Monday, June 11, 2012

Norm-Referenced And Criterion-Referenced

Norm-Referenced And Criterion-Referenced

In our textbook, Educational Testing & Measurement: Classroom Application and Practice, chapter 5 discusses two very different types of testing assessments, and these different styles of tests both allow educators to obtain information necessary for determining score levels and comprehension levels of students. The first type of test is called a norm-referenced test, and it is used to determine the intellectual capacity of an individual by gauging comprehension skills of students in comparison to other similar students, ultimately determining certain ranks or placements for students among their peers with parallel attributes. Norm-Referenced test compare students performances to a certain standard of performance, or norm, set forth by averaging the presentation of several other students. This norm-referenced test also places students amongst other students with corresponding learning abilities, and the status placement is centered around variety of performance skills that is guided by an average. However, with norm-referenced tests, the results are of limited use in academic decisions and grade placements. The second type of test is called a criterion-referenced test, and it is more inclusive and revolves around concrete standards set forth by a pre-determined curriculum. The criterion-referenced test is measured comparing a students performance to a defined mastery of specific materials, or set of courses, pre-determined by standard skill requirements of different academics. With the criterion-referenced test, the level of proficiency of a student can be defined or monitored, and through this type of testing, adjustments can be determined to help assist students in areas where they may be struggling with comprehension. The importance of data relevance sheds necessities for these types of tests, and the data or material must be relevant to goal outcomes or they can become useless in considering criterion or making decisions for students.

During my creative writing courses in my undergrad at the University of Iowa, I experience a lot of norm-referenced tests. For example, during an advanced non-fiction writing course, most of our assignments were scored through involvement of classroom workshops and critiques, where as a class we would each right a rather long formal story of our choice, and each week one of the students paper would the focus. Together as a class, we would analyze, criticize, critique, edit, evaluate, and correspond all the elements of the essays to a general idea of a customary standard, that we all were working towards as individuals and as blooming writers, but is was based around standards that had no specific concrete meaning, and the typical requirements where more elusive and indefinable. Over the course, we would each write several stories, and workshop most of these, and a final grade would be determined by our involvement and sincerity as a working classroom unit, where we were all equal as writers, editors, analyzers, and evaluators. For me, as an artistic individual, with aspirations to write literature and music, these type of tests seemed to suite me very well, and they helped to compliment my flaws and better my strengths as a developing writer, and they ultimately allowed me to grow as a creator, a writer, and a person. Being able to engage my writing intimacies with other writers and dreamers, with similar aspirations, provided me with enormous opportunities and confidences to develop as a creative writer and as an evolving scholar. A lot of these courses, I had to opportunity to endeavor, such as poetry writing, creative writing, fiction writing, non fiction writing, prose writing, diction writing, and many others, all contributed strings towards the weave of my artistic tapestry that I continue to weave together and evolve up to this day, and up to even to this very class as I sit here writing. Without these types of structures, I would never have been able envision the tapestry of my life as it was suppose to be, and I would have never evolved to cherish and relish the beauty of majestic mystery of the creative arts.

During my undergrad, I was also required to take several classical mythology and pre-medieval literature courses. And during many of these courses, I experiences several series of criterion-referenced test. One specific example that comes to my mind, before so many other courses, was a classical mythology course, where the materials include one large textbook, about 600 pages, and several other smaller books compiled of stories and poems from the ages. And with all the reading involved with the course, the tests that came at midterm and finals, where bubble sheet, multiple choice, rigid and timed assessments. I remember, the lengthy, multiple choice bubble sheet tests, where tricky, wordy, confusing, rigid, and dreadful. I would prepare with flashcards of all the many names of gods, demigods, humans, animals, and many other creatures that were all part of the long history of classical stories. I would read and reread the different sagas and stories, and even devour them with curiosity and naïveté, and all along remained thoroughly mesmerized and enchanted. However, when it came time for those strictly timed tests, I would always falter and never achieve the scores I had work so hard to achieve. Whether it was due to intimidation of the unalterable timing elements, or from not being able to chose correctly from the trickster types of different answers to chose from, ultimately, no matter how much I prepared, I could never excel to the top, and I could never boost my grade point average because of these types of tests. These types of assessments left me with many layers of frustrations, apprehensions, doubts, and resentments. In addition, having to force so much information into my brain for such a short allotment of time, never really allowed me to store specific data in my long term memory. I found the criterion-referenced tests for these courses discouraging and meticulous. Ultimately, I made it through it all, and I really do still love medieval literature and classic mythology literature, but when I think of the dreads and stress levels that I endured, it really makes me question the methods of our education system and the intentions of the strictness of certain types of assessments.

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