THE CTT ANALYSIS OF PSYCHOMETRIC PROPERTIES OF 2019 SAISSCE TEST ITEMS OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE DEVELOPED BY NBAIS IN NIGERIA

The study was carried out to conduct a CTT analysis of the Psychometric Properties of the 2019 English Language test items developed by NBAIS in Nigeria. Ex post facto design was utilized for the study. Three objectives with corresponding research questions were formulated. The population of the study consisted of Thirty-six thousand, one hundred and forty-one (36,141) registered candidates for the 2019 NBAIS English language examination. The sample was made up of 1134 candidates selected through multistage stratified random sampling technique. The instrument for data collection were the responses of candidates to 2019 NBAIS English Language Papers I test items. The item analysis was carried out on all the one hundred (100) multiple choice items of 2019 NBAIS English Language Papers I from the CTT framework using MS Excel programme which yielded item statistics that serve as data for the descriptive statistics (frequency count and percentage) that were used to answer the research questions. Findings revealed that the difficult index of the items of the 2019 NBAIS English Language was 0.32, the discrimination index of the items of the 2019 NBAIS English Language examination was 0.76 while 30% of the distractors of the options of the items in the 2019NBAIS English Language examination were plausible. It was recommended among others that there is need for the examination body to aim for a balanced mix of easy, moderate, and difficult items to adequately assess the full range of test-takers' abilities.