ADVANTAGE:
Quick and easy to score, by hand or electronically
Can be written so that they test a wide range of higher-order thinking skills
Can cover lots of content areas on a single exam and still be answered in a class period
Disadvantage:
Often test literacy skills: “if the student reads the question carefully, the answer is easy to recognize even if the student knows little about the subject” (p. 194)
Provide unprepared students the opportunity to guess, and with guesses that are right, they get credit for things they don’t know
Expose students to misinformation that can influence subsequent thinking about the content
Take time and skill to construct (especially good questions)
