Formative Assessment

Research recognizes the power of assessment to amplify learning and skill acquisition. This overview describes and compares two types of Assessments educators rely on: Formative Assessment and Summative Assessment. 

A substantial body of evidence is available to guide teacher preparation programs in developing a pre-service curriculum based on universal skills needed for success across settings, age ranges, and subjects being taught. These skills include instructional delivery, classroom management, formative assessment, and personal competencies (soft skills)

To produce better outcomes for students two things are necessary: (1) effective, scientifically supported interventions (2) those interventions implemented with high integrity.  Typically, much greater attention has been given to identifying effective practices.  This review focuses on features of high quality implementation.

To produce better outcomes for students two things are necessary: (1) effective, scientifically supported interventions (2) those interventions implemented with high integrity.  Typically, much greater attention has been given to identifying effective practices.  This review focuses on features of high quality implementation.

In this chapter we describe systematic instructional practices that are necessary for individuals with disabilities to benefit from educational services.

The NAEP Data Explorer provides national and state results for all main subject areas assessed, including mathematics, reading, writing, and science. Results have been produced for the nation and participating states and other jurisdictions since 1990, and for selected urban districts (on a trial basis) since 2002.

In this overview, classroom management strategies have been grouped into four essential areas: rules and procedures, proactive management, well-designed and delivered instruction, and disruptive behavior management. These strategies are devised for use at both school and classroom levels.

Research recognizes the power of assessment to amplify learning and skill acquisition. Assessing students is a fundamental ingredient of effective teaching. It is the tool that enables teachers to measure the extent to which a student or group of students have mastered the material taught in a lesson or a class or during the school year, and it gives instructors the necessary information to modify instruction when progress falters. Assessment affects decisions about grades, placement, advancement, instructional strategies, curriculum, special education placement, and funding. It works to improve instruction in the following ways: (1) as a diagnostic tool, (2) by providing feedback on progress measured against benchmarks, (3) as a motivating factor, and (4) as an accountability instrument for improving systems.

Effective ongoing assessment, referred to in the education literature as formative assessment or progress monitoring, is indispensable in promoting teacher and student success. Feedback through formative assessment is ranked at or near the top of practices known to significantly raise student achievement. For decades, formative assessment has been found to be effective in clinical settings and, more important, in typical classroom settings. Formative assessment produces substantial results at a cost significantly below that of other popular school reform initiatives such as smaller class size, charter schools, accountability, and school vouchers. It also serves as a practical diagnostic tool available to all teachers. A core component of formal and informal assessment procedures, formative assessment allows teachers to quickly determine if individual students are progressing at acceptable rates and provides insight into where and how to modify and adapt lessons, with the goal of making sure that students do not fall behind.

This book is compiled from the proceedings of the sixth summit entitled “Performance Feedback: Using Data to Improve Educator Performance.” The 2011 summit topic was selected to help answer the following question: What basic practice has the potential for the greatest impact on changing the behavior of students, teachers, and school administrative personnel?

This paper argues that ineffective practices in schools carry a high price for consumers and suggests that school systems consider the measurable yield in terms of gains in student achievement for their schooling effort.

This paper examines intervention and instruction failures and describe concrete steps that implementers can take to improve the results of their instruction and intervention in classrooms.

This analysis examined the cost effectiveness of research from Stuart Yeh on common sturctural interventions in education. Additionally, The Wing Institute analyzes class-size reduction using Yeh's methods.

This paper examines intervention and instruction failures and describe concrete steps that implementers can take to improve the results of their instruction and intervention in classrooms.

Research recognizes the power of assessment to amplify learning and skill acquisition. This overview describes and compares two types of Assessments educators rely on: Formative Assessment and Summative Assessment. 

This paper is based on the simple idea that students’ educational achievement is affected by the effort put in by those participating in the education process: schools, parents, and, of course, the students themselves.

This book is compiled from the proceedings of the sixth summit entitled “Performance Feedback: Using Data to Improve Educator Performance.” The 2011 summit topic was selected to help answer the following question: What basic practice has the potential for the greatest impact on changing the behavior of students, teachers, and school administrative personnel?

