In 1934, 29 American secondary schools agreed to participate in a landmark study to determine whether high schools could better serve youth when given flexibility around curriculum and freedom to "experiment with the basic structure of schooling." Popularly known as the "Eight-Year Study," it bolstered movements for progressive…

School psychologists may experience examiner drift--a deviation from standardized administration and scoring procedures that occurs slowly over time. The purpose of this article is to explain how examiner drift occurs, outline how it can be assessed, and how it can be prevented.

Kelly Gallagher writes that "wide swaths of students are not developing their writing skills--skills we know to be foundational to their literate lives." In this article, he explains how school districts can go about developing students' writing skills in all content-area classrooms. He highlights five reasons why students should write…

Many American students struggle to perform even basic comprehension of text, such as locating information, determining the main idea, or supporting details of a story. Even more students are inadequately prepared to complete more complex tasks, such as critically or analytically interpreting information in text or making reasoned decisions from…

This article is an overview of how Flin Flon School Division in Flin Flon, Manitoba, used money received through grant funding to revamp its math programming in order to meet the needs of the students within the division. A combination of standardized test scores and individual teacher assessments revealed where student mathematical understanding…

The Communities In Schools (CIS) Model of Integrated Student Supports aims to reduce dropout rates by providing students with integrated and tiered support services based on their levels of need. The model includes preventive services that are available to all students (Level 1 services) as well as intensive, targeted, and sustained services…

The Commonwealth of Kentucky is exploring competency-based education as a way to better prepare students for success in college and their careers. Some individual schools and districts are moving ahead with this innovative approach where achievement is the constant and time is the variable. Not all students learn at the same rate, or in the same…

In 2002, former US President George W. Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) into law, leading to a significant change in the way elementary and secondary teachers design curricula and instruct their students, as well as the ways in which students learn and view learning in and outside of the classroom. Most domestic students entering…

Learning as much as possible about what to expect and how best to select among response choices enables students to improve their scores so as to reflect more fully their knowledge and abilities, whether taking the SAT, ACT, AP history exams, multiple-choice exams in college courses, the GRE, or any other standardized examinations that include…

Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) is more than a school system, it is a community. It's a community of people working together to provide Montgomery County students with an education that prepares them for success today, tomorrow, and in the years to come. That is MCPS' core purpose: to prepare students to thrive in their future. The Annual…

We developed the Blooming Biology Tool (BBT), an assessment tool based on Bloom's Taxonomy, to assist science faculty in better aligning their assessments with their teaching activities and to help students enhance their study skills and metacognition. The work presented here shows how assessment tools, such as the BBT, can be used to guide and…

This chapter presents an overview of approaches to assessing critical thinking in community colleges, a brief description of standardized tests, and examples of several institutionally developed methodologies and good practices. Finally, it identifies challenges in assessing critical thinking in two-year colleges. (Contains 1 table.)

Applied research suggests that learning-disabled students can benefit from training in test-taking skills to improve their performance on both standardized tests and content area tests. Recommendations for classroom applications enumerate which skills are most important for objective, short answer, and essay question tests and suggest appropriate…

In fall 1997, a midwestern district initiated changes to enable all stakeholders (especially teachers) to be knowledgeable users of standardized and teacher-made test results. Two major activities were implemented: data notebooks for each school and a data-mentor program to develop school personnel's data-analysis skills. (MLH)

Critics of the Virginia Standards of Learning claim the tests do not allow teachers and students to explore their own interests. Proponents say the tests might force schools to cut out time-wasting activities (like Friday movies) and concentrate on performance. Parents worry about their kids' progress. (MLH)