이 연구의 목적은 예비 지구과학 교사들이 선다형 문항 제작 실습 프로그램에 참여하는 과정에서 드러나는 문 항 제작 역량의 발달 양상을 이해하는 것이다. 이를 위해 예비 지구과학 교사 15명이 선다형 문항 제작 과정 중 공동 검토 과정에서 나타나는 논의에 초점을 맞춰 그 특징을 분석하였다. 구성주의 근거 이론을 토대로 3단계의 코딩을 수 행한 결과, 36개의 초기 코드, 12개의 초점 코드, 5개의 이론적 코드가 도출되었다. 코딩 범주에 근거하여 논의의 특징 을 규정하는 검토 문화와 문항에 대한 관점을 두 축으로 설정하였으며, 이로부터 수험생의 문제풀이, 조심스레 한 걸음 떼기, 짙어지는 담화를 주제로 하는 세 가지 이야기를 구성하였다. 또한 프로그램 동안 일관되게 드러나는 문항 제작 역량의 한계를 다다르지 못한 노정에 대한 네 번째 이야기로 서술하였다. 문항 제작 과정에서 드러나는 평가 전문성은 예비교사의 정체성 발달과 관련되어 있으며, 본 연구에서 적용한 개발한 프로그램의 효과와 의의 및 프로그램의 개발과 개선을 위한 시사점을 논의하였다.

This study investigated the effects of reducing the number of options in multiple-choice items on the psychometric characteristics of the English section of the NAEA (National Assessment of Educational Achievement). The purpose of the NAEA is to measure educational progress and achievement and it is administered to all sixth, ninth, and eleventh grade Korean students annually. The English section for the ninth graders is the focus of this study; it is made up of thirty-four five-option multiple-choice items and six constructed-response items. A five-option, multiple-choice English test was converted to a four- and a three-option version by eliminating the least and the second least frequently chosen options. Item difficulty, item discrimination, guessing, reliability, and information function were computed as a function of the number of options. This study employed the 3-parameter IRT model. Results showed that there were no significant differences among the three means of item difficulty as well as item discrimination indices; however, the inspection of the test information function indicated that the five-option version generally yielded the highest amount of test information function over the ability scale. Results indicate that streamlined three- or four-option versions are not likely to function as well as the five-option version at the test level.

The demand for test-taking has become an inevitable element of Korean secondary EFL learners’ academic lives in which learners strive to excel in the high-stakes examoriented milieu. However, current knowledge of practitioners, such as those of teachers and administrators, may be insufficient for ascertaining if the learners actually undergo the test-taking process they anticipate and assess what they aim to test. In contrast to the product-oriented view where the primary interest is on the outcome (i.e., scores or stanine levels), the purpose of the present study was to explore 165 Korean high school learners’ test-taking process via questionnaires with proficiency and item type as the grouping variables. There was avid use of conventional reading strategies among the high proficiency learners and test management strategies among the lower proficiency learners. Results present implications for teaching learners not only to become testwise, but also to work consistently towards building reading skills and adopt long-term learning strategies.