The main focus of this study is to find different kinds of variables that might contribute to variations in the strength and direction of the relationship by examining quantitative studies that relate mathematics teachers’ subject matter knowledge to student achievement in mathematics.

Environmental features of elementary school classrooms are examined in relation to distraction and privacy. Teachers' adjustments of their activities to make their settings less distracting are also explored. 

Multilevel modeling techniques were used with a sample of 643 students enrolled in 37 secondary school classrooms to predict future student achievement (controlling for baseline achievement) from observed teacher interactions with students in the classroom, coded using the Classroom Assessment Scoring System—Secondary.

The authors effectively cover the construction of psychological tests and the interpretation of test scores and scales; critically examine classical true-score theory; and explain theoretical assumptions and modern measurement models, controversies, and developments.

This report breaks out key steps in the school identification and improvement process, focusing on (1) a diagnosis of school needs; (2) a plan to improve schools; and (3) evidenced-based interventions that work.

The authors investigated the hypothesis that treatment acceptability influences teachers' use of a formative evaluation system (curriculum-based measurement) and, relatedly, the amount of gain effected in math for their students.

The goal of the proposed study was to determine whether third-grade
students’ (n = 74) transcriptional skills and gender predicted their writing fluency growth in response to a performance feedback intervention.

The “Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing” were approved as APA policy by the APA Council of Representatives in August 2013. 

In current study, through a meta-analysis of 78 studies, it is aimed to determine the overall effect size for testing at different frequency levels and to find out other study characteristics, related to the effectiveness of frequent testing. 

Feedback is an essential construct for many theories of learning and instruction, and an understanding of the conditions for effective feedback should facilitate both theoretical development and instructional practice. 

Professional judgment is required whenever conditions are uncertain.  This article provides an analysis of professional judgment and describes sources of error in decision making.

Seeing Students Learn Science is a guidebook meant to help educators improve the way in which students learn science. The introduction of new science standards across the nation has led to the adoption of new curricula, instruction, and professional development to align with the new standards. This publication is designed as a resource for educators to adapt assessment to these changes. It includes examples of innovative assessment formats, ways to embed assessments in engaging classroom activities, and ideas for interpreting and using novel kinds of assessment information.

The later effects of the Direct Instruction Follow Through program were assessed at five diverse sites. Low-income fifth and sixth graders who had completed the full 3 years of this first- through third-grade program were tested on the Metropolitan Achievement Test (Intermediate level) and the Wide Range Achievement Test (WRAT).

Just as an athlete needs effective practice to be able to compete at high levels of performance, students benefit from formative practice and feedback to master skills and content in a course. At the most complex and challenging end of the spectrum of summative assessment techniques, the portfolio involves a collection of artifacts of student learning organized around a particular learning outcome.

This paper uses student-level data from a statewide community college system to examine the validity of placement tests and high school information in predicting course grades and college performance.

Six issues presented in this presentation are (1) The definitional issue (2) The effectiveness issue (3) The domain issue (4) The measurement issue (5) The professional development issue (6) The system issue

Assessing literature that uses either experimental (lottery) or student-level growth-based methods, this analysis infers the causal impact of attending a charter school on student performance.

This paper is a review of the literature on classroom formative assessment.

This is a review of the literature on classroom formative assessment. Several studies show firm evidence that innovations designed to strengthen the frequent feedback that students receive about their learning yield substantial learning gains.

Firm evidence shows that formative assessment is an essential component of classroom work and that its development can raise standards of achievement, Mr. Black and Mr. Wiliam point out. Indeed, they know of no other way of raising standards for which such a strong prima facie case can be made. 

This paper theorizes that variations in learning and the level of learning of students are determined by the students' learning histories and the quality of instruction they receive.

This paper theorizes that variations in learning and the level of learning of students are determined by the students' learning histories and the quality of instruction they receive.

This fourth edition provides in-depth treatments of critical measurement topics, and the chapter authors are acknowledged experts in their respective fields. 

