Basilio, Shara Marie B.

1. What is the importance of Item Analysis?

2. How will you select the appropriate scaling method in the test construction?
3. What is the purpose of having a table of specification?
4. What is the importance of the following item analysis:
a. Difficulty index
b. Discriminatory index
c. Item validity index
d. Item reliability index
e. Item characteristic curve
ANSWERS:
1. Importance of item Analysis:
Item represents the test. All the things of a test depend on items. The importance of item analysis is
given below:
There can be little doubt that item analysis is a vitally important operation in the development of a
new test and one that should invariably be carried out unless special circumstances.
Both the validity and reliability of any test depend ultimately on the characteristics of its items. High
reliability and validity can be built into a test in advance through item analysis.
Tests can be improved through the selection, substitution or revision of items.
Item analysis makes it possible to shorten a test and at the same time to increase its validity and
reliability.
2. The importance of a test achieving a reasonable level of reliability and validity cannot be
overemphasized. To the extent a test lacks reliability, the meaning of individual scores is ambiguous.
A score of 80, say, may be no different than a score of 70 or 90 in terms of what a student knows, as
measured by the test. If a test is not reliable, it is not valid.
3. The importance of a Table of Specifications is to identify the achievement domains being measured
and to ensure that a fair and representative sample of questions appear on the test. Teachers cannot
measure every topic or objective and cannot ask every question they might wish to ask. A Table of
Specifications allows the teacher to construct a test which focuses on the key areas and weights those
different areas based on their importance. A Table of Specifications provides the teacher with
evidence that a test has content validity, that it covers what should be covered. A Table of
Specifications benefits students in two ways. First, it improves the validity of teacher-made tests.
Second, it can improve student learning as well.
4. a. Difficulty index is a useful tool for identifying items that should be altered and discarded.
b. Discriminatory index is used to determine whether the examinees have done well on particular
items and have also done well on the whole test.
c. Reliability of a Test
Despite differences between the format and construction of various tests, there are two standards
by which tests (as compared to items) are assessed. These two standards are reliability and validity.

Reliability refers to the consistency of test scores; how consistent a particular student’s test scores
are from one testing to another. In theory, if test A is administered to Class X, and one week later is
administered again to the same class, individual scores should be about the same both times
(assuming unchanging conditions for both sessions, including familiarity with the test). If the
students received radically different scores the second time, the test would have low reliability.
Seldom, however, does a teacher administer a test to the same students more than once, so the
reliability coefficient must be calculated a different way. Conceptually, this is done by dividing a
homogeneous test into two parts (usually even and odd items) and treating them as two tests
administered at one sitting. The calculation of the reliability coefficient, in effect, compares all
possible halves of the test to all other possible halves.
d. Validity of a Test
Content or curricular validity is generally used to assess whether a classroom test is measuring what
it is supposed to measure. For example, a test is said to have content validity if it closely parallels the
material which has been taught and the thinking skills that have been important in the course.
 Whereas reliability is expressed as a quantitative measure (e.g., .87 reliability), content validity is
obtained through a rational or logical analysis of the test. That is, one logically compares the test
content with the course content and determines how well the former represents the latter.

f. Item Characteristic curve Graphical display of the relationship between the probability of a
correct response and the examinee's position on the underlying trait (criterion) measured by the test;
test scores represent the underlying traits; most common is the Rasch Model; a good item has a
positive slope; a normal distribution has a Normal Ogive (normal distribution in cumulative form);
based on Latent Trait Theory; (item (a) is preferred)