Several instruments previously validated for use in school library research were tested for their appropriateness in the context of public libraries' summer reading programs for youth. The researchers were also interested in whether the connection between perceived competence in one's own information skills and perceived competence in one's own…

Recently, student outcomes have bubbled to the top of debates about how to evaluate teaching in community and liberal arts colleges, universities, and professional schools, but even more international attention has been riveted on how outcomes are being used to evaluate teachers and administrators K-12 (Harris, 2012; Rowen & Raudenbush, 2016;…

Many schools identified by states as needing improvement through their Elementary and Secondary Education Act waivers have selected Response to Intervention (RTI), a three-tiered instruction program sometimes referred to as tiered levels of instruction, as one of their main strategies for improving school performance and closing achievement gaps.…

Regional Educational Laboratory Midwest assisted Milwaukee Public Schools in developing a fidelity monitoring system for measuring schools' progress in implementing Response to Intervention (RTI). The study examined the ratings produced by that system to determine the system's reliability, schools' progress in implementing RTI, and whether ratings…

In this paper, the Classroom Learning Activities Checklist (CLAC) is proposed as a classroom observation measure that effectively captures the classroom environments and strategies that support self-regulation via task-oriented learning in young students. The CLAC's dimensionality, reliability, and concurrent and predictive validity evidence are…

The primary goal of this study was to test an innovative way of assessing students' teamwork skills in a controlled environment. Twenty-four second year students from Western University of Health Sciences (WesternU) participated in the experimental group and 22 third year students from WesternU participated in the control group. Students in the…

Successful integration of mobile learning (m-learning) technologies in education primarily demands that teachers' perception of such technologies should be determined. Therefore, the perceptions of teachers are of great significance. There is no available instrument that assesses teachers' perceptions of m-learning. Our research provided the first…

Family Adaptability and Cohesion Evaluation Scale (FACES) IV was developed to tap the full continuum of the cohesion and flexibility dimensions from the Circumplex Model of Marital and Family Systems. Six scales were developed, with two balanced scales and four unbalanced scales designed to tap low and high cohesion (disengaged and enmeshed) and…

Background: Emotional/psychological child maltreatment (ECM) is a major public health problem with serious consequences including emotional and behavioral problems. Nevertheless, ECM is an understudied area. Objectives: The aims of this review are to identify measures of ECM and to evaluate their psychometric properties and utilities. We provide a…

This article reports on the development and the exploration of the underlying psychometric properties of the School Counselor Self-Advocacy Questionnaire, a measure of skills school counselors can use to advocate for their roles and programs. An exploratory factor analysis (N = 188) suggested a unidimensional model, and a confirmatory factor…

It is important to explore score reliability in virtually all studies, because tests are not reliable. The present paper explains the most frequently used reliability estimate, coefficient alpha, so that the coefficient's conceptual underpinnings will be understood. Researchers need to understand score reliability because of the possible impact…

In 1991, Herbert Kohl argued against the inaccurate and incomplete story of Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott that appeared prominently within texts and trade books of that era (Kohl 1991). He contended the biased perspective stripped Montgomery's African American community of their courage, intelligence, and moral conviction. Kohl…

In a world characterized by interconnectedness and interdependence, it is essential that teachers are able to effectively teach with a global perspective. To that end, it is necessary for teacher education programs to understand how students view the world around them to be able to best prepare them to teach with this global teaching perspective.…

This article describes the development, validation and application of a Rasch-based instrument, the Elementary School Science Classroom Environment Scale (ESSCES), for measuring students' perceptions of constructivist practices within the elementary science classroom. The instrument, designed to complement the Reformed Teaching Observation…

The purpose of this study was to test a hypothesized model that proposes a causal relationship between motivation and academic achievement on the acquisition of jazz theory knowledge. A reliability analysis of the latent variables ranged from 0.92 to 0.94. Confirmatory factor analyses of the motivation (standardized root mean square residual…