Argumentation, a key scientific practice presented in the "Framework for K-12 Science Education," requires students to construct and critique arguments, but timely evaluation of arguments in large-scale classrooms is challenging. Recent work has shown the potential of automated scoring systems for open response assessments, leveraging…

Background: Teachers and clinicians may struggle to provide early identification to support multilingual children's language development. Dynamic assessments are a promising approach to identify and support children's language development. Aims: We developed and studied a novel word learning task that is dynamic and language neutral. It makes use…

This research was carried out with the aim of examining the impact of communication training based on 'from the child to mother approach' on the communication of the mothers with their children attending mobile preschools. The sample comprised 80 children attending mobile preschool and mothers of those children. Two of the five neighborhoods…

Purpose: As follow-up to a previous study of probes, we evaluated the marking of tense and agreement (T/A) in language samples by children with specific language impairment (SLI) and typically developing controls in African American English (AAE) and Southern White English (SWE) while also examining the clinical utility of different scoring…

Measures of student disadvantage--or risk--are critical components of equity-focused education policies. However, the risk measures used in contemporary policies have significant limitations, and despite continued advances in data infrastructure and analytic capacity, there has been little innovation in these measures for decades. We develop a new…

Background: As the maker movement is increasingly adopted into K-12 schools, students are developing new competences in exploration and fabrication technologies. This study assesses learning with these technologies in K-12 makerspaces and FabLabs. Purpose: Our study describes the iterative process of developing an assessment instrument for this…

This study examined the degrees of congruence between two early childhood evaluation systems on various quality concepts: the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale-Revised (ECERS-R) and Zhejiang's Kindergarten Quality Rating System (KQRS). Analysis of variance and post hoc least significant difference tests were employed to show the extent to…

Quality engagement in early childhood programs is critical to the development and learning of young children, particularly those with disabilities. The purpose of this study was to examine the quality of engagement and interaction of children with disabilities in inclusive kindergartens in China. Specifically, the study aimed to examine the…

On average, private school students outperform public school students on standardized tests. Research confirms these differences in student scores, but also shows that when student background characteristics are controlled, on average, public school students outperform private school students. Explaining achievement differences between sectors…

Purpose: This study aimed to: (a) compare the physical activity (PA) levels (i.e., moderate-to-vigorous PA [MVPA] and total PA [TPA]) of preschoolers in 3 different early-learning environments (center-based childcare, home-based childcare, and full-day kindergarten [FDK]); and (b) assess which characteristics (e.g., play equipment, policies, etc.)…

This research examined children's performance on second-order false belief tasks as a function of the content area for the belief and the method of assessing understanding. A total of 70 kindergarten and first-grade children responded to four second-order stories. On two stories, the task was to judge a belief about a belief, and on two, the…

Background: Many in education argue for the importance of incorporating teacher judgements in the assessment and reporting of student performance. Advocates of such an approach are cognisant, though, that obtaining a satisfactory level of consistency in teacher judgements poses a challenge. Purpose: This study investigates the extent to which the…

To effectively provide early interventions to children, identifying those who are in need of these interventions is essential. In India, several problems hinder the process of early identification, including a lack of standardized measures for assessment. This study investigates the utility of the Bracken School Readiness Assessment, Third Edition…

Children take years to learn symbolic arithmetic. Nevertheless, non-human animals, human adults with no formal education, and human infants represent approximate number in arrays of objects and sequences of events, and they use these capacities to perform approximate addition and subtraction. Do children harness these abilities when they begin to…

The purpose of this study was to develop a quantitative and qualitative profile to investigate whether there was a significant difference in the reading performance of kindergarten students that did or did not attend prekindergarten by examining scores of the August benchmarks on the Dynamic Indicator of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS). Using…