This paper extends the theory of conditional covariances to polytomous items. It has been mathematically proven that under some mild conditions, commonly assumed in the analysis of response data, the conditional covariance of two items, dichotomously or polytomously scored, is positive if the two items are dimensionally homogeneous and negative…

Study 1 retrospectively analyzed neuropsychological and psychoeducational tests given to N = 220 first graders, with follow-up assessments in third and eighth grade. Four predictor constructs were derived: (1) Phonemic Awareness, (2) Picture Vocabulary, (3) Rapid Naming, and (4) Single Word Reading. Together, these accounted for 88%, 76%, 69%, and…

The paper considers the main results and some educational implications of the TIMSS 2003 assessment conducted in Serbia in the fields of the science achievement of Serbian eighth grade students and the science curriculum context of their achievement. There were 4264 students in the sample. It was confirmed that Serbian eighth graders had made…

With the growing federal, state, and local policy emphasis on teacher quality and student achievement, the Southwest Educational Development Laboratory (SEDL) investigated teacher resources and their relationship to student achievement in Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas. The purpose of this study was to provide policymakers with information about…

The Simple View of Reading states that reading comprehension is the product of word recognition and listening comprehension. Whereas much research has focused on word recognition accuracy, recent attention has been directed toward word recognition fluency. The current study investigated whether a separate fluency component should be added to the…

This study investigated the effectiveness of combining conceptual change text and discussion web strategies on students' understanding of photosynthesis and respiration in plants. Students' conceptual understanding of photosynthesis and respiration in plants was measured using the two-tier diagnostic test developed by Haslam and Treagust (1987,…

This paper provides a brief understanding of the educational technology in the teaching and learning of mathematics to Form Two students (equivalent to the eighth-graders) in Malaysia. In particular, it attempts to understand the relationships between educational technology and mathematics achievement in both the urban and rural schools. The study…

The biennial report to Congress on the implementation of the Title III state formula grant program provides a snapshot of the status of the U.S. Department of Education's efforts to hold states accountable for ensuring that all limited English proficient (LEP) students attain English language proficiency (ELP) and are achieving in the content…

Results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and other large scale tests are often reported as rank ordered lists showing mean values for each of the 50 states. Using data from the 2003 State NAEP Assessment, this paper examines the standard errors associated with State NAEP scores and explains why the use of rank order…

During discussions about planning, Tim Kemp and Charlotte Bickmore recently concluded that despite the name they give to their major Year 8 unit (The Making of the United Kingdom), they tend mainly to focus on England, and even more especially, on London. They have a good point. Ask an average Year 8 student to describe Britain in, say, 1700, and…

The primary focus of this study was to evaluate the impact of an intervention reading program on students repeating the 8th grade in a large urban inner city school district. Two years of Reading and Language Art scores (n=537) were analyzed (NCE scores) across various demographic variables (attendance, English language proficiency, and…

This paper considers the main characteristics of contents' connections between technical education and physics curricula, in the sixth, seventh and eighth grade of the Serbian primary school. The undertaken logical and didactic analyses of interconnectedness between contents structure of the two school subjects are based upon comparisons which…

Purpose: To examine concurrently and retrospectively the language abilities of children with specific reading comprehension deficits ("poor comprehenders") and compare them to typical readers and children with specific decoding deficits ("poor decoders"). Method: In Study 1, the authors identified 57 poor comprehenders, 27 poor decoders, and 98…

As part of compliance with with the federal No Child Left Behind Act, this document presents the State Report Card of Arizona for 2009-2010. The report card provides tables relating to percentage of students who passed AIMS in Arizona by subject and grade. The tables shown in this document include: (1) Mathematics Grade 3; (2) Reading Grade 3; (3)…

This article considers students' classroom notebooks, their character and their role in learning. The results presented were found within the frame work of a broader international project, the Learners Perspective Study, whose goal is to identify classroom practice from the students' point of view. Two 8th grade classrooms were studied. In each,…