Guidelines for Item Banks

8/3/2019 Guidelines for Item Banks

1/6

ITEMS e Instructional Topics in Educational hdeasurement

An NCME Instructional Module on

Guidelines for the Developmentof Item BanksAnnie W. WardThe Techn Group, Inc.Mildred Murray-WardCalrornia Lutheran University and The Techn Group, Inc.

Use of item banking technology can provide muc h relief for the choresassociated with preparing assessments; it muy also enhunce the quaiit yof the items and improve the quality o f the assessments. Item ban kingprograms pmvide for item entry and stomge, ite m retrieval and testcreation, and maintename of the item history. Some programs alsoprovide companion progmms for scoring, a d y s i s , and reporting.There are many item banking programs that muy be purchased orleased, and there are banks of items available forpurchase. Thi s modu leis designed to help those who develop assessments of any kind tounderstand the pm es s of item banking, to ad y z e their needs, and to/nd or develop programs and m u t e d s hat meet those needs. It shouldbe useful to teachers at al1 levels of education and to school-district testdirectors who are responsible for developing district-wide tests. It muy&o provide some useful in fonn ntion for those who are responsible forlarge-scale assessmentprograms of al1 types.An item bank is a collection of test items th at may be easilyaccessed for use in preparing examinations. Use of an itembank and of good item banking software is a solution to the

effort and expense of preparing new items for each administra-tion of an assessment, w hethe r th e test is used by a teache r of asmall class; a university l ed ur er who has several large sections;or the director of multifaceted programs for certification,licensing, accountability, or norm-reference d survey testing.When care is taken to see th at al1 items a re initially of highquality, and when the items a re easily retrievable for editing

l l Annie W. Ward is P resident of The Techn Group, Znc., 2800North Atlantic Avenue, Suite 1408, Daytona Beach, FL 32118. Herspecializations are psychometrics, research and evaluation, andI I counseling.Mildred Murray-Ward is an Associate Professor at CaliforniaLuthem n Universitv. Her address is 961 Rivera Street, Simi Va llw. 1 1I I CA 93065. Her spehzlizationsare research and evalu tion, psych:metrics, and elementary educat ion. 1 1l Series Informa tionITEMS is a series of units designed to facilitat. instruction ineducationai measurement. These units are published by the Na-tionai Council on Measurement in Education. This module may bephotocopied without permission if reproduced in its entirety and' used for instru ctionai purposes.

antl updating, the item bank will be more functional and itemquzility wiil be maintained.The widespread availability of computers makes it possibleto imtomate much of the effort of preparing assessments, aswell as to use th e computer capabilityto enhance th e quality ofthe items and to improve the o v e r d quality of examinations.Unfortunately, the automation is easier to achieve than thequatlity enhancement. The latter still requires personal,professional intervention and monitoring. AU items, whetherpurchased in a n item ban k, developed for a specific program, orconiputer-generated, must be carefully edited and tried out.Cornputer technology does facilitate th e indexing, storage, andretrieval of items, and it is necessary for th e analyses that are

an assential part of evaluating and monitoring test develop-merit. The computer can assist in item writing by handlingmuch of the re petitious work involved in item writing, freeingthe item developers to attend to more important asp eds of theitenis.Baker's (1989) chapter in Educational Measurement andRoid's (1989) article in Educational M easurement: Issues a ndPra:tice provide an overview of the whole field of the use ofcomputer technology in testing. Anyone who is inexperiencedin tliis field wiil find these materia ls verv useful in understand-ing i;he potential of th e technology for ah as pe ds of testing.Before the advent of desktop computers, the most commoniteni bank was a box of index cards, each containing a singleite11.i. Teachers could seled the items wanted for a test, tapethern to a sheet of paper, and use the copier to make sufficientcopies of the examination. If more than one version wereneecled, items could simply be rearranged. Instructors whowerr? r uly enterprising could record such item statistics as thepercentage who answered th e item correctly ( p value) and th enumber seledin g each option on the back of the item card forfuture reference. Large testing programs kept files of items inharc! copy and manually entered dat a about item performance.Al; the present time, large, sophisticated testing programsma i~i tai n omputer files of items from which assessments areprepared. Items are updated periodically, and statistics aboutitem performance are readily available. Some of the testingprograms use these files to provide for computer administra-tion of tailored tests, in which the items actually taken by anexaniinee are selected for diculty according to how theexaniinee performs on earlier items.The technology for managing these programs is readily


