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According to the definition provided in Appendix B, to analyze means to break material into its constituent parts and to determine how the parts relate to one another and to an overall structure or purpose. In the less effective example, students are asked to describe the impact. To describe requires students to give an account of the impact of America at war on the American economy, but it does not require students to make an analysis based on what the different effects of the war are and how they work together to affect the economy. The more effective question does make this distinction for students, therefore providing guidance concerning the task of analyzing. Thus, directive verbs must be carefully selected to clearly reflect the task required of students and to be aligned to intended outcomes. Similarly, the object of the directive verb must be carefully written. Just as it is important to select the right verb, it is important to delimit the scope of the object of that verb. As mentioned earlier, delimiting the scope of the task helps to avoid the problem of student responses containing ideas that were not meant to be assessed and the problem of extreme subjectivity when scoring responses. How to appropriately limit the subject matter for a given essay question depends on different factors that require the teacher’s subject matter expertise and the teacher’s knowledge of what material was introduced to the students in the course. Among other things, how to restrict the task can depend on the subcategories of the domain and how they relate to each other, and on what parts of the subject domain were How to Prepare Better Essay Questions - 26 - emphasized in class. The following example illustrates the process of limiting the scope of the task for a given essay question. Example of an Evolving Essay Question that Becomes More Focused 1. Less focused essay question:
Evaluate the impact of the
Evaluate the impact of the