A Content Validity Study of TEM-8 Reading Comprehension (2008-2010)

Abstract

TEM-8 (Test for English Majors, Band 8) is a large-scale nationwide standard test for

English majors in China. It has been increasingly recognized in China and has already

become one of the criteria for judging English teaching and learning in China. It is

necessary to pay more attention to its development. Meanwhile, reading comprehension is

regarded as vitally important in acquiring a language. It is worthy investigating how to

measure reading comprehension ability accurately and properly in language testing and

whether reading comprehension in TEM-8 can reflect the test-taker’s reading ability. This

thesis analyzes the content validity of the reading comprehension part of TEM-8 from

2008 to 2010 in terms of the new framework of task characteristics revised from Bachman

and Palmer’s framework (1996: 49), and in accordance with The Teaching Syllabus for

TEM-8 and The 2004 Test Syllabus for TEM-8. This study has shown that TEM-8

reading comprehension part has relatively high content validity, basically corresponding

to the requirements in the teaching syllabus and test syllabus. However, there are some

deficiencies influencing the content validity of TEM-8, such as limited test method,

limited data recources and time.

Key words:

TEM-8, Reading Comprehension, Content validity