Criterion-Referenced Tests

Criterion-referenced tests are used to measure student mastery of instructional objectives or curriculum (absolute performance), rather than to compare one student with another or to rank students. They are often used as end-of-unit tests in textbooks or as a "benchmark" to identify areas of strength or weakness in a given curriculum, readiness to move on to a different level of instruction, etc. Typically, raw scores are used to reflect the number of correct responses, the number of completed objectives, etc. Such tests will often use percentages to reflect the level of mastery of a given instructional objective, such as setting a goal of "90% correct addition problems." Raw scores are converted to a percent correct. This should not be confused with percentiles, discussed earlier, which are rankings of students, not percent correct.

back - next