2/6

available; it can be used by classroom teachers a t all levels ofeducation as well as by large licensing and certiicationagencies. Anyone who needs to prepare assessments forwhatever purpose can profit from learning how to set up an duse an item bank.Who ShouldUse an t e m BaWAnyone whose responsibilities involve preparing assessmentson a regular basis will find item banking technology veryuseful. In education, his group includesall classroom teachers,university instructors, directors of system-wide testing pro-grams, directors of sta te testing program s, and ev aluators ofspecid projects. Personnel in licensing and certification agen-cies and t est publishers rnay also find some of th e inform ationuseful.The needs of these people vary greatly, and the re are manyoptions available, so th at individuals can find the kind of helptha t is right for them.What Can an t e m Bank Do?There are three major fundions th at rnay be served by an itembank:

1. Item entry and storage2. Item retrievai for reviewing items, formatting te st forms,and editing and updating items3. Maintenance of item historyIn addition, two other functions are provided by computertechnology. Some commercially available programs includethese as a part of the item banking package; other vendorsprovide the other functions as a separate package. Thesefunctions are (a) scoring and item anaiysis and 01) reparationof records and reports, including Gradebook.WhatAre t h e Optionsfor S e t t i n gupan t e m Bank?The possibilities for establishing an item bank range from useof a canrted item bank, from which mu ltiple forms of tests canbe created, to programs that generate items from aigorithmsand create tests to speciications, with every variation imagin-able. Users have very W er en t needs and concems, dependingon their situations.A classroom teacher, for example, who is interested only inworkingwith a small item bank to produce classroom tests, hasa situation tha t is very W er en t from that of the coordinator ofa professional licensing bureau that manages and producesdozens of examinations in the course of a year. Licensingagencies are concerned with problems such as sharing of thebank while maintaining the security of the items and oftenwith preparing aitern ate forms of examinations. They are alsointerested in interfacing the scoring and analysis informationwith the item entry process. The classroom teacher rnay bemore concerned with programs tha t assist in th e item writingprocess and th at operate on an available computer system.There are th ree basic options for establishing an item bank.These options are discussed in what follows, along with theadvantages and disadvantages of each.Purchase of a Bank o f Items, Along With the Software toOperate itThe advantage of this option is that the labor of developingitems and the software is eliminated. Also, some of th e itembanks provide items that have been carefdy developed andevaluated, and t he program s are generally easy to operate.The major disadvantage is that much of the saving5 indeveloping items is offset by the necessity to check the itemsagainst th e objectives or test blueprint. Also, many of the itemsrnay tu rn o ut to be flawed and have to be replaced. Furth er-more, the cons traints of th e software limit what can be doneabout custom izing the item bank. You rnay be limited to a

