In recent times there has been considerable commentary regarding the need to enhance mathematical assessment as evidenced by "Numeracy, A Priority for All: Challenges for Australian Schools" (2000). This emphasis on assessment is timely because, although the mathematical reform movement has produced much needed improvements in both curriculum and instruction, changes in assessment have not kept pace. As Ridgway states in "From Barrier to Lever: Revising Roles for Assessment in...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Change, Curriculum Development, Educational Assessment, Mathematics...
Professional development (PD) for the improvement of educational practice has attracted a great deal of attention in recent years. Although experts acknowledge the importance of PD, many PD programmes have little effect on educational practice. This article identifies influences on the effective implementation of Invitational Education (IE) within the framework of professional development that were identified during a qualitative study in schools in two states. Specific categories affecting the...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Practices, Professional Development, Educational Change, Research...
This study uses Partial Credit Rasch analysis to study a complex data set of student responses to survey items relating to chance and data. The items were administered in the classroom and collected from 1993 to 2003 in the Australian state of Tasmania. Data were collected from a total of 5514 individual students across Grades 3 to 11 over the decade and of these students 896 provided at least one repeated measure. As students completed a core of common items, Rasch analysis could be performed...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Elementary Secondary Education, Foreign Countries, Longitudinal Studies, Mathematics...
Ever since technology became a major component in education, schools have been charged with teaching and integrating technology to enhance learning and ensure technology literacy. However, there is still no consistent definition, process, or assessment in place, leading to concerns about accountability. Because technology standards are seemingly arbitrary and open to multiple interpretations, each school district, each school, and even each teacher will have to develop their own definition,...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Industry, Federal Legislation, Technology Integration, Educational Technology,...
Best practices in the identification of the twice-exceptional point to the use of multidimensional assessment that outlines specific areas of strength and concern. Students who are twice-exceptional remain a misunderstood population in schools, thus making identification that much more difficult. The purpose of this study was to review the extant literature in the field of twice-exceptional studies and to design a plan for identification to be used by school districts. This article reports on...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Disproportionate Representation, Academically Gifted, Underachievement, Scores,...
In 1996, a new curricular framework for vocational education in schools called "Lernfelder" (learning arenas) was implemented in Germany. In the concept of learning arenas learning situations in schools have to be related to work activity in a particular occupation. For this reason work process orientation currently plays a significant role in German curriculum development. However, there is not just one approach on how to transform work activity into vocational curricula, but various...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Curriculum Development, Vocational Education, Training Methods,...
The purpose of this study is to demonstrate that dynamic assessment based instruction increases children's learning by using a quasi-experimental research design in Korea. In this study, dynamic assessment is defined as a measurement method of the zone of proximal development (ZPD) as well as the qualitative and quantitative diagnostic information for individual children. In addition, dynamic assessment based instruction is defined as a teaching method using the diagnostic information types in...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Teaching Methods, Research Design, Experimental Groups, Data...
This paper compares how educational reform documents in Korea and the U.S.A. conceptualize teachers and teacher education and examines how, if at all, the discourses of one country appear to influence those of the other. Special attention is paid to the ways in which reform documents incorporate different conceptions of professionalism in framing and in proposing remedies for the problems with teachers and teacher education. Eighteen reform documents issued in the two countries by national...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Educational Change, Comparative Education, Teacher Education...
The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) has greatly affected the current status of career and technical education (CTE). Since the implementation of NCLB, there has been increased course-taking in science, math, and the other traditional academic subjects by high school students in this country. Research shows that the consequence has been a loss of opportunity for many students to enroll in CTE--resulting in declines in CTE enrollments at the secondary level. A 2002 study found that over the coming...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Federal Legislation, Technical Education, Teacher Education Programs, Vocational...
Many educational initiatives have been and continue to be based on a macro-social system understanding of communal roles, values, norms, interactions, perceptions, and realities. This practice neglects the unique impediments and social norms that exist within the myriad of micro-social systems in the United States. This work draws attention to the disassociation of America's inner-city youth through an analysis of educational initiatives and macro-social system beliefs that have prescribed a...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Urban Youth, Urban Areas, Educational Improvement, Critical Theory, Educational...
