Achievement and Intelligence Tests Achievement Tests Measure

Achievement and Intelligence Tests

Achievement tests measure more specific areas compared to general intelligence tests. They are meant to focus on measuring skill levels within certain specific talent ranges. Often known as standardized tests, achievement tests break down traditional intelligence assessment into very definitive categories. Typically, schools use achievement tests for state standards reporting, and the commonly taken SAT and ACT are standardized tests that represent achievement evaluation, rather than general intelligence testing. These tests are helpful when educators or researchers want to focus in a certain academic category, or to measure the general skill levels of large groups of students against state and national averages. Still, there are some major issues with achievement tests, primarily the fact that they often do not allow for the incorporation of higher level critical thinking skills or problem solving abilities.

On the other hand, intelligence tests have a much broader subject matter when compared to achievement tests. These types of tests measure the progress of learning and problem solving abilities, rather than on specific knowledge thought to be a standard, as seen in achievement tests. Intelligence tests do still pinpoint where a student excels and may have some problem areas. These tests often rely on logic as a fundamental way to measure critical thinking skills and overall intelligence levels. Although these break down some of the boundaries of achievement test questions and include more logic, they only provide a single score which can be problematic when evaluating a student's success.

Each of these tests is useful for specific applications. For example, achievement tests are useful for evaluating students in a way to test how successful particular curriculum standards are. It is a way to evaluate progress of policy changes because it measures mastery. On the other hand, intelligence tests may be more beneficial for individual understanding of each student in a case by case basis. It allows critical thinking abilities to signify general intelligence levels, which differ dramatically from individual to individual.

The way tests are administered and scored is a huge part of understanding how accurately they represent individual students. Not all students have similar backgrounds or experiences that would provide for a completely fair playing field in regards to how they will react to tests. For example, certain demographic characteristics may provide both an advantage and a disadvantage in regards to standardized and intelligence testing. These tests are often given to a variety of students without generally considering demographic differences that may have an impact on student outcomes.

One article, by Burkam and Lee (2002) discusses scoring differences noted between children of different races. They claim that on achievement tests, "there are substantial differences by race and ethnicity in children's test scores as they begin kindergarten" (Burkam & Lee, 2002). For example, math achievement scores show that African-American children tend to score about 21% lower than whites and Hispanic children score about 19% less than whites at the kindergarten level. Cultural and socio-economic differences clearly impact student scoring on achievement tests, which then poorly reflect minority groups' intelligence ranking at that age.