Educators everywhere are responding to the realities of student learning loss, unfinished learning, or disrupted learning as they continue to experience the lasting impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Students of color and students attending high poverty schools experienced the largest achievement declines, increasing preexisting gaps for already…

In an increasingly data-driven society, making decisions with data is a requirement not only for research scientists but also for navigating life more generally (Kjelvik & Schultheis, 2019). An informed citizenry must be prepared to discover patterns, predict outcomes, make decisions with data, and evaluate data-based claims for legitimacy and…

Teacher preparation programs are increasingly expected to use data on pre-service teacher (PST) skills to drive program improvement and provide targeted supports. Observational ratings are especially vital, but also prone to measurement issues. Scores may be influenced by factors unrelated to PSTs' instructional skills, including rater standards…

In the existing literature, scholars have proposed various indices to measure the lexical richness (LR) of English as a foreign language (EFL) writing. However, there are currently issues of redundant indices and inconsistent usage. Attempting to address the research question of which indices are the most sensitive and effective ones to…

This extensively updated teaching resource provides over 100 engaging, full-color visuals with explanations of how they can be used to stimulate mathematics learning, to explain mathematical concepts, and to assess students' mathematical understanding in grades K-8. Readers are provided with a strong mathematical background, downloadable copies of…

Large-scale assessments, a prominent part of education in the United States, are the accountability measures used to determine policies, programs, and the allocation of resources. The U.S. school population continues to have an increasing number of culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students, indicating the need to reevaluate the…

This article provides an overview of the instructional activity implemented to introduce the authors' first-grade students to the concept of measuring, collecting, and recording temperature data as part of a unit on weather. The activities introduced involved approximately one week of instructional time. However, the application of the skill…

Contemporary views on learning highlight that deep learning occurs not simply by accumulating knowledge, but by using and applying knowledge as one engages in disciplinary activity. Increasingly, those concerned with education policy and practice are shifting priorities toward supporting deeper learning by emphasizing the importance of students'…

Classroom assessment has become a cornerstone of today's standards-based system of education. However, recent policy developments, professional standards, and variable assessment education have led to significant variability in teachers' approaches to assessment. The primary purpose of this research was to use a new instrument predicated on…

This report is an update of the assessment principles and guidelines for English language learners published in 2013 (Thurlow, Liu, Ward, & Christensen). That report, which was developed by the Improving the Validity of Assessment Results for English Language Learners with Disabilities (IVARED) project, presented essential principles of…

Given the exponential growth in the popularity of early foreign language programs, coupled with an emphasis of evidence-based instruction, assessing young learners' (YLs) foreign language abilities has moved to center stage. This article canvasses how the field of assessing young learners of foreign languages has evolved over the past two decades.…

The outcomes of educational assessments undoubtedly have real implications for students, teachers, schools and education in the widest sense. Assessment results are, for example, used to award qualifications that determine future educational or vocational pathways of students. The results obtained by students in assessments are also used to gauge…

Given the longstanding role of grades in education, and their increased use for high-stakes decisions including student mobility, admission, selection, and accountability, this paper presents a systematic review of grading policies across all 10 Canadian provinces and 3 territories. In total, 23 policies were inductively analyzed for their…

Relying on teachers' assessments for the information currently provided by standardized test scores would save instructional time, better capture the true abilities of diverse students, and reduce the problem of teaching to the test. A California high school is implementing standards-based reporting, ensuring that teacher-issued grades function as…

Item response theory (IRT) models are the main psychometric approach for the development, evaluation, and refinement of multi-item instruments and scaling of latent traits, whereas multilevel models are the primary statistical method when considering the dependence between person responses when primary units (e.g., students) are nested within…