Technology education has progressed through several iterations over the past 100 years and continues to evolve as the primary medium for preparing children and youth in technological literacy. Over the past 20 years, technology education has worked diligently to move from a subject field where students primarily manipulated materials (industrial arts) to one of systematic instruction about technological systems and enterprises (technology education). The "Standards for Technological...
Topics: ERIC Archive, National Surveys, Educational Change, Foreign Countries, Technological Literacy,...
This article focuses on issues related to boys, literacies, and schooling as played out in the Australian context. It reflects on the swathe of populist discourse centring on boys, and on literacy, that drives a potentially divisive education agenda. In providing more nuanced analyses of the debates surrounding the disputed territory of boys, literacies, and schooling, the article offers examples of disaggregated literacy test data to demonstrate the importance of adopting a "which...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Males, Gender Issues, Literacy, Agenda Setting, Public Opinion,...
The German dual apprenticeship system has traditionally been viewed as an effective system for generating a highly skilled workforce in the trades, crafts and service sectors. In addition, countries and systems looking to improve their own approaches to vocational education and training (VET) have considered as exemplary the main features of the "dual system" (that is, two learning sites and shared responsibility between private employers and public vocational schools). Nevertheless,...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Comparative Analysis, Vocational Education, Competency Based...
The poor performance of the education sector in Nigeria has become very worrisome. What is the problem? Is the educational policy faulty or is it the implementation that is faulty? What are the implications for national development? These are the issues explored in this paper, based on a literature review approach. The findings blame the distortions in the educational system on the ineffective implementation engendered primarily by lack of political will, lack of continuity of programs, and...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Educational Policy, Program Implementation, Performance Factors,...
This article reports on continuing education in China. It discusses the emergence of the field in the 1980s, the Chinese characteristics of continuing education, recent developments, and limitations. Continuing education became available in China in the 1980s following a change in government policy and economic reform. It caters mainly for training specialist technicians, although the field has recently diversified to include programs for government officials, leaders of public services,...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Continuing Education, Educational Change, Foreign Countries, Public Policy,...
The author of this article challenges a common assumption made by both critics and defenders of standardized-testing technology (or psychometry), namely that standardized tests "measure" something (culture, ability, etc.). It argues that psychometric practice cannot be classified as a form of measurement and instead is best understood as a marker of social value, an inherently political act. The chapter concludes by suggesting the significance of this argument for debates regarding...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Assessment, Social Values, Psychometrics, Standardized Tests,...
This article argues that, with all of its language about reaching "100% proficiency for all students in twelve years" as an "ambitious, but achievable" goal, the current federal administration seems to be on the side of the children in its No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), but further investigation reveals that many of the practices mentioned in the act may cause more harm than good. The key component in NCLB is to establish an "accountable" education system in...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Federal Legislation, Academic Achievement, Politics of Education, Accountability,...
Without question, the role of business, philanthropy, and other private sector interests in the day-to-day operation of public education has increased significantly over the past 25 years. Pundits of this phenomenon contend that a number of factors have contributed to the increase, such as (1) public dissatisfaction with the performance of school systems; (2) the physical decay of the nation's schools; (3) public dismay over school efforts to eliminate student academic, attendance, and...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Urban Schools, School Restructuring, Private Sector, Intervention, School Districts,...
This paper addresses the extent to which government policy has helped increase the number and diversity of private secondary schools in Hong Kong, which, in turn, has expanded the options for parental choice. Five indicators were selected to measure this objective. They are as follows: (1) Number of private schools and students enrolled; (2) Types of private schools and their curriculum; (3) Number of aided schools joining the Direct Subsidy Scheme; (4) Number of government-built premises...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Secondary Schools, Private Schools, Foreign Countries, Public Policy, Policy...
America's current systems of K-12 and higher education are based on the traditional view that only an elite group of students attends college. Today, the majority of students attend some form of postsecondary education after high school. These students encounter numerous challenges: many do not complete their programs of study, almost half the students in higher education require remediation, and college-going and completion rates are inequitable in terms of income level, race and ethnicity. As...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Higher Education, Elementary Secondary Education, Educational Policy, Articulation...
In few places is higher education so ingrained in a region's economic vitality as in New England. Students from all over the world enroll in New England's institutions of learning and research, bringing resources to finance their education and living expenses that reverberate throughout local and state economies. Human capital-based industries driven by New England's college-trained talent fuel New England's local and state economies. This article traces the economic growth of New England from...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Economic Progress, Higher Education, Economic Impact, Trend Analysis, Educational...