The best formative assessment involves both students and teachers in a recursive process. It starts with the teacher, who models the process for the students. At first, the concept of what good work "looks like" belongs to the teacher. The teacher describes, explains, or demonstrates the concepts or skills to be taught, or assigns student investigations—reading assigned material, locating and reading materials to answer a question, doing activities or experiments—to put content into students' hands.

The National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) assesses teaching practice based on videos and essays submitted by teachers. They compared the performance of classrooms of elementary students in Los Angeles randomly assigned to NBPTS applicants and to comparison teachers.

This book provide detailed information on how to systematically and explicitly teach essential reading skills. The procedures describe in this text have been shown to benefit all student, especially powerful with the most vulnerable learners, children who are at risk because of poverty, disability, or limited knowledge of English. 

This study developed a zero-to-five index of the strength of accountability in 50 states based on the use of high-stakes testing to sanction and reward schools, and analyzed whether that index is related to student gains on the NAEP mathematics test in 1996–2000.

This paper discusses the search for a “magic metric” in education: an index/number that would be generally accepted as the most efficient descriptor of school’s performance in a district.

This report provides a practical “management guide,” for an evidence-based key indicator data decision system for school districts and schools.

A rationale and model for changing assessment efforts in schools from simple description to the integration of information from multiple sources for the purpose of designing interventions are described.

The purpose of this appear is to describe a school-wide staff development model that is based on a proactive instructional approach to solving problem behavior on a school-wide basis and utilizes effective staff development procedures. 

This study investigates the effect of a school-wide intervention plan, consisting of precorrection and active supervision strategies, on the social behavior of elementary students.

The author reviewed about 1,000 articles to synthesize 119 studies from 1948 to 2004 with 1,450 findings and 355,325 students. The meta-analysis design followed Mackay, Barkham, Rees, and Stiles’s guidelines, including comprehensive search mechanisms, accuracy and bias control, and primary study validity assessment.

One flashpoint in the incendiary debate over standardized testing in American public
schools is the area of test preparation. The focus of this chapter is test preparation in achievement testing and it's purportedly harmful effects on students and teachers. 

This paper describes how teacher learning through involvement with student-performance assessments has been accomplished in the United States and around the world, particularly in countries that have been recognized for their high-performing educational systems

Problems associated with the school psychologists traditional assessment functions and methodology are identified and contrasted with the need for assessment information that can contribute meaningfully to the formulation and evaluation of educational interventions. 

To produce better outcomes for students two things are necessary: (1) effective, scientifically supported interventions (2) those interventions implemented with high integrity.  Typically, much greater attention has been given to identifying effective practices.  This review focuses on features of high quality implementation.

Examines the fundamental characteristics of and reviews empirical research on performance assessment of diverse groups of students, including those with mild disabilities. Discussion of the technical qualities of performance assessment and barriers to its advancement leads to the conclusion that performance assessment should play a supplementary role in the evaluation of students with significant learning problems

Curriculum-based measurement and performance assessments can provide valuable data for making special-education eligibility decisions. Reviews applied research on these assessment approaches and discusses the practical context of treatment validation and decisions about instructional services for students with diverse academic needs.

A disproportionate reliance on SAT scores in college admissions has generated a growing number and volume of complaints. Some applicants, especially members of underrepresented minority groups, believe that the test is culturally biased. Other critics argue that high school GPA and results on SAT subject tests are better than scores on the SAT reasoning test at predicting college success, as measured by grades in college and college graduation.

This is a comprehensive literature review of the topic of Implementation examining all stages beginning with adoption and ending with sustainability.

This is a comprehensive literature review of the topic of Implementation examining all stages beginning with adoption and ending with sustainability.

This digest summarizes principles of performance assessment, which connects classroom assessment to learning. Specific ways that assessment can enhance instruction are outlined, as are criteria that assessments should meet in order to inform instructional decisions. Performance assessment is compared to behavioral assessment, mastery learning, and curriculum-based management.

This is a summary of curriculum based measures (CBM) and a history of the practice.

In this meta-analysis of studies that utilize formative assessment the authors report an effective size of .7.

