SIETTE is a web-based adaptive testing system. It implements Computerized Adaptive Tests. These tests are tailor-made, theory-based tests, where questions shown to students, finalization of the test, and student knowledge estimation is accomplished adaptively. To construct these tests, SIETTE has an authoring environment comprising a suite of…

The purpose of the study was to investigate the impact of an experimental online learning tool on student performance. By applying cognitive load theory to online learning, the experimental tool used was designed to minimize cognitive load during the instructional and learning process. This tool enabled students to work with programming code that…

The purpose of the current investigation was to determine if the experimental analysis of antecedent variables conducted in English and in Spanish would identify effective and ineffective instructions for response accuracy for Spanish-speaking English language learners. An antecedent variable (i.e., directive complexity) arranged in a hierarchical…

In 1993 Wicklein conducted a study to determine the present and the future critical issues and problems facing the technology education (TE) profession. The Wicklein study questioned 25 panelists from 15 states and the District of Columbia to ascertain the issues and problems facing TE. However, in the Wicklein study, only seven of the panelists…

This study investigates the problems that translators and Arab learners of English encounter in translating Arabic sentences containing the Arabic discourse marker "fa" into English. Several types of texts were surveyed in order to identify the salient functions that this marker has in Arabic discourse. Five major functions were identified:…

This study provides information about the total and component scores of the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL). First, the study provides comparative global and component estimates of test-retest, alternate-form, and internal-consistency reliability, controlling for sources of measurement error inherent in the examinees and the testing…

In contrast to multiple-choice test questions, figural response items call for constructed responses and rely upon figural material, such as illustrations and graphs, as the response medium. Figural response questions in various science domains were created and administered to a sample of 347 fourth, 365 eighth, and 322 twelfth graders. Data were…

Results of a national survey on foreign language enrollments in United States public secondary schools are summarized. Aggregate data are provided for fall 1989, and more detailed data are included for fall 1990. Data indicate a 4.5% increase in secondary school language enrollments nationally since 1985. The increase for high schools alone was…

A study investigated the disparity between the English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) competence of South African black children and the competence required to comprehend content subject textbooks. Two ESL schemes and two fifth-year general science textbooks were analyzed for differences in vocabulary, syntax, speech acts, cohesion and coherence.…

Over the past 3 years, the Mathematics Department of Grossmont College, in California, has examined the issues of course standards, instructor grading variability, and course placement. In 1990, a study was conducted to determine if the Elementary Algebra instructors with lower pass rates had higher standards, and if their students had a higher…

This curriculum guide for Indiana's foreign language education (1) establishes what proficiency is at the end of each of four instructional levels, through sets of competencies, or learning outcomes, to be achieved throughout that level; (2) defines progress throughout the sequence of levels in terms that can be readily understood; and (3)…

The strategies examinees employ when making item difficulty level choices in self-adapted computerized testing were investigated. Subjects were 148 college students (88 females and 60 males) in an introductory statistics course. The primary instrument was a self-adapted computerized algebra test used to measure student readiness for the statistics…

Assessors of literature learning have long been concerned with the issue of difficulty and the fundamental contradictions in the term "examination of literary understanding." An alternate view of literature is that although texts are finally indeterminate, a group of them has been set aside by communities as forming a part of the…

Two studies were conducted to examine teachers' and young children's perceptions of persistence in classroom settings. In the first, 35 elementary school teachers responded to interview questions about (1) the appropriateness of persistence in relation to other strategies children could use to accomplish difficult tasks, (2) children's…

To determine how the difficulty of print materials affected elementary school students' sight copying accuracy and productivity and to explain correlate variance related to copying, 149 students in grades four, six, and eight were assigned materials to copy for three minutes. All subjects copied passages at grade level and at two grades above and…