The present study examined how information about different grading systems affects students' course expectations, particularly in ways that may have downstream consequences for learning and other academic outcomes. In an online experiment using a preregistered design, we prompted two samples of current and recent college students (N = 547) with a…

The purpose of this study was to gauge the degree to which selected NWEA MAP Growth assessments are aligned to the Virginia Standards of Learning (SOL) and the extent to which MAP Growth reports can be used by school divisions to gauge student achievement relative to grade level and to identify learning gaps. The study was delimited to four MAP…

Thorndike (1969) proposed a three P theory of faculty grading orientations (FGOs) -- "perfection", "peers", and "potential", also known as Criterion-, Norm, and Self-referenced FGOs in the literature. Using data from a 2014 faculty survey I examined the responses of 1,742 faculty at 18 four-year, primarily teaching…

Increasing numbers of states have incorporated measures of students' academic growth into their data and accountability policies. Measuring growth is a statistically complicated task and complex growth measures can be easy to misinterpret. This paper reports on a survey of 317 Massachusetts principals' understanding of the Student Growth…

In this quasi-experimental study, we assessed the promise of Word Generation, a research-based academic vocabulary program, on improving the reading achievement outcomes of struggling sixth-grade readers in an after-school small group instructional setting. After 34 hours of academic vocabulary instruction, we compared the performance of a…

Two studies explored the technical adequacy of various measures of advanced phonics skills. In Study 1, the advanced phonics measures consisted of pseudowords, real words, or a combination of both. Participants included 39 students in the third grade. Test-retest correlations for all measures were above 0.8 and interrater reliability was high.…

With tightening school budgets and continued emphasis on core subject standardized testing, physical education often takes a backseat to academic areas that school administrators deem more important. Much time is spent using improvement strategies in the classroom that do not involve exercise. Two hundred eighty-five sixth to eighth grade students…

This guide attempts to address an aspect of secondary CTE (Career and Technical Education) that has received little attention; the assessment literacy of educators. School leaders need to go beyond ensuring routine compliance with external and internal regulatory forces to identify ways in which CTE program teachers might better understand…

Infants 12 months of age or older who have a severe to profound hearing loss frequently receive cochlear implants. Given the inherent challenges of assessing children of this age, this study aims to determine how Listening and Spoken Language Specialists Certified Auditory-Verbal Therapists (LSLS Cert. AVT™) gauge the progress of very young…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of classroom performance assessment on the EFL students' basic and inferential reading skills. A pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design was employed in the study. The subjects of the study consisted of 64 first-year secondary school students in Menouf Secondary School for Boys at Menoufya…

Percentile scores appear to be the easiest standardized test scores for parents to understand. Yet in this true-false test, Hills reveals commonly held misconceptions about percentile score reports. (LC)

Contained in this packet on standardized tests and testing in English is a miscellany of materials written by students, teachers, researchers, test makers, and others about the uses, abuses, and misuses of standardized tests. The materials are not intended to be a definitive study of the standardized test in English but rather to provoke…

This module describes a method for weighting various measures of student achievement, such as examinations and home assignments, in order to combine these measures into a final grade. Standard deviation methods receive extensive attention. (TJH)

This guide is intended to assist rehabilitation counselors, school guidance personnel, and others involved in administering and interpreting the results of the Vocational Decision-Making Interview (VDMI). (The VDMI is a structured interview instrument that was developed to facilitate the assessment of an individual's vocational decision-making…

The relationship between classical discrimination indices (CDI) and criterion-referenced discrimination indices (CRDI) and the appropriateness of each for use on criterion-referenced tests are investigated. A CRDI is proposed that attempts to separate those who master material from those who do not master material. A 26 item multiple-choice…