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Eric.ed.gov – Passport Reading Journeys [TM]. What Works Clearinghouse Intervention Report

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: Literacy skills are critical to students’ academic achievement and setting them on a path to successful high school graduation and readiness for college and careers. “Passport Reading Journeys” [TM] is a supplemental literacy curriculum designed to help improve reading comprehension, vocabulary, word study, and writing skills of struggling readers in grades 6-12. Lessons incorporate both teacher-led instruction and technology, including whole-class and small-group instruction, independent reading, video segments, and independent computer-based practice. The curriculum includes a series of two-week, ten lesson instructional sequences on topics in science, math, fine art, literature, and social studies. Each sequence is themed as an expedition or journey for students. This What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) report, part of the WWC’s Adolescent Literacy topic area, explores the effects of “Passport Reading Journeys” [TM]… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – Changing Mindsets: Evaluation Report and Executive Summary

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: The Changing Mindsets project sought to improve academic attainment by supporting pupils to develop a growth mindset: the belief that intelligence is not a fixed characteristic and can be increased through effort. Previous research (Good et al., 2003; Blackwell et al., 2007) has suggested that holding this belief enables pupils to work harder and achieve better results. The project consisted of two separate interventions: (1) an intervention that taught pupils directly about the malleability of intelligence through six workshops, which were delivered by undergraduates from the University of Portsmouth, and four further sessions delivered by two local organisations: the Education Business Partnership, and Pompey Study Centre (now called Portsmouth in the Community); and (2) a professional development course that trained teachers on approaches to developing and reinforcing… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – When Does Preschool Matter?

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: We have many reasons to invest in preschool programs, including persistent gaps in school readiness between children from poorer and wealthier families, large increases in maternal employment over the past several decades, and the rapid brain development that preschool-age children experience. But what do we know about preschool education’s effectiveness? In this article, Hirokazu Yoshikawa, Christina Weiland, and Jeanne Brooks-Gunn report strong evidence that preschool boosts children’s language, literacy, and math skills in the short term; it may also reduce problem behaviors such as aggression. Over the elementary school years, however, test scores of children who were exposed to preschool tend to converge with the scores of children who were not. Many factors may explain this convergence. For example, kindergarten or first-grade teachers may focus on helping… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – Social Skills and Problem Behaviors as Mediators of the Relationship between Behavioral Self-Regulation and Academic Achievement

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: Early behavioral self-regulation is an important predictor of the skills children need to be successful in school. However, little is known about the mechanism(s) through which self-regulation affects academic achievement. The current study investigates the possibility that two aspects of children’s social func- tioning, social skills and problem behaviors, mediate the relationship between preschool self-regulation and literacy and math achievement. Additionally, we investigated whether the meditational processes differed for boys and girls. We expected that better self-regulation would help children to interact well with others (social skills) and minimize impulsive or aggressive (problem) behaviors. Positive interac- tions with others and few problem behaviors were expected to relate to gains in achievement as learning takes place within a social context. Preschool-aged children (n = 118) were tested with… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – Hallé SHINE on Manchester: Evaluation Report and Executive Summary

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: The “Hallé SHINE on Manchester” (HSoM) programme is a Saturday school educational programme designed to increase the reading and maths attainment, as well as engagement with school, of underachieving and disadvantaged pupils at Key Stage 2. Developed in collaboration between the SHINE Trust and Hallé Orchestra, the intervention provides additional school-based literacy and numeracy lessons, based on musical themes, as well as visits to Hallé rehearsals, performances and other theme-based activities. Twenty-five Saturday sessions, each lasting five hours, were planned for the intervention over the course of an academic year, delivered by qualified teachers, teaching assistants, peer mentors, and professional musicians. The evaluation consisted of two randomised controlled trials (RCTs)–a pilot trial and a main trial–and a process evaluation conducted with primary schools in the Manchester area… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – Kindergarten Impacts of the Pennsylvania Pre-K Counts Program: A Statewide Evaluation

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: Pennsylvania Pre-K Counts (PA PKC) is a state-funded prekindergarten program for 3- and 4- year-old children to help them gain school readiness skills. The goal of PA PKC is to help reduce educational disparities by providing high quality prekindergarten for children who lack opportunities or reside in environments that place them at risk of school failure. This Impact Study examined the effects of participation in PA PKC on children’s early academic, social, and executive function skills in kindergarten. In particular, the study focused on whether there were differences in performance for children with 1 or 2 years of enrollment in PA PKC compared to children with no early childhood education (ECE) experience in the 2 years prior to kindergarten. Two primary research questions (1 and 2) guided… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – English Transition Courses in Context: Preparing Students for College Success. CCRC Research Brief

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: Transition curricula are courses, learning modules, or online tutorials typically developed jointly by secondary and postsecondary faculty and offered no later than 12th grade to students at risk of being placed into remedial math or English programs in college. Based on interviews and other data, this brief describes key elements of English transition curricula in seven states. In discussing six trends that are salient in the development and implementation of transition curricula, the brief also highlights the different ways that this intervention may serve to help prepare students for college. English transition curricula are usually aligned to rigorous K-12 content standards and tend to emphasize college-level writing skills more than other content areas. Some transition curricula also incorporate contextualized learning, teach nonacademic skills that are valuable for… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – Effectiveness of Interactive Satellite-Transmitted Instruction: Experimental Evidence from Ghanaian Primary Schools. CEPA Working Paper No. 17-08

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: In lower- and middle-income countries, including Ghana, students in rural areas dramatically underperform their urban peers. Rural schools struggle to attract and retain professionally trained teachers (GES 2012; World Bank 2012). We explore one potential solution to the problem of teacher recruitment: distance instruction. Through a cluster randomized controlled trial, we estimate the impact of a program that broadcasts live instruction via satellite to rural primary school students. The program equipped classrooms in 70 randomly selected Ghanaian schools with the technology required to connect to a studio in Accra. An additional 77 schools served as the control. Instructors in Accra provided math and English lessons to classrooms in the treatment group. The model is interactive, and students in satellite classes could communicate in real time with their… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – Using Learning Analytics to Improve Students’ Reading Skills: A Case Study in an American International School with English as an Additional Language (EAL) Students

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: This paper shows how an American International School in Vietnam has been using data and Learning Analytics to find out about students’ learning from their assessments and how they use these findings to improve, among other areas, the reading skills of their mostly English as an Additional Language (EAL) student population. The source of data comes primarily from a Computer Adaptive Testing platform, commonly known as the MAP Growth test, which provides information about Math and Reading skills for each particular student. The data provided is transformed and presented to educational stakeholders through visualizations created in specialized software in order to dig into the data and answer the pedagogical questions emerged from teachers and administrators. This process involves a new field known as Learning Analytics and Visual… Continue Reading

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Eric.ed.gov – The Math Student/The Math Teacher/The Math Problem.

eric.ed.gov har udgivet: In an examination of the problem of national mathematical illiteracy, the math student, the math teacher, and the math problem are discussed. The math student may have defects, deficiencies, disruptions, and/or differences in the cognitive abilities required to perform a mathematical problem. The math teacher may tend to be less verbal and less socially responsive than other teachers. Math teachers also may have internalized mathematical reasoning and its accompanying numerical coding and notation so that they can hardly understand the primitive state of most students and many adults and thus students tend not to question, but instead accept math as a closed system. The math word problem poses a barrier to learning because of the new words and notations and the complex language and terse sentences. An… Continue Reading