The purpose of this study was to analyze one high school district's use of student survey data to measure district-wide goal achievement. The premise was that student school climate factors may serve as a more robust measure of district goal attainment than the district's use of discrete item analysis. The data were gathered from archived biennial surveys of students between 1999 and 2005. Factor analysis was used to reduce the data from each survey cycle into composite variables. Component...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Academic Achievement, Student Surveys, School Districts, Factor Analysis, Item...
This study examined the congruence between the priorities of the Manitoba Government's "Kindergarten to Senior 4 (K-S4) Education Agenda for Student Success" and priorities of stakeholders in a rural Manitoba school division, and the division's capacity to achieve them. Capacity included three components for success: Legitimization of Alternatives, Diverse Networks, and Resource Mobilization. The findings suggest that the theoretical conceptualizations of how rural areas develop...
Topics: ERIC Archive, School Restructuring, Academic Achievement, Educational Change, Foreign Countries,...
Given the increasing numbers of ESL students in Canadian classrooms, this study investigated how teachers of mainstream classes assess the written work of ESL students and whether they use different assessment strategies for ESL versus non-ESL students. Interviews were conducted with seven mainstream teachers from a private high school in Ontario. Although within-school variation was evident in the participants' approaches to assessing the work of both ESL and non-ESL students, most...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, English (Second Language), Second Language Instruction, Second...
Here is a short presentation of the main statistical indicators for higher education. The analysis was structured on national and regional level and also taking in account the differences between private and state universities. We have focused on some indicators regarding students and teachers flows. Romanian case is a special one, that had no private education during communist era and an exponential development after 1990. (Contains 9 figures and 3 tables.)
Topics: ERIC Archive, Private Education, Higher Education, State Universities, Foreign Countries,...
Because teachers' efforts are central to the success of standards-based reform, it behooves the policy community to look carefully at the beliefs about instruction that are rooted in this reform theory. Building on teacher-centric research on standards-based reform and ideas about teaching practice from research on multicultural education, this paper focuses on the assumptions embedded in Washington state's approach. Survey data from a representative sample of teachers suggest that the state's...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Multicultural Education, Educational Change, Accountability, State Standards,...
Education reforms have affected schools and the educators who work in them. Using state-wide survey data from 1993 and 2003, this study examines how the work of school superintendents has been affected over a ten-year period by these reform initiatives, especially increased demands for accountability. The general message from our data is that superintendents are interested in curriculum and instruction and believe these are important tasks, but the daily realities of their work often subvert...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Change, Accountability, Instructional Leadership, Superintendents,...
The governments of China and South Korea have supported the development of distance education both legislatively and financially. The use of traditional media for this purpose has been successful in both countries, though the evolution to Internet-based education has been only partially successful. This report describes this process in terms of uncritical application of western distance education technology and methodology in environments that are unsuitable for them. Until these issues are...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Distance Education, Foreign Countries, Educational Technology, Technology Uses in...
Since passage of the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) in 2002, state departments of education across the U.S. have been busy creating or modifying school accountability systems to meet NCLB guidelines. Ultimately, NCLB seeks to have all public school students proficient in English/Language Arts and mathematics by 2014. To identify schools in danger of not meeting this goal, states must establish student performance benchmarks and identify schools not making "adequate yearly...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Intervention, Federal Legislation, Educational Improvement, Educational Indicators,...
One of the biggest challenges facing the career and technical education (CTE) community as it works to implement the 2006 Perkins Act is responding to more rigorous requirements for reporting on CTE students' technical skill attainment. The U.S. Department of Education suggested in non-regulatory guidance that states and locals use the number of CTE concentrators who passed technical skill assessments aligned with industry-recognized standards as their performance indicator to fulfill the new...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Student Evaluation, Industry, Educational Assessment, Federal Legislation, Vocational...
Denis Ashton uses technology in his automotive technology program at East Valley Institute of Technology (EVIT) to positively impact student outcomes. Ashton, the department chair for the automotive programs at EVIT, in Mesa, Arizona, says that using an interactive PowerPoint curriculum makes learning fun for students and provides immediate feedback for the teacher. Not only does he know what percentage of the class "gets" it, but he also knows who is not getting it, and if he needs...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Feedback (Response), Learner Engagement, Technical Institutes, Auto Mechanics,...
