The Skill Acquisition Measures (SAM) were designed by the Lancaster (Pennsylvania) School District as criterion referenced tests for mathematics. This manual consists of copies of the student test forms for level 6, with additional information for the teacher's use. Each of the test items is presented with the correct answers and the criteria for…

The development of a powerful learning environment aiming at the acquisition and transfer of general thinking skills through learning to program in LOGO was studied. The following conditions were sought: (1) sufficient knowledge of the LOGO primitives and concepts; (2) mastery of the thinking skills within the programming context; and (3) explicit…

In Sweden the International Association Evaluation of Educational Achievement in written composition study involved 4,500 students from grades 6 and 9, as well as students from the terminal grades of the upper secondary school. Students wrote essays of various kinds and replied to questionnaires. Essays were evaluated according to content,…

It is argued in this paper that a truly holistic approach to school empowerment would legitimize the student as a stakeholder in the educational process. The initial field testing of two developmentally based student feedback mechanisms is described. Focus groups were used with sixth-grade students to assess the "goodness of fit" between…

A previous study of the perceived social realism of television series featuring families was both replicated and extended with a sample of 1692 second, sixth, and tenth graders in 42 schools in southern California. The "Viewing Frequency" instrument and the "Realism" instrument took children 10-15 minutes to complete. Content…

These item specifications were developed as a part of the Arkansas "Minimum Performance Testing Program" (MPT). There is one item specification for each instructional objective included in the MPT. The purpose of an item specification is to provide an overview of the general content and format of test items used to measure an…

This handbook was designed for use in conjunction with an ongoing program in the New York (New York) public schools to improve students' test-taking skills. Directed towards sixth grade teachers and their supervisors, this guide has been developed for implementation as an integral part of the school's ongoing instruction in communication arts and…

This document, developed by the Illinois State Boaord of Education, identifies five state goals for learning in the fine arts, and provides sample learning objectives for grades, 3, 6, 8, 10, 12, which are consistent with the goals. The state goals for learning are broadly stated expressions of what the Illinois State Board of Education expects…

Student achievement test scores were compared and equated, using three different testing methods: paper-administered, computer-administered, and computerized adaptive testing. The tests were developed from third and sixth grade mathematics item banks of the California Assessment Program. The paper and the computer-administered tests were identical…

The educational television series "Across Cultures" was evaluated to examine the effectiveness of the series and how the programs were structured to attain objectives. Designed to complement sixth- and seventh-grade social studies textbooks, the series on world cultures is composed of thirteen 15-minute programs about three widely…

This research was conducted to compare the effects of a cooperative instructional context with a competitive instructional context on the verbal and nonverbal behaviors of same-sex student pairs within a microcomputer environment. Subjects were 20 male and 20 female sixth-grade students who were randomly assigned to same-sex pairs. All pairs were…

The Alcohol Misuse Prevention Study (AMPS) presented an alcohol education program to fifth and sixth grade students based on social learning theory. The AMPS program introduced students to the concept of social pressure (especially peer pressure) to misuse alcohol and to strategies to effectively counter such pressure. The program was evaluated in…

To examine the role of phonetic code in memory, a study investigated the use of phonetic recoding strategies in fifth and sixth graders identified as good and poor readers. Subjects--120 students with IQ scores in the average range--were divided evenly between both grades. Thirty subjects from each grade who scored above the 50th percentile on the…

As standardized tests receive more critical scrutiny and fall into more disfavor, members of the educational community search for alternative measures of assessing schooling and learning. If one of the goals of education in a democracy is to encourage students to express, develop and share ideas, the discussion setting is a logical arena in which…

This paper describes the development of a language arts test to assess the consistency of student response patterns and the feasibility of using the test to diagnose students' misconceptions. The studies were part of a project to develop computerized adaptive testing for the language arts with software to diagnose student errors. The…