single item type, or example, and editing or replacing itemsrnay be very difficult.Some proponents of item banks have suggested the possibil-ity that eve~.tuallyhere might be a gigantic item bank incommonly tested areas th at can be accessed by any legitimateuser to prepare examinations, without the effort and expense ofwriting items. Already there a re several item banks th at schoolsystems can purchase, and th ere ar e also a few banks of itemsfor some occupations (Ward, 1990).However, purchase of an item bank saves only a part of thelabor of pre p~ ui ngtems. It is still essential that the coverage ofan assessment be carefully specified. This is usually donethrough a ci~rriculumguide, a list of objectives, or a testblueprint. Each item in the bank must be reviewed to deter-mine whether it fits the desired coverage and, if so, where itfits. It often happens tha t a large proportion of the items mu stbe discarded, either because they do not fit or because they donot meet commonly accepted standards.Purchase or l ~ a s i n gf Item Banking Software WithLocalDevelopment of ZtemsThe advantage of this option is tha t it offers the possibility ofmaximum flexibility while requiring a minimum of computerknow-how. The disadvantage is that selection of softwarepackages requires a careful analysis of th e user's needs and ofthe fe ature s of each software package. It aiso requires that th eitems, item entry procedures, and form atting be adapted to fitthe capability of the selected program, and these capabiiitiesvary widely from one program to an other.Item bankting programs are supplied by many differentvendors, and. the programs vary greatly as to the functionsperformed aiid the so ph tica tio n with which these functionsare handled. Most item banking programs were originallydesigned to be used by classroom teachers and universityins tm do rs to constmct classroom examinations. Some havebeen adapted to serve the needs of large-scale testing agencies,and m any provide for use by multiple dat a operators and fornetw orking . :Many vendors offer not a single program, bu t a setof programs, sometimes but n ot always fundion ing in conjunc-tion with oxie another. Some vendors sell their programs,whereas others lease theirs. Some offer both options.The intended use should govern the kinds of capabiiities theuser looks foil in purchasing a n item banking program . It wouldbe foolish to purchase or lease a program with every availableoption if the only use is for teachers to produce classroomexaminationis. On th e oth er han d, a larg e testing agency wouldbecome very frustrated trying to manage dozens of very largeitem banks arith a program tha t has many lim itations. Some ofthese agencies have opted to use a word processing progra m foritem entry arnd revision and a database-management programto format th e examination forms (see Option 3 below). Scoringand analysis functions are handled by a different set ofprograms.Furtherm ore, users typically prefer to have a program th atis as simple to operate as possible, so long as it has thecapability to do th e necessary work. Th erefore, it is importantfor the user to be very clear as o wha t capabiiity is necessaryand to look 'or the program (s) th at m eet these needs in a waytha t is easy to manage.In selectirig programs for item banking and test processing,the potential user should i d e n t e those features tha t are mostimpo rtant for the situation and consider several questions. Thechecklist provided suggests some questions to be addressed.The answers to these questionswill clanfy the features tha t areimportant to that particular user. Features that are notimpor tant will aiso be identified.A final considerationwill be the type of hardware required torun each program. In most cases, the user will want to secureitem banking programs t,hat will ru n on the hardware alreadyavailable. This should be no problem, because most of the


3/6

avadable programs r un on IBM or compatibles and th e rest r uneither on the Apple or the Macintosh. Some have versions forboth IBM and Apple 11 or Macintosh. At least one program hasa version for the Comm odore.If the user plans to purchase new hardware, th e avadabilityof item bankmg programs rnay be a consideration in thepurchase.Local Development of Software Programs and ItemsThe ad va nG e of t h s option is that th e programs rnay betailored to provide the specific characteristics the test devel-oper wants, so it is th e obvious choice for a tes t developer whohas access to th e necessary computer know-how. The obviousdisadvantage is that development of item bankmg softwarerequire s a level of computer sophistication beyond tha t of mosttest developers. However, if the test is to consist entirely of asingle type of item, if the user has a good word processingprogram, and if time permits each test to be hand-formattedwith t he items hand selected, much of this disadvantage is lost.Moderately sophisticated users rnay use a word processingprogram to inpu t items into files, one item per le, th en use adatabase-managem ent program such a s D-Base to format testsand prepare the item map. The possibilities are limited only bythe skill of the programming staff.What Are the StepsinItem Banking?The steps in item banking are listed and discussed below.Item Entry and Storage

Method of item entry. There a re several processes by whichitems rnay be entered into an item bank. They can be enteredby keying in on a computer keyboard; they can be purchasedalready entered into an item bank that runs on the program;they can be entered by reading a disk or tape that has beencreated using a word processing program; they can be enteredfrom hard copy by use of a document reader; or the itembanking program rnay provide algorithms that create items.Some programs provide only one method of item e ntry , whereasothers offer many of these alternatives.The method of item entry will depend on the source of theitem and on the capabdities of the program being used. Newlydeveloped items will usually be keyed in at the computerconsole. Computer files of existing item banks rnay be read intothe bank and then edited as necessary. Printed copies of itemsrnay be read by a document reader and edited by keyboardentry. If th e program does not have eit her of these capabilities,the item s will have to be hand en tered, just as if they are newitems.Graphics and special characters. In some test ing programs,such as those in mathematics, science, and occupational skills,the handling of graphics is very important. Many of theavailable programs do not have the capability of handlinggrap hcs within the item le; they must be in a separate le,either computerized or in hard copy. Also, some of the pro-grams are limited as to the extent to whch they will handlespecid cha racters, such as m athematics symbols, foreign alpha-bets, accents, and so forth. These limitations rnay not beimpor tant for some testing programs, but they rnay be crucialfor others.T a t imi ta tions. Some programs are limited as to how manylines of text are permitted in e ither the stimu lus or option, orboth; and many programs limit the num ber of items tha t rnaybe store d in a given bank. Also, some programs do no t providefor such information as a uthor, reviewers, reference, or source.Potential item bank users should check that those featuresthey desire are available in t he program being considered.Size of item bank. Some programs will handle a limitednumb er of items-usually those on a single disk. Oth ers wdluse multiple disks or an auxiliary storage unit.