Rather than regard frequent and subjective testing as a negative, it should prove more beneficial for educators to offer students an opportunity to acquire life skills that will carry them through any test-taking situation. Offering students the skills necessary to succeed not only in the classroom but also through testing is where accountability begins. In this article, the author proposes attaining accountability both in the classroom and on standardized assessments. She stresses that nothing...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Educational Testing, Accountability, Teaching Experience, Educational Objectives,...
This research comprises a brief analysis of the economic model design, projected for poor countries, where complex assessments of the health status, education outcomes and motivation for children with disabilities are impossible to be done; is possible to be applied on a national scale in Georgia, if the actual government has the necessary resources, or, in other countries, having a similar lack of expertise in special education and disabled children assessment. The National Curriculum...
Topics: ERIC Archive, National Curriculum, Audits (Verification), Inclusive Schools, Academic...
With the increased focus on issues of diversity and multiculturalism in the United States and abroad, educators and clinicians have become more and more concerned about the feasibility and validity of their assessment instruments and practices for children and adults from nonWhite backgrounds. Many researchers emphasize that when working with racially diverse groups in multiple settings, issues relating to their cultures often differ from those of the dominant group and thus warrant different...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Multicultural Education, Psychological Evaluation, Cultural Pluralism, Evaluation...
The COLA project has been developing a large bank of assessment items for units across the Scottish further education curriculum since May 2003. These will be made available to learners mainly via colleges' virtual learning environments (VLEs). Many people have been involved in the development of the COLA assessment item bank to ensure a high level of technical and pedagogical quality. Processes have included deciding on appropriate item types and subject areas, training authors, peer-reviewing...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Postsecondary Education, Virtual Classrooms, Test Items,...
This paper draws attention to literature surrounding the subject of computer-assisted assessment (CAA). A brief overview of traditional methods of assessment is presented, highlighting areas of concern in existing techniques. CAA is then defined, and instances of its introduction in various educational spheres are identified, with the main focus of the paper concerning the implementation of CAA. Through referenced articles, evidence is offered to inform practitioners, and direct further...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Student Evaluation, Computer Assisted Testing, Educational Assessment, Program...
Following the political changes of 1994 in South Africa, the decision was taken to replace the traditional skills-based education system at primary and secondary school level (Grades 1-12) with an outcomes-based education system (OBE) . The implementation of the OBE system did not come without problems, giving rise to revised initiatives. The OBE approach, referred to as Curriculum 2005, was introduced into schools in 1998, for all learners in Grades 1-6 and progressively phased in after that....
Topics: ERIC Archive, Outcome Based Education, Foreign Countries, Change Strategies, Educational Change,...
Transition problems from secondary to tertiary level in mathematics have been a recurrent issue in Sweden. This paper summarises the development during the last decades. Results from two recent research studies that illuminate the transition problem are presented. The first one, based on empirical data from a major Swedish technical university, characterises the widening gap, in content and in approach, between secondary school and first year university courses. The second study deals with...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Foreign Countries, Mathematical Logic, Transitional Programs, Achievement Gap,...
Pressure for better measurement of stated learning outcomes has resulted in a demand for more frequent assessment. The resources available are seen to be static or dwindling, but Information and Communications Technology is seen to increase productivity by automating assessment tasks. This paper reviews computer-assisted assessment (CAA) and suggests future developments. A search was conducted of CAA-related literature from the past decade to trace the development of CAA from the beginnings of...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Cultural Influences, Risk, Technology Integration, Computer Assisted Testing,...
Concept maps provide a unique pictorial representation of an individual's understanding of a concept, problem, or idea. As tools in the undergraduate and graduate programs of an institution of higher learning, concept maps provide faculty with interesting and effective ways to assess learning by students in all academic areas. Concept maps can give students and faculty meaningful information about student performance, and indirectly the performance of faculty in the undergraduate and graduate...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Concept Mapping, Program Effectiveness, Student Evaluation, Evaluation Methods,...
