A Linguistic Perspective on Multiple Choice Questioning

This article critiques the over-emphasis on multiple choice testing in some large first year classes as well as the poor design and construction of many of these tests, and calls for the use of multiple choice questions as part of a broader and more diverse range of assessment measures. It argues that this kind of testing means that students are not given enough opportunity to develop communicative competence in the discourses of the academic disciplines they are studying.