Type (s) of items used. Some programs permit only four- ofiae-choice multiple-choice items, whereas others provide fortrue-false, multiple true-false, and constructed response item(completion, essay, fill-in). The program must handle th e typesof ite ms to be used on the tes t.Ease of editing or add ing new ite ms to the bank. Many of thesame considerations as for item entry apply here. However, icb.anges in the item bank are made frequently, the ease oferitering and editi ng items becomes of even greater importanteClassificationlcoding. Regardless of how the items are init i d y entered, there must be a capability to retrieve the itemas n e c e s s q to make revisions ort o create a test. It is essentiathat the items be coded in some fashion, and that certaininformation be readiiy avadable. Prog rams differ greatly in theniimber of codes available and in th e types of coding permitted.The prima qr reason for coding is to simplify the task of itemretrieval so that tests rnay be assembled to fit the desiredcoverage of the assessment. The item code usually indicatesconten t, skdl level, and assessm ent type. Co ntent codes rnay bebased on a content outline or on key words, or objectives. Theskili code rnay be based on a formal taxonomy or it rnay be asimple 2 or 3 level code to differentiate between memory andapplication and/or problem solving. If more than one type ofassessment is to be used, then a code to indicate the type ofassessment should be provided. For example, the item codeAc2M might indicate tha t th e item covers Topic A, Subtopic cSkill Leve1 2, and that it is a Multiple-choice item.Other codes, called referral codes, are used to identifycross-linked items, tha t is, items for which the text of one item"gives away" the answer to another, and items that must begrouped together because they use a common stimulus, such asreading comprehension items based on a single passage ofmiiterial. In addition, a "readability index" is important forsome tests. The most frequently used codes are listed in Ta-blt?l .. -.The codes must be specified in advance so they rnay beentered into the files at th e time th e items are entered. Once acol3ng scheme is set up, t here should be no modification in thecolling scheme unless the entire bank is recoded. Each itemmiist also have a unique identification number tha t rnay be asirnple accession number or perhaps an accession numberw it hn the content classification scheme.Othe r information, such as au thor, reviewers, date of revi-sic~ns, nd references, rnay be entered into the item bank. Atsome point the item history should be added. T h s includes thedate of each use, the diculty ( p value), discrimination index(BIS or PBIS ), distractor analysis (N and percentage choosingealrh option), and the readability index, if it is used. Itemsshould also be assigned an item number.Item Retrieval

Review and updating of items. Item review is an essentialpart of an assessment development program. For classroomtests, items rnay be reviewed using a screen display. However,for larger tes ting program s w ith a form al review, copies of eachitem be ing reviewed will need to be printed. As a minimum, thereview copies should contain t he foliowing information: Codesfor the Item, Key, Reference, and Item Text. In addition, theitem history should be made available, either as a part of thereview copy or in a separa te document.As a result of the review process, or afte r an item h as beenused, or when events cause an item to become out of date, it isso:metimes necessary to revise the item. The item codes andnumber are used to retrieve the item, and th e editing process issirnilar to th at of the original entry. The dat e of the revisionshould be a part of the item information. Whether the oldve:rsion of the item is retained in the bank or diswded is amatter of polig. However, if the old version is retained, itshould be clearly marked that it is obsolete. The authors'recommendation is to delete the old item from the bank, along


4/6

Table 1Frequentlu Used Codes fo r ItemsBlueprint codes Other codes

Content codes Ski11 leve1 Referral codesTopic/subtopic Recognition Cross-lin ked itemsKey words Application Items wi th aObjectiveslskills Problem solving commonOR stimulusType of assessment Literal knowledge Code for graphicsWritten test Inferential ltems with special

