Introduction to Essay Test:
The essay tests are still commonly used tools of evaluation,
despite the increasingly wider applicability of the short answer and objective type
questions.
There are certain outcomes of learning which cannot be satisfactorily measured
through objective type tests. The importance of essay tests lies in the measurement
of such instructional outcomes.
An essay test may give full freedom to the students to write any number of pages.
The required response may vary in length. An essay type question requires the
pupil to plan his own answer and to explain it in his own words. The pupil
exercises considerable freedom to select, organise and present his ideas. Essay type
tests provide a better indication of pupil’s real achievement in learning. The
answers provide a clue to nature and quality of the pupil’s thought process.
That is, we can assess how the pupil presents his ideas (whether his manner of
presentation is coherent, logical and systematic) and how he concludes. In other
words, the answer of the pupil reveals the structure, dynamics and functioning of
pupil’s mental life.
The essay questions are generally thought to be the traditional type of questions
which demand lengthy answers. They are not amenable to objective scoring as they
give scope for halo-effect, inter-examiner variability and intra-examiner variability
in scoring.
Types of essay question:
There are two types of essay type test items. These are given below:
Extended-response items:
Allows student to determine the length and complexity of response is called
an extended response essay item.
Compare and contrast the presidential administrations of Bush and Clinton.
Consider economic, social, and military policies. Avoid taking a position in
support of either president. Your response will be graded on objectivity,
accuracy, organization, and clarity.
To assess the ability to evaluate, to organize, and to select viewpoints.
Restricted-response items:
poses a specific problem for which the student must recall proper
information, organize it in a suitable manner, derive a defensible conclusion,
and express it within the limits of the posed problem is called a restricted-
response essay item.
e.g. List the major political similarities and differences between U.S.
participation in the Vietnamese War and the Persian Gulf War. Limit your
answer to one page. Your score will depend on accuracy, organization, and
brevity.
To assess knowledge, comprehension, and applications types of learning
outcomes.
Student Skills Required for Essay Tests:
Before expecting students to perform well on either type of essay question, we
must make sure that they have the required skills to excel. Following are four skills
that students should have learned and practiced before taking essay exams:
1. The ability to select appropriate material from the information learned in
order to best answer the question.
2. The ability to organize that material in an effective manner.
3. The ability to show how ideas relate and interact in a specific context.
4. The ability to write effectively in both sentences and paragraphs.
Constructing an Effective Essay Question:
Following are a few tips to help in the construction of effective essay questions:
Begin with the lesson objectives in mind. Make sure to know what you wish
the student to show by answering the essay question.
Decide if your goal requires a restricted or extended response. In general, if
you wish to see if the student can synthesize and organize the information
that they learned, then restricted response is the way to go. However, if you
wish them to judge or evaluate something using the information taught
during class, then you will want to use the extended response.
If you are including more than one essay, be cognizant of time constraints.
You do not want to punish students because they ran out of time on the test.
Write the question in a novel or interesting manner to help motivate the
student.
State the number of points that the essay is worth. You can also provide
them with a time guideline to help them as they work through the exam.
If your essay item is part of a larger objective test, make sure that it is the
last item on the exam.
Advantages of the Essay Tests:
i. It is relatively easier to prepare and administer a six-question extended-
response essay test than to prepare and administer a comparable 60-item
multiple-choice test items.
ii. It is the only means that can assess an examinee’s ability to organize and
present his ideas in a logical and coherent fashion.
iii. It can be successfully employed for practically all the school subjects.
iv. Some of the objectives such as ability to organise idea effectively, ability to
criticize or justify a statement, ability to interpret, etc., can be best measured
by this type of test.
v. Logical thinking and critical reasoning, systematic presentation, etc. can be
best developed by this type of test.
vi. It helps to induce good study habits such as making outlines and summaries,
organizing the arguments for and against, etc.
vii. The students can show their initiative, the originality of their thought and
the fertility of their imagination as they are permitted freedom of response.
viii. The responses of the students need not be completely right or wrong. All
degrees of comprehensiveness and accuracy are possible.
ix. It largely eliminates guessing.
x. They are valuable in testing the functional knowledge and power of
expression of the pupil.
