The author provides information about reliability and areas that educators should examine in determining if an assessment is consistent and trustworthy for use, and how it should be interpreted in making decisions about students. Reliability areas that are discussed in the column include internal consistency, test-retest or stability, inter-scorer…

Multidimensional measuring instruments are often used in behavioral, social, educational, marketing, and biomedical research. For these scales, the paper discusses how to find the optimal score based on their components that is associated with the highest possible reliability. Within the framework of structural equation modeling, an approach to…

This technical report provides an authoritative bibliographic resource of all the studies conducted on "easyCBM"® and published on the main website for Behavioral Research and Teaching under Publications (https://brtprojects.org). The "easyCBM"© software is a direct descendent of "Curriculum-based Measurement" (CBM)…

Aspiring teachers must develop an in-depth understanding of high-quality instructional practices. In order to prepare, instruct, and coach aspiring teachers, the National Institute for Excellence in Teaching (NIET) has developed a the NIET Aspiring Teacher Rubric (ATR) based on principles of excellence in instruction. This research brief…

This paper describes a process to define a comprehensive list of exemplars for seven core Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM) diagnostic criteria for autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and report on interrater reliability in applying these exemplars to determine ASD case classification. Clinicians completed an iterative process to map specific…

Universal screening is one of the most-common topics and well-accepted best practices within the field of gifted and talented education. There appears to be little disagreement that universally screening all students as part of a gifted and talented identification process results in fewer missed students. But surprisingly, there is little guidance…

The product Bayes factor (PBF) synthesizes evidence for an informative hypothesis across heterogeneous replication studies. It can be used when fixed- or random effects meta-analysis fall short. For example, when effect sizes are incomparable and cannot be pooled, or when studies diverge significantly in the populations, study designs, and…

This article outlines a readily applicable procedure for point and interval estimation of the population discrepancy between reliability and the popular Cronbach's coefficient alpha for unidimensional multi-component measuring instruments with uncorrelated errors, which are widely used in behavioral and social research. The method is developed…

Students who are engaged writers are likely to produce better writing and to enjoy writing more than students who are disengaged writers. Yet, we are unaware of any existing tool that validly and reliably measures writing engagement. In this article, we describe what writing engagement is and why it is important. Then, we present the Writing…

Sample size and statistical power are important factors to consider when planning a research synthesis. Power analysis methods have been developed for fixed effect or random effects models, but until recently these methods were limited to simple data structures with a single, independent effect per study. Recent work has provided power…

Instructional coaching, informed by observation tools that measure teachers' practices, has been effective in improving teaching quality in early learning programs. However, existing measurement tools limit teachers' abilities to implement this type of instructional coaching at scale. To address this challenge, a team at SRI Education, along with…

Contribution: This article describes the process used to create a questionnaire to evaluate the usability of mobile learning applications (CECAM). The questionnaire includes specific questions to assess user interface usability and pedagogical usability. Background: Nowadays, mobile applications are expanding rapidly and are commonly used in…

Psychometrics is the field of designing tests and assessments to measure certain psychological concepts. It is chiefly concerned with two fundamental properties: reliability and validity. These properties are often influenced by confounding variables: other things that can influence performance but are not what you are trying to measure. Here, I…

One Extension Specialist implemented a STEM pilot robotics program across three middle school settings. A program evaluation to provide guidance and recommendations for future development, implementation, and continued evaluation was conducted as part of a larger study. This process led to the development of a condensed STEM survey that can be…

Assessments are one of the most important--and often misunderstood--elements of education. In most cases, tests are administered by the state as well as by districts and schools. Assessments at each of these levels have distinct purposes, yield different information, and are part of a powerful, coordinated approach to improving student outcomes.…