This meta-analysis investigated the effects of formative evaluation procedures on student achievement. The data source was 21 controlled studies, which generated 96 relevant effect sizes, with an average weighted effect size of .70. The magnitude of the effect of formative evaluation was associated with publication type, data-evaluation method, data display, and use of behavior modification. Implications for special education practice are discussed.

This study examined the educational effects of repeated curriculumbased measurement and evaluation. Thirty-nine special educators, each having three to four pupils in the study, were assigned randomly to a repeated curriculum-based measurement/evaluation (experimental) treatment or a conventional special education evaluation (contrast) treatment

This article describes a research program conducted over the past 8 years to address how technology can be used to surmount these implementation difficulties. The research program focused on one variety of objective, ongoing assessments known as curriculum-based measurement, in the areas of reading, spelling, and math.

30 special education teachers were assigned randomly to 3 groups: curriculum-based measurement (CBM) with expert system advice (CBM-ES), CBM with no expert system advice (CBM-NES), and control (i.e., no CBM). 

The purpose of this study was to examine students' weekly rates of academic growth, or slopes of achievement, when Curriculum-Based Measurement (CBM) is conducted repeatedly over 1 year.

The purpose of this study was to examine effects of classroom-basedperformance-assessment (PA)-driven instruction.

The purposes of this study were to examine how well 3 measures, representing 3 points on a traditional-alternative mathematics assessment continuum, interrelated and discriminated students achieving above, at, and below grade level and to explore effects of cooperative testing for the most innovative measure (performance assessment).

The purpose of this study was to assess the effects of (a) ongoing, systematic assessment of student growth (i.e., curriculum-based measurement) and (b) expert system instructional consultation on teacher planning and student achievement in the area of mathematics operations.

Formative assessment (FA) is considered a powerful tool to enhance learning. However, there have been few studies addressing how the implementation of FA influences the development of inquiry skills so far. This research intends to determine the efficacy of teaching using FA in the development of students' inquiry skills.

As a classroom teacher or administrator, how do you ensure that the information shared in a student-led conference provides a balanced picture of the student's strengths and weaknesses? The answer to this is to balance both summative and formative classroom assessment practices and information gathering about student learning.

High-school grades are often viewed as an unreliable criterion for college admissions, owing to differences in grading standards across high schools, while standardized tests are seen as methodologically rigorous, providing a more uniform and valid yardstick for assessing student ability and achievement. The present study challenges that conventional view. The study finds that high-school grade point average (HSGPA) is consistently the best predictor not only of freshman grades in college, the outcome indicator most often employed in predictive-validity studies, but of four-year college outcomes as well.

High-school grades are often viewed as an unreliable criterion for college admissions, owing to differences in grading standards across high schools, while standardized tests are seen as methodologically rigorous, providing a more uniform and valid yardstick for assessing student ability and achievement. The present study challenges that conventional view. The study finds that high-school grade point average (HSGPA) is consistently the best predictor not only of freshman grades in college, the outcome indicator most often employed in predictive-validity studies, but of four-year college outcomes as well.

Principal evaluation shares many characteristics with the more general field of personnel evaluation. That is, evaluations may have the purpose of gathering data to help improve performance (formative), or may use the collected information to make decisions about promotion or firing (summative).

To evaluate the impact of comprehensive teacher induction relative to the usual induction support, the authors conducted a randomized experiment in a set of districts that were not already implementing comprehensive induction.

The concept of treatment fidelity (integrity) is important across a diversity of fields that are involved with providing treatments or interventions to individuals. Despite variations in terminology across these diverse fields, the concern that treatments or interventions are delivered as prescribed or intended is of paramount importance to document that changes in individuals’ functioning (medical, nutritional, psychological, or behavioral) are due to treatments and not from uncontrolled, extraneous variables.

This quantitative review examines 20 studies to establish an effect size of .71 for the impact of “metacognitive” instruction on reading comprehension.

The authors analysis of special education placement rates, a frequently identified area of concern, does not show any responsiveness to the introduction of accountability systems.

The central argument of this paper is that the formative and summative purposes of assessment have become confused in practice and that as a consequence assessment fails to have a truly formative role in learning.

this report aims to provide the public, along with teachers and leaders in the Great City Schools, with objective evidence about the extent of standardized testing in public schools and how these assessments are used.

