Construction and Validation of a General Science Aptitude

Ilorin Journal of Education, Vol. 27 August, 2007 CONSTRUCTION AND VALIDATION OF A GENERAL SCIENCE APTITUDE TEST (GSAT) FOR NIGERIAN JUNIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL GRADUATES Ariyo, Akinyele Oyetunde (PhD), International Centre for Educational Evaluation, Institute of Education, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria. [e-mail] [phone] Abstract

This paper is a report of a study whose major purpose was to develop and validate a General Science Aptitude Test (GSAT) for Junior Secondary School graduate seeking admission into senior secondary school one in Nigeria. The specific objectives were to describe the various stages in the development and validation of GSAT and also to determine the psychometric properties of the instrument. The Pearson Product Moment Correlation, Test difficult index, discriminative index and the KuderRichardson 21 statistics were used for the analysis of results. The results of analysis show that the GSAT was moderately difficult for the sampled students (average item difficult is 0.39), while the instrument was found to be reliable since internal consistency was found to be 0.90. The inter-correlation among the GSAT‘s sub-scales was found to be substantial .GSAT is recommended for use in other parts of the world.
Introduction There is a strong agreement among educationist and psychologist on the utility of aptitude tests in the process of educational and vocational decisions, about placement, streaming, admission and classification of students and job seekers (Gay, 1980; Macklem, 1990). According to Gay (1980), aptitude tests help the teacher to test more realistic expectations of students’ abilities and facilitate the identification of under achievers. The terms intelligence, ability, and aptitude are often used interchangeably to refer to behaviour that is used to predict future learning or performance. However, subtle differences exist between the terms. The tests designed to measure these attributes differ in several

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