true false test

TRUE – FALSE TEST
I. Definition
In the most basic format, true-false questions are those in which a statement is
presented and the student indicates in some manner whether the statement is true or false. In
other words, there are only two possible responses for each item, and the student chooses
between them.
Another term applied to these items is "forced choice" because the student must
choose between two possible answers.
II. Aims
• makes students demonstrate understanding and simple logic
• access student's ability to recognize the accuracy of a declarative statement.
• measures student's knowledge, comprehensive and application levels of understanding
III. Format of true – false tests
 A true-false item can be written in one of three forms:
• simple: answers can consist of only two choices
Example: Conflict is essential in a play. True False
• complex: answers can consist of more than two choices
Example: Conflict is essential in a play. True False Opinion:
Conflict is essential in a play. True False Not given
• compound: Answers can consist of two choices plus a conditional completion response
Example: Conflict is essential in a play. True False
If this statement is true, what makes it true?
 True-False test also has some variations:
• Yes- No:
Example: What reasons are given by students for taking evening classes? In the list
below, circle "Yes" if that is one of the reasons given by students for enrolling in evening
classes; circle "No" if that is not a reason given by students.
Yes No They are employed during the day.
Yes No They are working toward a degree.
Yes No They like going to school
• Checklist:

Example: Check beside each of the following that are listed by evening school students
as reasons for taking evening classes; leave blank those not listed by students.
_____ Employed during the day
_____ Working toward a degree
_____ Like going to school
• Selection :
Example: Indicate whether each type of test below is a type of recognition test or
reproduction test by circling "A" if it is recognition, "B" if it is reproduction.
Recognition Reproduction
A B True-False
A B Multiple choice
A B Essay
III. How to design
• Statements should be relatively short and simple.
• Avoid ambiguous statements and generalizations that are open to interpretation
• True statements should be about the same length as false statements.
• The answers should not be obvious to students who don't know the material.
• Avoid using:
* specific determiners (all, always, none, never, only) statements are likely to be
false.
* qualifying determiners (usually, sometimes, often) statements are likely to be
true.
• Varying the ratio of true/false statements from test to test so that students do not
depend on previous tests for cues as to the balance of true and false questions.
• Arrange the statements so that there is no discernible pattern of answers (such as T, F,
T, F, T, F and T, T, F, F, T, T, F, F) for True and False statements.
• Avoid taking statements directly from the text, lecture or other materials so that
memory alone will not permit a correct answer.
• Include directions that tell students how and where to mark their responses, preferably
having students circle or underline their answers ("T" or "F," "true" or "false"), which

would be typed beside each question. This will be easier to mark as well as prevent any
wrong scoring due to misreading students’ handwriting.
IV. Advantages of true false tests:
• Quite easy to write and develop.
• Quick to score and have objective scoring.
• Easy to give a lot of information to a large number of students to test their knowledge in
a short amount of time and can test much information.
• Limit bias due to poor writing.
• Occupy less space on the page, therefore minimizing the cost of production.
• Minimize reading time.
• Reliability of test scores is adequate.
V. Disadvantages
• Scoring tends to be high since guessing yields a 50-50 score (half right half wrong) as a
base. i.e. if there are 100 items, and the student knows the correct answer to 50, and
guesses on the other half, the score will be 75 knowing only half the material.
• Do not discriminate between students of varying ability as well as other item types
• The format does not provide diagnostic information on why a student got it wrong
• It may be easy to cheat
• Can often lead an instructor to write ambiguous statements due to the difficulty of
writing statements which are clearly true or false
• Can often lead an instructor to favor testing of trivial knowledge content can be
simplistic and/or trivial
• Encourage students memorizing the materials without actually understanding