Essay - Psychological Testing. Teachers Must Test. It Is One Method of...

Psychological Testing.

Teachers must test. It is one method of evaluating progress and determining individual student needs. More than two hundred and fifty million standardized tests are administered each year to forty four ***** students who attend American elementary and secondary schools (Ysseldyke et al 1992). Testing is only part of the broader conception of assessment. Testing is the sampling of behavior in students to obtain scores (quantitative indexes) or relative standing. In addition teachers and other school personnel assess ***** collect data through classroom observations, interviews with *****' family members or care-givers. Psychological and psycho-educational ***** are used in *****s to help ***** identify types and bases and the extent of a student's learn*****g difficulty or school adjustment problem. The assessment is used to make decisions about students.

At a curricular level, tests help to determine the effectiveness ***** a particular instructional intervention. Teachers give ***** before and after instituting a new teaching method or use of material and *****y examine the gain in the achievement of the student.Testing can also be ***** ***** screen students ***** identify those ***** potential *****s, ***** ***** ***** may need remediation in areas such as academic achievement, perceptual-motor functioning, learning aptitude. Students can then be placed in appropriate programs or even in a special classroom or school if needed.

In other w*****ds, psychological tests are not necessarily to be given to all students, but to those students when the teacher suspects that there may be a difficulty which ***** impede the progress of the student in ***** normal classroom.

A variety of types of tests is used in education, *****cluding, but not limited to, ***** aptitude tests, group or individual achievement test, *****s ***** specific skills thought to be basic to school learning, (e.g. v*****ual-motor integration *****, speech and language tests, vision and hearing tests), personality inventories, behavior observations and projective techniques. Ford-Martin (www.findarticles.com)definespsychological tests as "written, visual or verbal evaluations ***** to ********** the cognitive ***** emotional functioning of children and adults." She explains that psychological tests are used to assess a variety of mental abilities and attributes, including achievement and ability, ***** ***** neurological functioning.

However it is very important ***** *****s and other practiti*****rs who are testing students have a good basic knowledge of not only the test itself, but ***** procedure and more importantly how to interpret ***** ***** results. According ***** Overton (*****) the "use of st*****ardized instruments requires ***** of test- selection criteria, basic principles ***** measurement, administration techniques, scoring ability and careful interpretation of test results." Since the student's future is at risk it is extremely important that the testing ***** carried out by someone properly trained to administer ***** tests and to interpret the test results.

Many of ***** instruments used are norm-referenced, i.e the pupil's performance is evaluated in reference to the performance of other pupils of his same age and/or grade level. One way in ***** meaning is attached to a test score is to indicate how far along the normal development