Limitations of Essay Tests:
i. One of the serious limitations of the essay tests is that these tests do not give
scope for larger sampling of the content. You cannot sample the course
content so well with six lengthy essay questions as you can with 60 multiple-
choice test items.
ii. Such tests encourage selective reading and emphasize cramming.
iii. Moreover, scoring may be affected by spelling, good handwriting, coloured
ink, neatness, grammar, length of the answer, etc.
iv. The long-answer type questions are less valid and less reliable, and as such
they have little predictive value.
v. It requires an excessive time on the part of students to write; while assessing,
reading essays is very time-consuming and laborious.
vi. It can be assessed only by a teacher or competent professionals.
vii. Improper and ambiguous wording handicaps both the students and values.
viii. Mood of the examiner affects the scoring of answer scripts.
ix. There is halo effect-biased judgment by previous impressions.
x. The scores may be affected by his personal bias or partiality for a particular
point of view, his way of understanding the question, his weightage to
different aspect of the answer, favoritism and nepotism, etc.
Thus, the potential disadvantages of essay type questions are:
(i) Poor predictive validity
(ii) Limited content sampling
(iii) Scores unreliability
(iv) Scoring constraints
Suggestions for Improving Essay Tests:
The teacher can sometimes, through essay tests, gain improved insight into a
student’s abilities, difficulties and ways of thinking and thus have a basis for
guiding his/her learning.
While Framing Questions:
Give adequate time and thought to the preparation of essay questions,
so that they can be re-examined, revised and edited before they are
used. This would increase the validity of the test.
The item should be so written that it will elicit the type of behavior the
teacher wants to measure. If one is interested in measuring
understanding, he should not ask a question that will elicit an opinion;
e.g.,
“What do you think of Buddhism in comparison to Jainism?”
Use words which them give directions e.g. define, illustrate, outline,
select, classify, summarize, etc., instead of discuss, comment, explain,
etc.
Give specific directions to students to elicit the desired response.
Indicate clearly the value of the question and the time suggested for
answering it.
Do not provide optional questions in an essay test because.
It is difficult to construct questions of equal difficulty;
Students do not have the ability to select those questions which they
will answer best;
A good student may be penalised because he is challenged by the
more difficult and complex questions.
Prepare and use a relatively large number of questions requiring short
answers rather than just a few questions involving long answers.
Do not start essay questions with such words as list, who, what,
whether. If we begin the questions with such words, they are likely to
be short-answer question and not essay questions, as we have defined
the term.
Adapt the length of the response and complexity of the question and
answer to the maturity level of the students.
The wording of the questions should be clear and unambiguous.
It should be a power test rather than a speed test. Allow a liberal time
limit so that the essay test does not become a test of speed in writing.
Supply the necessary training to the students in writing essay tests.
Questions should be graded from simple to complex so that all the
testes can answer at least a few questions.
Essay questions should provide value points and marking schemes.
While Scoring Questions:
Prepare a marking scheme, suggesting the best possible answer and
the weightage given to the various points of this model answer.
Decide in advance which factors will be considered in evaluating an
essay response.
While assessing the essay response, one must:
Use appropriate methods to minimize bias.
Pay attention only to the significant and relevant aspects of the
answer.
Be careful not to let personal idiosyncrasies affect assessment;
Apply a uniform standard to all the papers.
The examinee’s identity should be concealed from the scorer. By this
we can avoid the “halo effect” or “biasness” which may affect the
scoring.
Check your marking scheme against actual responses.
Once the assessment has begun, the standard should not be changed,
nor should it vary from paper to paper or reader to reader. Be
consistent in your assessment.
Grade only one question at a time for all papers. This will help you in
minimizing the halo effect in becoming thoroughly familiar with just
one set of scoring criteria and in concentrating completely on them.
The mechanics of expression (legibility, spelling, punctuation,
grammar) should be judged separately from what the student writes,
i.e. the subject matter content.
If possible, have two independent readings of the test and use the
average as the final score.
