PISA (the Programme for International Student Assessment) is a triennial survey of the knowledge and skills of 15-year-olds. It is the product of collaboration between participating countries and economies through the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), and draws on leading international expertise to develop valid…

Instructional strategies determine the approaches an educator may take to achieve learning objectives. Research has shown that sets of strategies or instructional models anchored on social constructivist learning theories were found to be effective in enhancing active participation. It is particularly influential and meaningful in many areas of…

Results of a survey of college and university students of modern languages in Great Britain are presented in three separate reports. The first concerns current classroom practice in language teaching, including how students spend their time on language-related activities (e.g., attending lectures in a foreign language, doing translations, using a…

This book grew out of a conference sponsored by the Educational Testing Service and the University of Wisconsin's National Center for Research in Mathematical Science Education that focused on assessment issues in mathematics education. The book's 16 chapters focus on clarifying and articulating the goals of assessment and instruction. They are…

This curriculum focuses on providing students in grades 7 through 9 with information on the prevention of disabilities. Introductory material describes the curriculum's development; its overall goals; and its four elements (awareness, knowledge, application of knowledge, and life-style and behavior patterns). The introduction also provides…

This report is one of a series that documents progress in understanding the effects of new assessment based on case studies in three elementary schools. It presents the preliminary analyses of interviews with teachers about their knowledge, beliefs, and practices related to assessment and instruction in reading and mathematics. Changes in beliefs…

Information literacy is the ability to use information purposefully and effectively. It is a holistic, interactive learning process encompassing the skills-based phases of defining, locating, selecting, organizing, presenting, and evaluating information from sources that include books and other media, experiences, and people; being able to…

Diagnoses of students' performance on procedural mathematical tasks need to display a certain level of stability and robustness if they are to be used as the basis for remediation, particularly with computer-delivered instruction. The purpose of this study was to compare two diagnostic approaches for describing students' (n=231) errors in algebra…

In the past decade, there have been ample interests in the assessment of cognitive and affective processes and products for the purposes of meaningful learning. Meaningful measurement (MM) has been proposed which is in accordance with a humanistic constructivist information-processing perspective. Students' responses to the assessment tasks are…

This paper reports on two studies conducted at Washburn University (Kansas) to evaluate the ability of preservice fine arts teachers to transmit knowledge of subject to students through the demonstration of teaching competencies. Answers were sought to the following questions: (1) what were the perceptions relative to student teachers' knowledge…

This newsletter presents a brief summary of central findings of a national survey designed to gather a systematic profile of the range and type of telecommunications activities being conducted by teachers for professional development or student learning. Responses were received from 550 of the 1,100 educators who were contacted through…

This study describes what some urban teachers at one school believe and know about literacy teaching and learning, and relates what they believe and know to two contrasting viewpoints about the way students become literate (mechanism and contextualism). Quantitative and qualitative measures were used to create summaries of teacher beliefs and…

Reform proposals for mathematics teaching and learning have clear implications for significant change in curriculum and in traditional teacher roles. One contribution to the reform effort was the SummerMath for Teachers program, an inservice program committed to helping teachers develop constructivist orientations to teaching and learning by…

This paper describes a study by Project ACCESS (Addressing Computer Concerns of Educators of Special Students) in Michigan to ascertain the existing level of knowledge and use of technology in special education. Analysis of questionnaires returned by 346 directors or supervisors of special education indicated the following findings: the majority…

The impact of the Channel One school newscasts on student knowledge of current events and on student attitudes was studied with tenth and eleventh graders in six suburban high schools in the Midwest. Three schools (464 students) received the newscast and the remaining schools (604 subjects) did not. Current events knowledge was assessed with a…