Like many professors, I tend to disparage multiple-choice tests. They measure a narrow test-taking skill that has little to do with “real life.” They’re about memorizing facts rather than dealing with ...

Back in the 1930s, the American physicist Frank Benford discovered that the first digit in certain lists of numbers was much more likely to be a 1 than a 9. He tested this idea on a variety of ...

With multiple-choice questions, only one of the answers can be correct. If there are four choices, three must be wrong. An answer may be correct because it is precise or because it is vague. An answer ...

In Teaching TO the Test vs. Teaching the Test, I wrote that there’s nothing wrong with teaching to a test in terms of content, as long as that test is aligned to appropriate, rigorous curriculum. Yet ...