Mul tiple choice knowledge conditionsConstructed Analysis Readability ndex

response EvaluationPerformance test Problem SolvingProduct evaluationObservation

with al1 item statistics for that item. This is especially impor-tan t if computer-selectionof items is used. The alternative is totransfer the text and all information about obsolete items to a ninactive file.Form atting and pr inti ng tests; pre pari ng un item map. Someprograms were designed to present items for com puter admin-istration, whereas others produce printed forms. Some pro-grams will produce tests in either form, and some of theprograms for com puter administration perm it tailored testing;that is, items are selected in accordance with the examine'sperformance on previous items. For other c omputer-adminis-tered programs, items are selected in the same way that itemsare selected for printed form s.Printed test form s may be assembled either by the computeror by the operator. Commercially prepared item bankingprograms differ as to the automatic features available forformatting. Some programs permit a variety of methods ofitem selection, whereas others allow only one or two possibili-ties. When the computer assembles the tests, items may beselected randomly from the entire bank, or they may beseleded randomly w ithin specified categories.With operator-selection, some programs permit on-screenviewing and selection, with great variation in the amo unt an dh n d of information provided to the operator. Othe r programsrequire th at the op erator use hard copies of the item and iteminformation and make the selection on the basis of an itemnumber. Stiil others allow the operator to speci@ categories ofitems, to view the items and item data, and to select from thecomputer console.Some of the se options are obviously better for some situa -tions than others. The point is that the program should havethe capability that the test developer needs and wants. As aminimum, a program should print stored general directionsand i t should num ber items and pages automatically. Also, it isessential that the program does not insert a page break withinan item , and it is highly desirable ha t the program provides fora two-column format.The program should produce an item map, indicating thecodes and key for each item. Also, if the tes t is reform atted, or ifmultiple forms of the tes t are produced, a new item m ap shouldbe produced for each form.

Maintenance of Ztem HistoryMost of th e analysis prograrns are se parate from th e item en tryand t est formatting program(s1. Some vendors have a packagetha t includes scoring and analysis programs, and some of these

provide for an interface with the item bank program . Informa-tion from the ;malysesshould be incorporated as a par t of eachitem file.Usually, the item history includes the date of each adminis-tration and the following item da ta for each adm inistration:Multiple-choice items: 1)ifficulty (percen tage answering cor-rectly, p-value); Percentage selecting each option; D iscrimina-tion index (EIIS or P BIS ).Open-endizd (construc ted response) items: Dis tribu tion ofscores on thi? tem ; Reliability of the scor ing.

Some cominercial item banking programs include theseanalyses. Hourever, in many cases, the analyses are carried outindependently, and the d ata mus t be interfaced with the itemtext files or bm d entered. Some programs have the capabilityto interface u ith the scoi-inglanalysis program to update th eitem history. Other programs do not have th is capability, so theitem history nnust be upda ted by manual ent ry.For many large testing programs, Item Response Theorystatistics are also desirable. It is very desirable tha t the itemhistory program provide for accumulation of data over timeand calculate cumulative statistics. And, for some programs, ameasure of differences in the performance of differentethniclgendei* groups is required. In addition, some of thecommercial prograrns permit the user to add other analyses.Scoring an d ltem AnalysisComputer admin istration. When tests are adm inistered bycomputer, the scoring is usually, but not always, handledimmediately. Some programs calculate a scaled score andproduce an immediate report. Other programs accumulateexaminees' performance m d calculate examination statisticsand the e xa mi ne s' scores based on a given adrninistration.Printed test forms. When printed examinations are adminis-tered, th e scoring and analysis is usually a separate process.Some of the item banking programs have a companionprogram that provides statistics for the test and for individualitems. A few programs collect cumulative data and keep itemdata c urrent. Th ese programs are almost always separate fromthe item baniung programs, but a few have the capability ofinterfacing with them.Although ~icoring,tem a nalysis, and rep orting are not reallya part of the item banking process, some of the analysisprogra ms also cover the prepara tion of several kinds of reports.Tests may be scored by hand or by the use of desktop scannersthat generati?a record to be processed by the computer. Datafor hand-scored items must be hand entered.Scanning md scoringprograms and equipment range from asimple desktop scanner that prints raw scores on the answers h e t to a sophisticated machine that reads answer sheets invariable forniats and creates a ta pe or disk record tha t can beprocessed to yield any desired type of analysis and t o produce awide variety of reports.Records and ReportsMany vendors provide programs to prepare both group andindividual reports, including Gradebook (Record keeping) pro-gram s for one or more classes. Such program s keep a record ofvarious measures, multiply each measure by a specified weight,and com pute totals andl or averages.Questions l;obe AddressedinDeciding Whether toPurchase, hase, or Develop Item Banking SoftwareItem En ty and EditingDo you already have a set of items to be entered into thebank? Y NIf Yes:

