True or False?: Multiple Choice Can Test Understanding
I've always been rather sceptical of the idea of multiple choice tests, because they're often administered badly and so merely test factual recall - e.g. what year was Hobbes' Leviathan published?: a) 1641, b) 1646, c) 1651, d) 1656. That's no way to test university students, who should be developing understanding rather than merely the ability to cram many facts into their heads.
Doug Portmore interactive quiz on hedonistic act-utilitarianism, however, strikes me as a fine example of how such testing can be done well. Granted the fact that it's binary (necessarily true or not necessarily true, rather than true/false) means you'd expect someone to get 50% just by guessing randomly, and maybe notably higher with a bit of luck and knowledge. Nonetheless, to get all the answers right - as I did - suggests that one is either very lucky or has a pretty good understanding of the implications of the stated theory.
Maybe there is a place for multiple choice tests, given their advantages (ease of marking being one) and I might even send this one to my students over the Easter vac...