Hattie’s book is designed as a meta-meta-study that collects, compares and analyses the findings of many previous studies in education. Hattie focuses on schools in the English-speaking world but most aspects of the underlying story should be transferable to other countries and school systems as well. Visible Learning is nothing less than a synthesis of more than 50.000 studies covering more than 80 million pupils. Hattie uses the statistical measure effect size to compare the impact of many influences on students’ achievement, e.g. class size, holidays, feedback, and learning strategies.

This book takes over fifteen years of rigorous research into education practices and provides teachers in training and in-service teachers with concise summaries of the most effective interventions and offers practical guidance to successful implementation in classrooms.

The purpose of this study is to compare different statistical and methodological approaches to standard setting and determining cut scores using R- CBM and performance on high-stakes tests

The National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality (TQ Center) has released an Issue Paper providing a framework and justification for effective ways that teachers can collect and use assessment data to make instructional decisions.

This paper investigates organizational characteristics and conditions in schools that drive staffing problems and teacher turnover.

Focusing on elementary classrooms, chapters include: Students' Feelings about School; Involvement and Withdrawal in the Classroom; Teachers Views; The Need for New Perspectives.

This study examines the effects on early reading skills of three different methods of
presenting material with computer-assisted instruction.

Demonstrates the experimenting society model using data-based decision making and collaborative consultation to evaluate behavior-management intervention strategies in 25 seventh graders. Each intervention results in improved behavior, but active teaching of classroom rules was determined to be most effective. 

Some of the specific reasons for the success or failure of retention in the area of reading were examined via an in-depth study of a small number of both at-risk retained students and comparably low skilled promoted children

Responsiveness to intervention (RTI) is being proposed as an alternative model for making decisions about the presence or absence of specific learning disability. The author argue that there are many questions about RTI that remain unanswered, and radical changes in proposed regulations are not warranted at this time.

The present study used cross-sectional data from 1,438 schools to examine relations between fidelity self-assessment and team-based fidelity measures in the first 4 years of implementation of School-Wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (SWPBIS). Results showed strong positive correlations between fidelity self-assessments and a team-based measure of fidelity at each year of implementation.

This meta-analysis examines the impact of formative assessment.

More than 300 studies that appeared to address the efficacy of formative assessment in grades K-12 were reviewed. Many of the studies had severely flawed research designs yielding uninterpretable results.

The authors proposed a preliminary FI theory (FIT) and tested it with moderator analyses. The central assumption of FIT is that FIs change the locus of attention among 3 general and hierarchically organized levels of control: task learning, task motivation, and meta-tasks (including self-related) processes.

A comprehensive search of the research on formative assess­ment interventions was recently released. This study identified 23 studies that it determined were rigorous­ enough for inclusion to build a picture of the impact of formative assessment interventions on student outcomes. The study concluded that formative assessment had a positive effect on student academic achieve­ment. On average across all the studies, students who participated in formative assessment performed better on measures of academic achievement than those who did not. Across all subject areas (math, reading, and writing), formative assessment had larger effects on student academic achievement when other agents, such as a teacher or a computer program, directed the formative assessment.

This book offers strategies that make a difference in student learning including: content planning, instructional practices, and community building.

Like we consider our formative years when we draw conclusions about ourselves, a formative assessment is where we begin to draw conclusions about our students' learning. Formative assessment moves can take many forms and generally target skills or content knowledge that is relatively narrow in scope (as opposed to summative assessments, which seek to assess broader sets of knowledge or skills).

In this paper, a self-regulated flipped classroom approach is proposed to help students schedule their out-of-class time to effectively read and comprehend the learning content before class, such that they are capable of interacting with their peers and teachers in class for in-depth discussions.

This study examined the effectiveness of social skills instruction for seven elementary-age students at risk for antisocial behavior who were unresponsive to a school wide primary intervention program

In undertaking this study, two goals were established: (1) to obtain a better understanding of how much time students spend taking tests; and (2) to identify the degree to which the tests are mandated by districts or states. 