Are the items already on tape or disk? Y NWhat form are they in?Computer d i s kHard copy- ther-


5/6

Do the ite ms involve graphics? Y NDo the items involve special syrnbols? Y NHow many items must th e bank accommodate?-ow long is the longest item stem? wordsWhat type(s) of items a re used? M-C-Open-ended -- T-F- ther-f No:What kind of items wdl you use?How often will new items be entered into th e bank?How often will item s be edited?What variables will be used to code, sor t, and select item s?Content - h l l - ifficulty - efer-rals-eading leve1-- Other (List):How much on-screen assistance will the item e n t v person-nel need?-Test Assembly/AdministrationHow will the test be administered?By computer? Y NIf Yes:How should items be se lected? Randomly-Tailored-ow should sco ring be done? No. Right-R - W Other-y printe d copies of the te st? Y NIf Yes:G mu lti ple forms used for each administration? Y NHow are items to be selected for each test form?How are items to be arranged on a form? On a page?

Scoring, Reporting, AnalysisWhen wdl the tes t be scored?At the time of administration- ater-hat kind of data should be reported?Fo r individuals? Raw score- caled score-Pass-fall-or items? r, value- ISIPBIS- ogit-D I F Other-or the total test? Mean- D- R20-or pa rt scores? Mean- D- R20-n what form should the reports be prepared?Sources of Information About Item BankingProgramsWith the large numbers of item banking programs avadable, itis difficult for a potential user t o secur e the kind of informa tionneeded to make an informed selection. The references a t theend of this module provide information about some of theprograms. Th e bulletin prepared by th e senior author (Ward,1990) summarizes inform ation from a large num ber of sourcesto assist potential users in the preliminary investigation ofdifferent programs by reviewing points to be considered inselecting item banking sys tems and providing as much informa -tion as posib le, along with addresses and contact persons. Thisinformation may be used to identiSl possibilities, then thevendor may be contacted to secure brochures and /or a demon-stration of the most likely programs. The name of the contactperson is supplied when it is avadable.

la .

lb .

2.

Self-Test1. What are t he advantages of using an item bank?a. For classroom assessment?b. For large-scaie assessments?2. What does an item banking program do?

Where do you get th e software for item banking?How do you set up and us e an item bank?Why are ite ms coded?Where can you get information about the purchase item bimks?

Answers to Self-TestThe niajor advantage is tha t the teacher does not havto write new items for every examination. In additiothe item bank can be much m ore complete in coverithe domain than wili tests written on an ad hoc basiAlso, items can be edited and corrected periodically, that items in the bank are usually of much bettequality than those written hurriedly just for a singtest. Of course, the teacher has to be careful thindividual items are not used so frequently thstudents memorize the answers without having think about them. This means that the item banshould have a large number of items for each courobjective.Other advantages are that it is easy to put aexamination together, and, if the program provides, get the scoring and analyses done quickly.The advantages for a large-scale testing program avery m uch the same as those for the classroom teacheHowever, the large programs often have needs wiwhich classroom teachers are not concerned, such afor example, providing alternate forms, seeing thsubsequent forms of an examination are equivalenand maintaining the quality of the examination. Al1 these a re facilitated by the use of item banks.The item banking program may do any or al1 of thfollowing:a. St.ore temsb. Faci litate retrieval of items for:Reviewing itemsFormatting test formsEditing itemsUpdating itemsc. Maintain item history:Date of each administration

