Grades are the figurative representations of students' scholastic performances. They show how bright/dull or active/inactive a student is in a specific period of time. Unfortunately, fifty percent of grades are taken from written examinations. This is why students have to write more and speak less to acquire higher grades.
Teachers aim to collect valid and reliable results from examinations. This means that they have to do everything to make their examinations standard enough to gauge or measure what has to be measured -- understanding.
Aside from psychological factors that may lessen the validity or reliability of an examination, there are also physical factors -- physical factors in the students' part and physical factors of the examination paper itself.
Arrangement of test items, color of the exam paper, font and font size used in the paper, font spaces used and many physical factors may affect the test's validity and reliability.
Here are some guidelines in arranging test items.
1. Should be arranged categorically
It would be really hard for a student if the test items are randomly categorized. This could scrabble ideas in the students' minds.
This is why it has been practiced by many students that the examination is divided into tests. Test one will focus on a specific category (say, multiple-choice), test two on another and so on.
2. ARRANGE items logically
Test items should be logically arranged. One of the most common logical arrangement is, of course, in numerical order. Others say that test items should also be arranged in a way that the first items are easier than the succeeding items. They say this in light of Edward Thorndike's Law of Effect.
3. SELECTION before supply
Examples of selection-type test-category are multiple-choice, matching type and other examples where students only have to choose the best answer. Examples of supply-type test-category are those which require students to identify or fill out blanks.
Psychologists say that selection-type test-categories are easier than supply-type because it gives students choices. This is, as I've mentioned a while ago, in light of E. Thorndike's Law of Effect. Students must first feel ease in answering so that they will not be demotivated.
4. SHORT items before essay
Essay-categories require more time and they require more thinking, sometimes. This means that short items should go before. This will give students more time to think.
5. SPECIFY and make clear the directions.
Most of the time, students fail examinations because of vague questions and directions. Wrong questions lead to wrong answers and wrong directions lead to wrong executions.
Teachers must be very careful in making clear the directions.
6. AVOID cramming items too closely to each other.
Not only that very closely crammed test items cost the face validity of an examination, they also lessen the students' ability to focus on the exam. It would be hard for them to read the questions and it would risk their understanding.
One last thing: teachers are facilitators of assessment and learning. Therefore: teachers must make things easier for students if possible.
7. AVOID splitting test items across two pages.
I personally loathe this when I was in high school. I hate it when the question for a multiple-choice item is in the first page and the choices are in the next page. It causes me to lose my concentration.
One thing that the teacher should avoid is for the students to lose concentration.
8. NUMBER items consecutively.
There is no way you could write 1, 4, 6, 8, 9 2, 5... for you test items. And, what the hell is that for, anyway!? It would be very confusing for the students.
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