OECD. PISA Take the Test: Sample Questions from the OECD's PISA Assessments. OECD Publishing, 2009. ISBN: 9789264050808. Pages: 318.

OECD. PISA 2006 Technical Report. OECD Publishing. 2009. ISBN: 9789264048089. Pages: 420.

What does PISA actually assess? PISA Take the Test presents all the publicly available questions from the PISA surveys. Some of these questions were used in the PISA 2000, 2003 and 2006 surveys and others were used in developing and trying out the assessment.

After a brief introduction to the PISA assessment, the book presents three chapters, including PISA questions for the reading, mathematics and science tests, respectively. Each chapter presents an overview of what exactly the questions assess. The second section of each chapter presents questions which were used in the PISA 2000, 2003 and 2006 surveys, that is, the actual PISA tests for which results were published. The third section presents questions used in trying out the assessment. Although these questions were not used in the above mentioned surveys, they are nevertheless illustrative of the kind of question PISA uses. The final section shows all the answers, along with brief comments on each question.

The PISA 2006 Technical Report describes the methodology underlying the PISA 2006 survey. It examines additional features related to the implementation of the project at a level of detail that allows researchers to understand and replicate its analyses. The reader will find a wealth of information on the test and sample design, methodologies used to analyse the data, technical features of the project and quality control mechanisms.

The books are for sale at the OECD bookshop, while the PDF version of the Technical Report can be downloaded free of charge.

PISA Take the Test
PISA Technical Report
PISA Technical Report (pdf)