This study provides a direct comparison of differential reinforcement of other behavior (DRO)
and differential reinforcement of alternative behavior (DRA). Participants included three
children in center-based classrooms referred for functional assessments due to disruptive
classroom behavior.

This article provides a summary of measuring the fiscal impact of practices in education
educational policy.

It is argued that there is a need to rethink the criteria by which the quality of educational assessments are judged and a set of criteria that are sensitive to some of the expectations for performancebased assessments are proposed

The authors examined the effects of pullout small-group and teacher-directed classroom-based social skills instruction on the social behaviors of five third- and fourth-grade students at risk for emotional or behavioral disorders.

Sitting in our schools right now is one of the most powerful levers we have for deepening equity: teacher teams focused on developing collective expertise in high-leverage, equity promoting practices. One conversation at a time, teams like the one in the vignette above, a composite of teams we have observed over time, chip away at low expectations, racism, and cultural biases that have marginalized special education students, English language learners, students of color, and others who have not traditionally been served well by schools.

Many schools and teachers are striving to create more dynamic classroom learning environments that encourage students to think critically and manage their own learning in preparation for college and careers. Some observers view formative assessment as a means to this end.

This monograph attempts to synthesize and interpret the extant research from the last 4 decades on the impact of schooling on students' academic achievement.

This is a study of classroom management on student engagement and achievement.

This research examines the relationship between noise and preschool children's acquisition of prereading skills, environmental factors in preschool inclusive classrooms, and children's use of outdoorplay equipment.

The study investigates the correlation and predictive value of curriculum-based measurement (CBM) against the Michigan Educational Assessment Program's (MEAP) fourth grade reading assessment.

This report offers recommendations for the implementation of standards-based reform and outlines possible consequences for policy changes. It summarizes both the vision and intentions of standards-based reform and the arguments of its critics.

his pioneering text provides a comprehensive and highly accessible introduction to the principles, concepts, and methods currently used in educational research. This text also helps students master skills in reading, conducting, and understanding research.

The constituent parts of a five component behavioural intervention package are described and the effect of the intervention on the on‐task behaviour of two “disruptive” secondary school classes reported. 

This study documents the implementation of research-based strategies to minimize the occurrence of reading difficulties in a first-grade population. Three strategies were implemented. 

This study examined processes and techniques teachers used to ensure that their assessments were valid and reliable, noting the extent to which they engaged in these processes.

The goal of this guide is to provide useful information about standardized testing, or assessment, for practitioners and non-practitioners who care about public schools. It includes the nature of assessment, types of assessments and tests, and definitions.

The primary purpose of this chapter is to review the literature on teachers’ summative assessment practices to note their influence on teachers and teaching and on students and learning.

This research report presents the findings of this formative and summative research effort.

To investigate the relationship between students’ achievement and various contextual factors, NAEP collects information from teachers about their background, education, and training.

How did U.S students perform on ht most recent assessment? 

This non-technical brochure provides introductory information on the development, administration, scoring, and reporting of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). The brochure also provides information about the online resources available on the NAEP website.

Twelfth-graders’ performance in reading and mathematics improves since 2005. Nationally representative samples of twelfth-graders from 1,670 public and private schools across the nation participated in the 2009 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP).

The Data Explorer for the Long-Term Trend assessments provides national mathematics and reading results dating from the 1970s.

Nationally representative samples of 209,000 fourth-graders and 175,200 eighth-graders participated in the 2011 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) in mathematics.

Percentages of students meeting state proficiency standards and performing at or above the NAEP Proficient level, by subject, grade, and state: 2009

In this new national writing assessment sample, 24,100 eighth-graders and 28,100 twelfthgraders engaged with writing tasks and composed their responses on computer. The assessment tasks reflected writing situations common to both academic and workplace settings and asked students to write for several purposes and communicate to different audiences.

No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 ESEA Reauthorization

This Campbell systematic review examines the effect of multi‐component teacher classroom management programmes on disruptive or aggressive student behaviour and which management components are most effective.

