Multiple choice questions usually include a phrase or stem
followed by three to five options:Test strategies:
- Read the directions carefully
Know if each question has one or more correct option
Know if you are penalized for guessing
Know how much time is allowed (this governs your strategy)
- Preview the test
Read through the test quickly and answer the easiest questions first
Mark those you think you know in some way that is appropriate
- Read through the test a second time and answer more difficult questions
You may pick up cues for answers from the first reading, or become more
comfortable in the testing situation
- If time allows, review both questions and answers
It is possible you mis-read questions the first time
Answering options
Improve your odds, think critically:
Cover the options, read the stem, and try to answer
Select the option that most closely matches your answer
Read the stem with each option
Treat each option as a true-false question, and choose the "most true"
Strategies to answer difficult questions:
- Eliminate options you know to be incorrect
If allowed, mark words or alternatives in questions that eliminate the
option
- Give each option of a question the "true-false test:"
This may reduce your selection to the best answer
- Question options that grammatically don't fit with the
stem
- Question options that are totally unfamiliar to you
- Question options that contain
negative or
absolute words.
Try substituting a qualified term for the absolute one, like
frequently
for always; or typical for every to see if you can
eliminate it
- "All of the above:"
If you know two of three options seem correct, "all of the above" is a strong
possibility
- Number answers:
toss out the high and low and consider the middle range numbers
- "Look alike options"
probably one is correct; choose the best but eliminate choices that mean
basically the same thing, and thus cancel each other out
- Double negatives:
Create the equivalent positive statement and consider
- Echo options:
If two options are opposite each other, chances are one of them is correct
- Favor options that contain qualifiers
The result is longer, more inclusive items that better fill the role of the
answer
- If two alternatives seem correct,
compare them for differences,
then refer to the stem to
find your best answer
Guessing:
- Always guess when there is no penalty
for guessing or you can eliminate options
- Don't guess if you are penalized for guessing
and if you have no basis for your choice
- Use hints from questions you know
to answer questions you do not.
- Change your first answers
when you are sure of the correction, or other cues in the test cue you to
change.
Remember that you are looking for the best answer,
not only a correct one, and not one which must be true all of the time, in all
cases, and without exception.
For teachers:
Writing multiple choice tests
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