A Comparison of Free Response Items and Multiple Choice Items in Terms of Effectiveness of Estimating Mathematical Ability

수행형 문항과 선다형 문항의 수학적 능력 추정 효율성 비교

For the past several years, performance assessment has been widely used by mathematics teachers. The superiority of performance assessment items compare to multiple choice items has been discussed by many researchers, however these discussions tend to be lack of empirical data. Thus, this study aims to examine the effectiveness of tree response items in comparison with multiple choice items. Using the information function in Item Response Theory(IRT), item information of free response items and multiple choice items from the Third International Mathematics and Science Study-Repeat(TIMSS-R) were obtained and compared. Test informations of the whole mathematics area as well as each content area of mathematics were computed. On average, tree response items yielded more information than multiple choice items, especially in measurement and data interpretation. This study also revealed that free response items estimated students' mathematics ability more accurately than multiple choice items with smaller number of items.