Flipped classrooms are by design highly interactive. As a result, formative assessment is a necessary component of the flipped classroom. Professors need to be able to assess students' in the class, use this assessment information to inform classroom activities in real time and personalize learning for their students.

This volume of PISA 2009 results looks at the progress countries have made in raising student performance and improving equity in the distribution of learning opportunities. 

Volume II of PISA's 2009 results looks at how successful education systems moderate the impact of social background and immigrant status on student and school performance. 

The OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) surveys, which take place every three years, have been designed to collect information about 15-year-old students in participating countries.

This first volume of PISA 2009 survey results provides comparable data on 15-year-olds' performance on reading, mathematics, and science across 65 countries. 

Establishing a functional relationship between the independent and the dependent variable is the primary focus of applied behavior analysis. Accurate and reliable description and observation of both the independent and dependent variables are necessary to achieve this goal.

Positive teacher-student interactions are a primary ingredient of quality early educational experiences that launch future school success. With CLASS, educators finally have an observational tool to assess classroom quality in pre-kindergarten through grade 3 based on teacher-student interactions rather than the physical environment or a specific curriculum

This book contains necessary information to help teachers deal with the assessment concerns of classroom teachers. 

Instructional theory describes a variety of methods of instruction (different ways of facilitating human learning and development) and when to use--and not use--each of those methods. It is about how to help people learn better. 

This text employs a pragmatic approach to the study of educational tests and measurement so that teachers will understand essential psychometric concepts and be able to apply them in the classroom.

This research brief is one in a series for the Back on Track Study that presents the findings regarding the relative impact of online versus face-to-face Algebra I credit recovery on students’ academic outcomes, aspects of implementation of the credit recovery courses, and the effects over time of expanding credit recovery options for at-risk students.

The present study assessed the relative strength of daily rule review and rehearsal on student behavior when such procedures were added to a token economy. The token program was designed to increase appropriate classroom behaviors of disruptive boys attending a multi categorical resource room.

Amrein and Berliner (2002b) compared National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) results in high-stakes states against the national average for NAEP scores. In this analysis, a comparison group was formed from states that did not attach consequences to their state-wide tests.

CHILDREN take one of two types of standardized test, one ''norm-referenced,'' the other ''criteria-referenced.'' Although those names have an arcane ring, most parents are familiar with how the exams differ.

The Tennessee Value-Added Assessment System determines the effectiveness of school systems, schools, and teachers based on student academic growth over time. Research conducted utilizing data from the TVAAS database has shown that race, socioeconomic level, class size, and classroom heterogeneity are poor predictors of student academic growth. Rather, the effectiveness of the teacher is the major determinant of student academic progress.

This book looks at research and theoretical models used to define educational effectiveness with the intent on providing educators with evidence-based options for implementing school improvement initiatives that make a difference in student performance.

Formative assessment has the potential to support teaching and learning in the classroom. This study reviewed the literature on formative assessment to identify prerequisites for effective use of formative assessment by teachers. The review sought to address the following research question: What teacher prerequisites need to be in place for using formative assessment in their classroom practice?

The purpose of this article was to describe the developmental effects of one elementary physical education teacher's proactive teaching of prosocial behavior. An ABA (B) design coupled with a control group comparison across six matched urban physical education classes was used to assess the teaching strategy.

Part of the president Bush strategy for the transformation of "American Schools" lies in an accountability system that would track progress toward the nation's education goals as well as provide the impetus for reform. Here we focus primarily on issues of accountability and student achievement. 

Scores went up in all grades and subjects this year on the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL). But how much depends on how you look at them. 

The goal of this paper is to provide a general understanding for teachers and administrators of the concepts of validity and reliability; thereby, giving them the confidence to develop their own assessments with clarity of these terms.

As the successor to one of NASP's most popular publications, Interventions for Academic and Behavior Problems II offers the latest in evidence-based measures that have proven to create safer, more effective schools.

This article reviews the corpus of research on feedback, with a focus on formative feedback—defined as information communicated to the learner that is intended to modify his or her thinking or behavior to improve learning. According to researchers, formative feedback should be nonevaluative, supportive, timely, and specific.