Reliability of scoresFo r M-C items:Difficulty levelsDiscrimination Index (BIS)For other items:Distr ibution of scores on the itemReliability of sc oringd. Score and analyze the itemse. Prepa re records and reports.Some users develop their own software, using a worprocessing program for item entry and a databasprogram to format and print t he test forms.However, there are many commercially prepareprograms available, each with some distinct featureAlso, some universities and sta te testing agencies havmade thei r programs av ailable to qualified users . War1990, presents the results of a survey of vendors oprograms, along with comments and annotations abouthe programs.The first st ep is to secure an item banking program-whether it is locally developed or purchased from vendor. Next, the items m ust be entered into th e bankeither by writing items, purchasing an item bank, ocopying items that have aiready been developeFinally, one must learn how to operate the program tperform th e tasks th at need to be done.


6/6

5. Item codes facilitate selection of items to fit a given testblueprint or area of content. The codes also help to getthe desired balanc e. between different ski11 levels.Finally, the codes insure th at items have t he graphicsor other stimuii they need and that one item does not"give away" the answer to one or more other item s.6. Many testing agencies have made banks of itemsavailable for purchase. Unfortunately, some of theseitems may not fit the curriculum of the school system.Also, some universities have developed banks of itemsinvarious curriculum areas.These items vary greatly as to quahty and coverage, soanyone who purchases an item bank mus t expect to do a lot of

analysis and review of the items before trying to use th em intest development.Ward, 1990, presents the results of a survey of vendors ofprograms, along with comments and annotations about thenatu re of the item banks. Th is builetin may be used to locatevendors to check out the suitability of the item banks.

Annotated ReferencesArter, J. A, & Estes, G. D. (1984 ). Item ban king for local testdeuelopment. Portland, OR: Northwest Regional Educa tionalLabora-tory.Addresses many aspects of item b anking. Numerous forms andcheckiists to guide users in th e selection of item banks.Appendixincludes summaries of information about computer software.Practitioner oriented.Baker, F. B. (1989). Computer technology in test construction andp m s s i n g . In R. L. Linn (Ed.), Educational measurement (3rd ed.,pp. 40-28). New York: Macmillan.Systems approach to computer-assisted testing. Describes hard-ware, software, and te sting syctems now avaiiable. Coversuse ofcomputers for item writing, item banking, test construction, testscanning and scoring, and rep orting results.Brzezinski, E. J., & Hiscox, M. D. (Eds.). (1984). Special issue onmicrocomputers in educationai measur ement. Education al Measure-ment: Issues an d Pmt ice , 3(2).Eight papers on the u se of compu ters in developing tests, adminis-tering tests, and assessing achievement. Opposing viewpointspresented on each topic.Hiscox, M. D., & Bnezinski, E. K. (1980).A guide to item banking ineducatwn. Portland, OR: Northwest Regional Educationai Labora-tory. (ERIC Document Reproduction S e ~ c e o. ED 196 945)(Updated in 1984).Results of item b ank telephone survey to ascertain the u se of itembanks in statewide assessment programs of d 0 states. Discus-sion of the importante of adopting and optimizing an itemclassification system.Hsu, T-C., & Nitko, A. J. (1983). Microcomputer testing softwareteachers can use. Educational Mecrsurement: Issues and Practice,2(4), 15-18,23 40.Identica tion of classroom testing tasks that can be computerized,identification of available software, summ ary of 56 testin g soft-ware packages.Millman, J., & Westman, R. S. (1989). Computer-assisted writing ofachievement test items: Toward a future technology. Joumal ofEducatio nal Measurement, 26(2), 177-190.Expository discussion of methods for individualizing testing,including item bankingandadaptive, comp uter-adm inistered ests.Roid, G. H. (1989).Item writin g and item banking by microcomputer:An update. Educational Measurement: Issues and Practice, 8(3),17-20,38.Reviews available item-w riting, tem-ba nking,and test-generationsoftware. Critica1 review uf three packages. Offers caveats abo utthe u se ofd oftware.Ward, A W. (1990) . tem banking an d item banks. Daytona Beach, FL:The Techn Group.A discussion of ikm banking, with suggestions for seleding andusing item-ban king programs. Annotated list of more than 40item-bankingprograms from 22 vendors and 77 item banks.

Documents

Guidelines for Item Banks