The DEC Recommended Practices provide guidance to families and professionals about the most effective ways to improve learning outcomes and promote development of young children, birth through age 5, who have, or are at-risk for, developmental delays or disabilities. "Assessment: Recommended Practices for Young Children and Families" is…

Assessment is an important part of an overall quality educational program and is, in fact, an integral part of improving classroom instruction. The purpose of educational assessments is to provide an academic check- up and to give educators and parents meaningful information on what students know and can do, and how well they are progressing…

Given the rapid growth of diversity in schools across the country, teacher educators are turning to innovative ways to redesign their programs. In this article, we describe efforts of a dual licensure program in which undergraduate teachers-in-training acquired knowledge and skills in core content, as well as evidence-based pedagogy and discipline…

In this article the authors describe a three-step instructional coaching cycle that can helps coaches become more effective. The article provides the steps and related components to: (1) Identify; (2) Learn; and (3) Improve. While the instructional coaching cycle is only one effective coaching program, coaches also need professional learning that…

This piece is framed by questions we are often asked when we talk about online reading assessments and instruction with teachers. We begin with some of the lessons we have learned in our own experiences with designing measures of online reading comprehension. Then we share our thoughts about key design considerations as well as some of the biggest…

Background: There is a need for brief progress monitoring measures of behavioral and emotional symptoms for youth in out-of-home care. The Symptoms and Functioning Severity Scale (SFSS; Bickman et al. in Manual of the peabody treatment progress battery. Vanderbilt University, Nashville, 2010) is one measure that has clinician and youth short forms…

Principals are an integral member of a child's education. Their job is not only to manage the day to day affairs of a school, but to be an instructional leader. Much research has been conducted to determine the characteristics of effective school leaders and how these leaders turn their schools into effective learning spaces. Instructional leaders…

Today's students are preparing to enter a world in which higher education and the workforce are demanding higher-level skills than ever before. To ensure all students are ready for success after high school, the Common Core State Standards establish a set of learning goals that work grade-by-grade, step-by-step, to prepare them to meet challenges…

This article explores how information visualization techniques can be applied to learning analytics data to help teachers and students deal with the abundance of learner traces. We also investigate how the affordances of large interactive surfaces can facilitate a collaborative sense-making environment for multiple students and teachers to explore…

Physical activity in infancy is essential for early brain development. Development in the early years is the most rapid at any time during life. Monitoring functional movement skills of infants and toddlers frequently (3-week intervals) and quickly (minutes) produces information on whether development is on track or in need of intervention. To…

Students with persistent and severe reading difficulties pose a significant challenge for educators. The primary purpose of this article is to provide a detailed demonstration of data-based individualization (DBI) implementation in the area of reading. Also provided are various resources a teacher may access to learn more about the instructional…

While its importance for promoting learning is well-documented, feedback can only promote learning to the extent that it is acted on by learners. However, there is evidence that students often have difficulty understanding feedback or with knowing how to act on it and/or are not necessarily receptive to the feedback provided. These kinds of…

The purpose of this evaluation was to determine the effectiveness of the Ascending to Men (ATM) program using ATM students', mentors', and program managers' perceptions and experiences and ATM students' academic performance on the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR). ATM is a mentoring-based program designed to support boys of…

The Board of Education's mission is to equitably educate the whole child so that every student graduates with the tools to reach their full potential (Houston Independent School District (HISD), 2019). To succeed in their mission, the board participates in Lone Star Governance, whose intent is to provide a continuous improvement model for…

University of Minnesota educators use an integrated pest management (IPM) survey conducted during private pesticide applicator training as an educational, needs assessment, and evaluation tool. By incorporating the IPM Assessment, as the survey is called, into a widely attended program and using TurningPoint audience response devices, Extension…