Many universities use diagnostic tests to assess incoming students' preparedness for mathematics courses. Diagnostic test results can help students to identify topics where they need more practice and give lecturers a summary of strengths and weaknesses in their class. We demonstrate a process that can be used to make improvements to a mathematics…

The ultimate goal of this study is to test the validity of the newly developed Sustainable Leadership for Learning Questionnaire (SLLQ) in terms of predictive validity on teacher satisfaction towards teaching. Apart from that this study also to test the convergent and discriminant validity of SLLQ. To achieve the objective of the study, a…

Test development is a complicated process that demands examining various factors, one of them being writing items of varying difficulty. It is important to use items of a different range of difficulty to ensure that the test results accurately indicate the test-taker's abilities. Therefore, the factors affecting item difficulty should be defined,…

Many school systems face recurring shortages of qualified teachers. Research suggests that improving teachers' working environment is one way of improving teachers' job satisfaction and retention in the profession. However, working environment is inconsistently measured in the literature, hampering cumulation of knowledge. This article develops…

In an attempt to engage more students in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects, schools are encouraged by STEM educators and professionals to introduce students to STEM through projects which integrate skills from each of the STEM disciplines. Because little is known about the learning environment of STEM classrooms, we…

This article and its Online Supplemental Material describe the development of the California School Wellness Index (CSWI), a tool to aid mental health research and practice in schools, specifically for wellness screening and monitoring. The CSWI is a 0-40 composite index derived from responses to the Brief Multidimensional Student Life…

Reflecting on academic errors is a critical skill for engaging with feedback for learning. However, teachers lack training in knowing how to create environments that promote reflection and help students to acquire this skill (Metcalfe, "Annual Review of Psychology," 68, 465-489). Part of the problem is that many teacher education…

One of the questions with the longest history in educational assessment is whether it is possible to increase the reliability of a test simply by altering the way in which scores on individual test items are combined to make the overall test score. Most usually, the score available on each item is communicated to the candidate within a question…

Extending the discussion on replication in sociology and psychology, this article focuses on the adaption of scales in research. Drawing on a recently published scale, we highlight several validity issues in the scale's composition and development. Using data from two empirical studies, we subsequently show how scales can be tested and adapted. In…

Grit--"perseverance and passion for long-term goals" (Duckworth, Peterson, Matthews, & Kelly, 2007, p. 1087)--has attracted the attention of researchers in fields ranging from psychology to business to education (e.g., Robertson-Kraft & Duckworth, 2014; Robins, 2019). Continuing the line of research that explores the domain…

This paper describes "the development and technical adequacy of the Classroom Observations of Student Teacher Interactions (COSTI) instrument," a tool for measuring the frequency and rate of explicit instructional interactions, such as those used in Direct Instruction curricula, for teaching children basic reading and math skills.…

Background: Inquiry-based learning is widely applied in science education; however, so far, the outcomes of learning process have been systematically assessed mainly at the secondary school level. For primary school students, there is no valid instrument for assessing the outcomes of their science inquiry. The aim of the current study was to…

Motivation for reading is important to comprehension and has been studied extensively in offline reading contexts. However, little is known about the role of motivation in online reading, a new and increasingly important context for reading, largely because of a lack of valid and reliable instruments to estimate a student's motivation for online…

Instruments for assessing secondary students' conceptual understanding of core concepts in biology are needed by educational practitioners and researchers alike. Most instruments available for secondary biology (years 9 to 12) focus only on highly specific biological concepts instead of multiple core concepts. This study describes the development…

There are currently many mathematics anxiety rating scales designed typically for adult and older children populations, yet there remains a lack of assessment tools for younger children (< 7 years of age) despite a recent focus on this age range. Following previous testing and validation, the 26-item iteration of the Children's Mathematics…