A critical review of reading programs requires objective and in-depth analysis. For these reasons, the authors offer the following recommendations and procedures for analyzing critical elements of programs.

The purpose of this paper is to describe a systematic literature search to identify evidence-based classroom management practices.

This Campbell systematic review examines the impact of class size on academic achievement. The review summarises findings from 148 reports from 41 countries. Ten studies were included in the meta‐analysis.

In this grounded theory study, 19 teachers were interviewed and then, in constant comparative fashion, the interview data were analyzed. The theoretical model that emerged from the data describes novice teachers' tendencies to select and implement differing strategies related to the severity of student behavior. 

The averaged freshman graduation rate provides an estimate of the percentage of students who receive a regular diploma within 4 years of entering ninth grade.

Evidence-based practice is a decision-making framework.  This paper describes the relationships among the three cornerstones of this framework.

This analysis examined the cost effectiveness of research from Stuart Yeh on common sturctural interventions in education. Additionally, The Wing Institute analyzes class-size reduction using Yeh's methods.

In this overview, classroom management strategies have been grouped into four essential areas: rules and procedures, proactive management, well-designed and delivered instruction, and disruptive behavior management. These strategies are devised for use at both school and classroom levels.

Effective ongoing assessment, referred to in the education literature as formative assessment or progress monitoring, is indispensable in promoting teacher and student success. Feedback through formative assessment is ranked at or near the top of practices known to significantly raise student achievement. For decades, formative assessment has been found to be effective in clinical settings and, more important, in typical classroom settings. Formative assessment produces substantial results at a cost significantly below that of other popular school reform initiatives such as smaller class size, charter schools, accountability, and school vouchers. It also serves as a practical diagnostic tool available to all teachers. A core component of formal and informal assessment procedures, formative assessment allows teachers to quickly determine if individual students are progressing at acceptable rates and provides insight into where and how to modify and adapt lessons, with the goal of making sure that students do not fall behind.

This investigation contributed to previous research by separating the effects of simply making instructional changes, not based on student performance data, from the effects of making instructional changes in accordance with CBM data.

The second edition of this exceptionally lucid and practical assessment text provides a wealth of powerful concrete examples that help students to understand assessment concepts and to effectively use assessment to support learning.

This paper argues that ineffective practices in schools carry a high price for consumers and suggests that school systems consider the measurable yield in terms of gains in student achievement for their schooling effort.

Keeping RTI on Track is a resource to assist educators overcome the biggest problems associated with false starts or implementation failure. Each chapter in this book calls attention to a common error, describing how to avoid the pitfalls that lead to false starts, how to determine when you're in one, and how to get back on the right track.

To examine a response to treatment model as a means for identifying students with reading/learning disabilities, 45 second-grade students at risk for reading problems were provided daily supplemental reading instruction and assessed after 10 weeks to determine if they met a prior criteria for exit.

This report describes the first of a series of researches that will attempt to characterize the performance of New Jersey's public school system.

This literature review examines the impact of various instructional methods

This is a meta-review and synthesis of the research on the variables related learning.

The purpose of this study was to ascertain the effects of manipulating the data base used for instructional decision making on student achievement.

Studies of the effectiveness of Direct Instruction programs with special education students 
were examined in a meta-analysis comparison. To be included, the outcomes had to be 
compared with outcomes for some other treatment to which students were assigned prior to 
any interventions. Not one of 25 studies showed results favoring the comparison groups. 
Fifty-three percent of the outcomes significantly favored DI with an average magnitude of 
effect of. 84 standard deviation units. The effects were not restricted to a particular handicapping condition, age group or skill area. 

This study evaluated the effects of performance feedback on increasing the quality of implementation of interventions by teachers in a public school setting.

This study compares the effect size and return on investment for rapid assessment, between, increased spending, voucher programs, charter schools, and increased accountability.

This study compares the effect size and return on investment for rapid assessment, between, increased spending, voucher programs, charter schools, and increased accountability.

This paper conducts an analytic literature review to examine the use and operationalization of the term in multiple academic fields

The Technical Assistance Center on PBIS provides support states, districts and schools to establish, scale-up and sustain the PBIS framework.