The Test of Adolescent and Adult Language — Fourth Edition (TOAL-4) is efficient, reliable, and valid. It was designed to measure spoken and written language abilities of adolescents and young adults, with varying degrees of knowledge of the English language. It was normed on 1,671 individuals in 35 U.S. states, all between the ages of 12.0 years and 24.11. It is non-biased in regard to gender, race, and ethnicity.

Subtests

The TOAL-4 has six subtests:

• Word Opposites — examinee is asked for a spoken word of exact meaning of the word examiner says; the opposite of “Day” is “Night”
• Word Derivations — examinee is asked for a missing word at the end of the second sentence the examiner says, deriving from a key word; “Laugh. The play was very funny. The people broke out laughing.”
• Spoken Analogies — examinee is asked to finish an examiner’s partial analogous sentence with a word to complete the analogy; “Birds are to sing, as dogs are to bark.”
• Word Similarities — examinee is asked to write a synonym (correct spelling is irrelevant) for a printed stimulus word; “Pig” is written after seeing the word “Hog.”
• Sentence Combining — examinee is asked to write one grammatically correct sentence from the given two or more sentences; “We ate lunch,” and “It was an hour ago” can be combined into, “We ate lunch an hour ago.”
• Orthographic Usage — examinee is asked to write down all the correct words and punctuation marks to all the sentences given; “I want to go home” can be corrected to “I want to go home.”

Composites

Test results can be reported as percentile ranks and scaled scores. The scaled scores of these subtests can be combined to form three composites (Spoken Language, Written Language, and General Language) to estimate an individual's status relative to the abilities measured by the test.

• Spoken Language — formed by combining the scaled scores of the subtests Word Opposites, Word Derivations, and Spoken Analogies.
• Written Language — formed by combining the scaled scores of the subtests Word Similarities, Sentence Combining, and Orthographic Usage.
• General Language — formed by combining the scaled scores of all six subtests.

The complete TOAL-4 kit includes an Examiner's Manual; 25 Examiner Record Booklets; and 25 Written Lanugage Forms all in a sturdy storage box (2007).