teaching the lesson for the
day is example of this type of test.
8. Socio –metric test – test used in discovering
learners’ likes and dislikes, preferences and
their social acceptance, as well as social
relationship existing in a group.
9. Trade test – test designed to measure an
individual’s skill or competence in an
occupation or vocation.