The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) testing is conducted every 3 years by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD; oecd.org) with 15-year-olds across the globe. Students complete a battery of tests in science, reading, and mathematics and complete an attitudinal survey. The goal of the PISA testing is…

For assessment contexts where both a paper-based test and an on-screen assessment are available as alternatives, it is still common for the paper-based test to be prepared first with questions later transferred into an on-screen testing platform. One challenge with this is that some questions cannot be transferred. One solution might be for…

Successive relearning involves practicing to-be-learned content until a designated level of mastery is achieved in each of multiple practice sessions. As compared with practicing the content to the same criterion in a single session, successive relearning has been shown to dramatically boost students' retention of simple verbal materials. Does the…

The purpose of these notes is to generalize and extend a challenging geometry problem from a mathematics competition. The notes also contain solution sketches pertaining to the problems discussed.

The aim of this study was to investigate how pictorial representations with different semiotic characteristics affect additive word problem solving by kindergartners. The focus of the study is on three categories of additive problems (change problems, combine problems and equalize problems) and on representational pictures with different semiotic…

Homework is prevalent in mathematics courses, as are cumulative final exams. This study incorporated the memory science concepts of the "testing effect" and "spacing effect" in the homework and final exam of college mathematics courses. By replacing some new homework problems with review problems, students had additional…

This mixed-method study aims to explore the feasibility of using the game-based, multimodal representation of mathematical problems to support middle school students' practice and performance of math problem representation and solving. A three-dimensional architectural simulation game, called E-Rebuild, was developed to engage students in…

Technology-based assessments that involve collaboration among students offer many sources of process data, although it remains unclear which aspects of these data are most meaningful for making inferences about students' collaborative skills. Recent research has focused mainly on theory-based rubrics for qualitative coding of process data (e.g.,…

Licensure tests play a critical role in any profession. Well-designed tests both delineate the core competencies that are required to enter a profession and provide evidence that candidates can safely practice in the profession. They also identify the professional knowledge and skill that differentiates any educated individual from the…

Since its introduction in 2017, National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) has been contracted by Ofqual to develop, deliver and analyse the results of the National Reference Test (NRT) in English and maths. The NRT is administered annually and shows if student performance in English and maths at GCSE level has changed from year-to-year.…

A typical mathematics assignment consists of one or two dozen practice problems relating to the same skill or concept, yet empirical evidence suggests that there is little or no long-term benefit from working more than a few problems of the same kind in immediate succession. Alternatively, randomized experiments in the laboratory and classroom…

Mathematics anxiety is a major impediment to achievement in mathematics and science academic domains. Although important steps have been made in understanding the psychological processes of mathematics anxiety, as well as developing promising interventions, less is known about the relationship among mathematics anxiety, affective and biological…

Students from England and Wales had their A-level results in 2020 decided by a 'triple lock' system as traditional examinations were cancelled due to the pandemic. Therefore, there was a fear that students were either being unfairly judged (Arden University 2020) or would enter university with a reduced understanding of concepts leading to an…

Prior research on the Measures of Academic Progress (MAP), a computer-adaptive test distributed by the Northwest Evaluation Association, has primarily focused on the Reading MAP for screening/benchmarking in elementary grades. The purpose of this study was to explore the functional form of growth and the extent to which student variability in…

Differential Item Function (DIF) analysis is commonly employed to examine potential bias produced by a test item. Since its introduction DIF analyses have focused on potential bias related to broad categories of oppression, including gender, racial stratification, economic class, and ableness. More recently, efforts to examine the effects of…