This study investigates the assessment strategies used in social-studies courses at the high-school level in Turkey and examines how teachers and students perceive them. Results indicate that short-answer tests are most frequently used to assess student performance, followed by oral tests. Multiple-choice and essay tests are also occasionally…

The authors investigated the relationship between self-perceptions of ability and achievement in math, science, and English from Grades 8 to 11 (N = 342). A state-trait model that included an association between stable (i.e., trait-like) components of self-perceptions and achievement as well as time-specific (i.e., state-like) effects during the…

Although fundamental beginning reading skills are highly related to later reading success (National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2000), it remains unclear how these beginning reading skills impact the social adjustment of kindergarten through second grade children. Therefore, the purposes of this study were: (a) to examine the…

This article addresses the validity of teacher evaluation measures produced by the Tennessee Value Added Assessment System (TVAAS). The system analyzes student test score data and estimates the effects of individual teachers on score gains. These effects are used to construct teacher value-added measures of teaching effectiveness. We describe the…

"Testing for Justice Rationale" calls for schools to meet the needs of all children. The needs of children can be determined by comparing what children can do with what they can learn to do. Any discrepancy between achievement and potential indicates a need and it is only through adequate testing that these needs can be determined. This…

In this article, the author discusses her views on philosophies and theories by Lev Semenovich Vygotsky and Howard Gardner. Here, she argues that Vygotsky's ideas should be viewed through the prism of Gardner's theory of Multiple Intelligences, and that the combination of these concepts can shed new light on education--on teaching and learning.…

The injustices of tracking or ability grouping according to degrees of learning, first noted in reading classes throughout elementary grades, can have a bad effect on little children, who do not understand these injustices. In the history of the rural school, where individual help and cooperative learning were practiced, no child was labeled a…

This study investigated whether or not selected academic ability indices and personal characteristics of 65 teachers (all were Bowling Green State University teacher candidates who began their teacher training in 1985 and who by June 30, 1989 had completed their first year of full-time classroom teaching) were associated with longitudinal changes…

This study examined the relative effects of homogeneous versus heterogeneous ability grouping on performance and attitudes of students working cooperatively during interactive videodisc instruction. After two cooperative training sessions 80 fourth through sixth grade students, classified as high and low ability, were randomly assigned to…

This study defines efficacy for teachers as a teacher's sense of ability to function as an instructional leader in the classroom, and knowledge of, and contribution to, school instructional policy. A brief review of two previous studies indicates that school policies and the mission of the school tend to affect teachers' beliefs about their…

Since the late 1960's, researchers have been concerned with the influence of teacher expectations on student performance. Teacher expectations generally can be categorized into three types: assessments of ability, predictions of progress, and natural discrepancies between teacher estimates and actual student performance. Expectations can have the…

Disaggregation of standardized test data is essential in determining the differential effects of the school's climate and program upon groups of students formed by social class. In a recent secondary school study comparing the outcomes of two approaches to school assessment (the Connecticut School Effectiveness Survey vs. The National Study of…

The relationship between visual-motor perception and classroom behavior was investigated for a sample of 76 first-grade children. Analysis of regression indicated that three types of classroom behavior tend to be associated with poor visual-motor perception. These behaviors are described. (Author)

A study involving teachers and administrators from 16 elementary, middle, and high schools in Tennessee investigated the factorial structure of the Self-Directed Learning Readiness Scale (SDLRS). The SDLRS includes 58 Likert-like items designed to measure the readiness of adult learners to assume self-direction in the learning process. Study…

This report provides a picture of students who entered a university engineering program and then persisted or left the program. It examines students' mathematical-mechanical abilities, psychological-motivational aspects, support services, and perceptions of the world of engineering work. It also identifies problems that women and blacks…