temporary test, means that it only applies to certain situations because it is likely that the items or the capacity of the students will change.
9
When a teacher creates his or her tests, she or he has a complete control over the format. However, it does
not mean that a teacher made test is always perfect. In fact, teacher made test still needs to be revised.
According to Dasar-dasar Evaluasi Pendidikan The Principles Basics for Evaluation in Education by Suharsimi Arikunto, there are four ways to check the
quality of the test items, they are; by checking the clarity of questions, by doing item analysis, by checking the validity and the last is by checking reliability of the
test. It is also written there “Item analysis is a systematic process, which provides
specific information to the item test that teacher has constructed ”.
10
Meanwhile Ahmann and Glock states
“Item analysis is reexamining each item test to discover its strength hand flaws.
”
11
From those two opinions, the writer concludes that item analysis is a systematic process in order to get specific information about the strength and
flaws of the test item. An item analysis tells about three things; first is to know how difficult each item is, the next is to know whether or not the test items have
ability to discriminate higher and lower students, and the last is to know whether or not the distracters have functions as they should. An analysis like this is used
with any important exam – for example, review test and test given at the end of
the school term or program.
12
Throughout item analysis, the teacher will get specific data about item flaws and provide information to improve the test item.
2. The Construction of Multiple-Choice Test Item
Multiple-choice test items are commonly used to review students learning. However, not all of the teacher in high school are know how to make a good
9
Zainal Arifin, Evaluasi pembelajaran: Prinsip, Teknik dan Prosedur, Bandung : PT. Remaja Rosdakarya, 2011, p. 120.
10
Suharsimi Arikunto, Dasar-dasar Evaluasi Pendidikan, Jakarta: Bumi Aksara, 1999, Edisi Revisi, p. 205.
11
J. Stanley Ahmann and Marvin D. Glock, Evaluating Pupil Growth, Boston: Allyn and Bacon, Inc. ,1967, 4
th
edition, p. 184.
12
Harold S. Madsen, Techniques in Testing, Hongkong: Oxford University Press, 1983, p. 180.
multiple-choice test items.
13
Therefore, it is necessary for the teacher to know are the items have well made. Although multiple-choice test items are commonly
used in school, teacher can not use it in any circumstances. It is only appropriate to use multiple-choice of items when the objective of learning can be measured by
having students choose his or her response from several alternatives.
14
There are three parts in multiple-choice test item; One or more introductory sentence called
a stem, a correct alternative as a key, and several wrong alternative called distractors.
15
According to Effective Instructional Strategies by Kenneth D. Moore, multiple choice should be well constructed, so they are straightforward, clear, and
concise. In order to make a straightforward, clear, and concise multiple-choice test items, D. Moore make a guidelines
16
that can be followed, as follows:
The central issues or problem should be stated clearly in the stem, and there should be no ambiguity in terminology.
A stem and the alternatives should be in one page.
Avoid to provide grammatical or contextual clues to the correct answer.
Use language that even the most unskilled readers will understand. Keep
the reading requirement question to a minimum. Write brief stems and accurate choices.
Avoid using absolute terms such as always, never, none in the stem or
alternatives.
Alternatives should be grammatically correct. The use of is or are can help students to guess the correct response. All alternatives should be fit the
stems to avoid giving clues to items that are incorrect.
13
Dawn M. Zimaro, Writing Good Multiple-Choice Exams, Austin: University of Texas, 2004, p. 2.
14
Steven J. Burton, et.all, How to Prepare Better Multiple Choice Test Items: Guidelines for University Faculty, New York: Brigham Young University.1991, p. 9.
15
Kelly V. Kings, et.all, The Distractors Rationale Taxonomy: Enhancing Multiple- Choice Items in Reading and Mathematics, San Antonio: Pearson Inc., 2004, p. 3.
16
Kenneth D. Moore, Effective Instructional Strategies: From Theory to Practice, Washington DC: SAGE Publication Ltd., 2012, pp. 270-271.
