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Eric.ed.gov – Children’s Kindergarten Outcomes and Program Quality in the North Carolina Pre-Kindergarten Program: 2013-2014 Statewide Evaluation

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: The 2013-2014 North Carolina Pre-Kindergarten (NC Pre-K) Evaluation study was designed to examine the longitudinal outcomes through kindergarten for children who attended the Pre-K program, along with comparisons to previous cohorts of program attendees. A sample of 561 children was included in the study, with data gathered at the beginning and end of NC Pre-K (2012- 2013) and kindergarten (2013-2014) to examine their growth in skills. Researchers conducted individual assessments of children’s language, literacy, math, and general knowledge skills and gathered teacher ratings of behavior skills. For 119 Spanish-speaking dual language learners (DLLs) in the sample, parallel assessments were conducted in both English and Spanish to examine their progress when measured in both languages. In addition, program characteristics and services were examined for the 2013-2014 NC Pre-K… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – Assessing the Potential of Using Value-Added Estimates of Teacher Job Performance for Making Tenure Decisions. Brief 3

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: This research brief presents selected findings from work examining the stability of value-added model estimates of teacher effectiveness and their implication for tenure policies. Findings show year-to-year correlations in teacher effects are modest, but pre-tenure estimates of teacher job performance do predict estimated post-tenure performance in both math and reading, and would therefore seem to be a reasonable metric to use as a factor in making substantive teacher selection decisions. (Contains 2 tables, 2 figures, and 15 notes.) Link til kilde

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Eric.ed.gov – The Risks and Opportunities Associated with Weak Arithmatic Skills of Accounting Students

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: This paper explored the authors’ concerns about students enrolled in their introductory accounting course. Anecdotal evidence suggested that students struggle with basic arithmetic concepts that underlie basic business transactions even though their math placement and ACT scores are high. A survey of 125 students in a first accounting course was conducted in the spring of 2010 to assess the basic arithmetical skills. The results indicated that the ACT scores and math placement tests do not reveal weakness in basic arithmetic. We find that faculty and students will experience frustration due to the impaired arithmetic ability. By taking for granted that students possess basic skills in arithmetic faculty will exclude exercises from the curriculum that will build the kind of arithmetic abilities students need to think on their… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – The Content, Predictive Power, and Potential Bias in Five Widely Used Teacher Observation Instruments. REL 2017-191

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: School districts and states across the Regional Educational Laboratory Mid-Atlantic Region and the country as a whole have been modifying their teacher evaluation systems to identify more effective and less effective teachers and provide better feedback to improve instructional practice. The new systems typically include components related to student achievement growth and instruments for observing and rating instructional practice. Many school districts and states are considering adopting commercially available instruments for the instructional practice component of their evaluation systems. Yet little data are available to help districts and states choose among available instruments or determine which dimensions of instructional practice merit the greatest emphasis. Most existing data comparing different observation instruments, including their statistical characteristics and their relationship to student achievement, come from the Bill & Melinda… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – How to Assess the Potential to Teach: New Evidence from a STEM Teacher Assessment Centre Model in England. Data Insights Report

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: Recruiting and retaining excellent teachers remains a pressing policy issue in education systems worldwide. According to UNESCO estimates, 68.8 million teachers will need to be recruited globally to meet Sustainable Development Goal 4. However, simply recruiting more teachers will not be enough to meet this challenge: we need to recruit high-quality teachers who provide high-quality lessons to improve learner outcomes — and who will remain in the teaching profession. The high number of teachers who leave teaching early in their careers means that there is a crisis in teacher retention, and high staff turnover constitutes a major drain on the resources available to develop a strong education system. As part of our commitment to research and development, we have invested in the review of our Future Teaching… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – Validating Teacher Effects on Students’ Attitudes and Behaviors: Evidence from Random Assignment of Teachers to Students

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: There is growing interest among researchers, policy makers, and practitioners in identifying teachers who are skilled at improving student outcomes beyond test scores. However, questions remain about the validity of these teacher effect estimates. Leveraging the random assignment of teachers to classes, I find that teachers have causal effects on their students’ self-reported behavior in class, self-efficacy in math, and happiness in class that are similar in magnitude to effects on math test scores. Weak correlations between teacher effects on different student outcomes indicate that these measures capture unique skills that teachers bring to the classroom. Teacher effects calculated in nonexperimental data are related to these same outcomes following random assignment, revealing that they contain important information content on teachers. However, for some nonexperimental teacher effect estimates,… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – Predicting Math Outcomes from a Reading Screening Assessment in Grades 3-8. REL 2016-180

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: District and state education leaders frequently use screening assessments to identify students who are at risk of performing poorly on end-of-year achievement tests. This study examines the use of a universal screening assessment of reading skills for early identification of students at risk of low achievement on nationally normed tests of reading and math and provides support for the interpretation of screening scores to inform instruction. Several members of the Regional Educational Laboratory Southeast Improving Literacy Alliance already use a reading screening assessment–the Florida Center for Reading Research Reading Assessment (FRA)–for all students in grades 3-8 to identify students who may be at risk of poor end-of-year reading outcomes. To gain more information to drive instruction without students having to spend more time taking tests, these alliance… Continue Reading