Knowledge management (KM) and data-driven decision making (DDDM) are terms that are used with more frequency in teacher education. Although accreditation expectations and the increased focus on accountability have pushed these ideas to the forefront, the tools that support them are still not robust. Electronic portfolio assessment has been one approach that many schools of education adopt to address these gaps, but there has been little documentation on how electronic portfolios actually...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Knowledge Management, Portfolios (Background Materials), Schools of Education,...
Appropriate classroom assessment now tends to utilize formative measures with greater frequency, especially in the early grades and with learner groups at risk of not passing state-mandated standardized tests. Within the authentic context of an action research project, teacher candidates were given handheld computers equipped with data-collection software to assess the effectiveness of tutoring sessions with students identified with special needs. The data was collected and reviewed weekly as...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Preservice Teachers, Research Projects, Action Research, Formative Evaluation,...
This study used a modified version of the Perception of Science Classes Survey (Kardash & Wallace, 2001) to survey 7,885 grade school and high school students in different provinces in the Philippines regarding their perceptions of their science classes. Factor analysis revealed five dimensions of the students' perceptions that relate to different aspects of the teacher's pedagogy and the learning environment created by the teachers: (a) Learner-Centered Pedagogy, (b) Science Inquiry...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Student Attitudes, Factor Analysis, Foreign Countries, Student Surveys, Science...
Education has become a central issue in West Papua. During the Suharto regime, the Indonesian government paid little attention to educational investment in the province which led to poor educational infrastructure and a shortage of teachers. As a result, the quality of human resources in the province is poor. Since 2001, the adoption of the Special Autonomy Law has seen education emerge as a priority program for local government. Improving the quality of human resources to match standards in...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Economically Disadvantaged, Foreign Countries, Educational Planning, Educational...
Instructors at community colleges around Virginia have been assessing student learning informally and formally since their opening, but recently, with renewed emphasis on accountability and documentation, a group of faculty and administrators were brought together to study the assessment process and develop procedures to ensure that student-learning objectives (SLOs) are at the forefront of instruction. At Lord Fairfax Community College (LFCC), instructors hoped to build a culture of assessment...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Community Colleges, Student Evaluation, College Outcomes Assessment, Total Quality...
Background: With the accession of the PRC to the WTO, Chinese education market is open to the educational service providers of the foreign countries. They are keen to offer MBA Degree programs to the Career Managers in the Mainland. Aims: This research studies program evaluation and so forth the quality assessment of a MBA degree program in the Mainland. Sample: The qualitative study involves literature review and focus group interviews of educational administrators, teaching staff and MBA...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Business Administration Education, Masters Programs, Program Evaluation, Educational...
The manner in which teachers mediate children's learning varies across early childhood classrooms. In this study, we used a multi-element design to evaluate the efficacy of three commonly implemented strategies that varied in teacher directedness for teaching color- and object-name relations. Strategy 1 consisted of brief exposure to the target relations followed by an exclusively child-led play period in which correct responses were praised. Strategy 2 was similar except that teachers prompted...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Early Childhood Education, Teaching Methods, Preschool Children, Instructional...
This article looks at the controversial starting of testing, its boycott, the subsequent years of protest and, in October 2008, the apparent end of key stage examining in England. It considers a possible alternative to the tests based on a project carried out at King's College London based on portfolio assessment.
Topics: ERIC Archive, Portfolio Assessment, Alternative Assessment, English Instruction, Evaluation...
The intention of this article is to illustrate how assessment is an "emotional practice" (Hargreaves, 1998) for teachers and how paying attention to the emotions involved can provide useful information about assessment practices to teachers, teacher-educators and policy-reformers. Through presenting a review of research literature it makes three main points. Firstly, assessment decisions are not "neutral" but involve teachers' emotions, which are interwoven with their...
Topics: ERIC Archive, Emotional Response, Formative Evaluation, Accountability, Student Evaluation, Teacher...
This article narrates and interrogates some of the responses of a group of English teachers, and their lecturer, to an assignment in a post-graduate course entitled Language and assessment. The assignment required the teachers to respond to a text in a mode other than writing, and to design the assessment of this representation. Three of their designs, and their lecturer's assessment of these designs, are described and discussed. It is argued that assessment of multimodal representations of...
Topics: ERIC Archive, English Teachers, English Instruction, Education Courses, Inservice Teacher...