California Department of Education
Taking Center Stage – Act II

DOCUMENT LIBRARY

Writing Prompt Guidelines
for Teacher Teams

Taking Center Stage, Sacramento: California Department of Education, 2001, pp.74,75.

General Item-Writing Guidelines

  1. Use the standards to guide item-writing efforts. This will help ensure that all items are linked to targeted standards.

  2. Make sure that items:
    • Focus on high-level thinking, reasoning, and problem-solving skills as much as possible.
    • Use simple, concise language to clearly articulate the tasks to be completed.
    • Include only information that is relevant and necessary for answering the items or completing the tasks.
    • Are within the appropriate range of difficulty for the intended student population.
    • Use the lowest readability level possible (e.g., grade-appropriate vocabulary and simple, concise sentences).
    • Use graphics (when applicable) that are clear and easy to understand.
    • Do not use language or content that could be offensive or inappropriate for a population or subgroup.
    • Do not include or implicitly support negative stereotypes.
    • Develop two to three times the number of items actually needed for the final assessment. This will make it possible to drop ineffective items following classroom tryouts and analysis of test results.

  3. Develop two to three times the number of items actually needed for the final assessment. This will make it possible to drop ineffective items following classroom tryouts and analysis of test results.

  4. Allow ample time for editing and proofreading of items. Check for clarity, as well as for errors in spelling, grammar, and punctuation.

Multiple-Choice Item-Writing Guidelines (specific)

Present a clearly formulated, concise problem in the item’s stem. The best stems focus on a single aspect of content (e.g., a concept or principle) and one type of cognitive performance (e.g., recall of knowledge or application of knowledge).

  • State the item stem in positive terms whenever possible. Students, especially second-language learners, often have difficulty understanding questions that are phrased in negative terms (e.g., “Which is not an example of . . . ”). They often overlook the word “not,” and, therefore, misinterpret the question. If it is necessary to phrase a question using negative terms (e.g., “not,” “except”), make sure to capitalize or bold-face the negative terms so that they stand out to students.

  • Avoid the use of unnecessary or irrelevant details in the item stem and answer choices.

  • Use answer choices that are brief and parallel (e.g., if one answer choice begins with a verb, make sure all answer choices begin with verbs).

  • Use answer choices that are grammatically consistent with the stem of the item. Grammatical inconsistencies can provide clues that help uninformed students correctly guess the appropriate answer.

  • Include distracters that are plausible and attractive to uninformed students. For example:
    • Use common or likely misconceptions or errors of students as distracters.
    • Make distracters similar to the correct answer in both length and complexity of wording.
    • Use scientific- and technical-sounding words to help make distracters enticing.

  • Do not give clues that might enable students to guess the correct answer or to easily eliminate incorrect alternatives. For example:
    • Avoid using similar wording in the item stem and correct answer choice.
    • Avoid writing the correct answer in a style that is distinctly different from the distracters.
    • Avoid stating the correct answer in greater detail or length than the distracters.
    • Avoid including absolute terms (e.g., “always,” “never,” “all,” “none,” “only”) in distracters.

  • Make sure each item has a correct answer that is unquestionably correct or clearly best.

Written-Response Item-Writing Guidelines (specific)

For all written-response items:

  • Present a clearly formulated problem or situation (in paragraph form) in the item’s prompt. Make sure that the described problem or situation is novel but not entirely unfamiliar to students. The context or details in the prompt should not be beyond the ability of students to imagine.

  • Provide specific instructions that tell students everything they need to do when responding to the prompt. Be sure, however, not to provide excessive information which might remove the challenge for students.

  • Present the instructions in the form of statements rather than questions whenever possible (e.g., “Explain three reasons . . .” rather than “What are three reasons . . .”).

  • Avoid unnecessary detail in both the prompt and instructions. Ask yourself, “Is this essential information?” If the answer is “no,” eliminate it.

For long written-response items:

  • Clearly state the evaluation criteria (i.e., what students must demonstrate to receive a satisfactory rating). Providing this information helps students understand what is expected. (See "Four Point Scoring Guide for Writing Tasks for Grade Seven.")

  • Make sure that the information presented in the prompt, instructions, and evaluation criteria is consistent. For example, concepts included in the evaluation criteria should reiterate or support information given in the instructions and the prompt.

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