Background: While highlighting is one of the most common strategies to enhance reading comprehension, little is known about how highlighting behavior and its relationship with performance varies across cultures. Our purpose was to examine whether the use and the success of highlighting prevalence, quantity, and task relevance vary internationally.…

This paper informs users of data collected in international large-scale assessments (ILSA), by presenting argumentsunderlining the importance of considering two design features employed in these studies. We examine a commonmisconception stating that the uncertainty arising from the assessment design is negligible compared with that arisingfrom the…

In international large-scale assessments, students may not be compelled to answer every test item: a student can decide to skip a seemingly difficult item or may drop out before the end of the test is reached. The way these missing responses are treated will affect the estimation of the item difficulty and student ability, and ultimately affect…

The Cross-Classified Mixed Effects Model (CCMEM) has been demonstrated to be a flexible framework for evaluating reliability by measurement specialists. Reliability can be estimated based on the variance components of the test scores. Built upon their accomplishment, this study extends the CCMEM to be used for evaluating validity evidence.…

From once being synonymous with reading and writing, literacy, as a concept has expanded in the last three decades to today being associated with multiple meaning making forms and competences. Impactful, in this shift, has been the research orientation of New Literacy Studies. Besides academia, the literacy concept has also had a major influence…

Based on the relationships motivation theory, it can be assumed that social interactions in elementary school are essential for students' development and especially for their school success. Thus, this study examined how vital social resources, more precisely social interactions with peers and teachers, are for two central aspects of school…

Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) was used to measure Indonesian fourth grade elementary school students' reading comprehension in 2006 and 2011. Indonesian students scored among the lowest of the participating countries with a score of 405 in 2006 and 428 in 2011, with the PIRLS average scale score being 500. These results…

This paper extends existing work on teacher weighting in student-centered surveys by looking into aspects of practical implementation of deriving and using weights for teacher-centered analysis in the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS). The formal…

Contextual factors have been identified as greatly influencing students' reading performance. However, the collaborative influence of key contextual factors on students' reading performance is still elusive and warrants further exploration. Based on Walberg's educational productivity theory and Bronfenbrenner's ecological system theory,…

In common understanding, resilience enables students to withstand adverse conditions. Resilient students achieve moderate to good educational outcomes in spite of high risks. To foster academic resilience, a deep understanding of risk and resources, their interplay and moderating effects is essential. We aim to achieve this goal by using hidden…

In this article, we extend Liao's test for across-group comparisons of the fixed effects from the generalized linear model to the fixed and random effects of the generalized linear mixed model (GLMM). Using as our basis the Wald statistic, we developed an asymptotic test statistic for across-group comparisons of these effects. The test can be…

Student well-being has emerged as a topic of considerable interest to researchers and educators. Recent work has sought to examine relationships between measures of student well-being and other constructs such as academic achievement, physical health, relationships with peers, and engagement in learning. Reading assessment and context…

International Large-Scale Assessments (ILSAs) have had significant impact on education policy across the globe. But has interest in ILSAs now started to wane? This paper presents new evidence on this issue, exploring how the amount of attention three major ILSAs receive compares across countries, between studies and over time. Using information on…

Background: Providing a rich home literacy environment (HLE) is considered to contribute to the development of students' reading comprehension. However, less research attention has been given to the underlying mechanisms that influence this relationship, including potential mediating characteristics. The present study aims to assess whether…

This paper introduces an approach that uses latent class analysis to identify cut scores (LCA-CS) and categorize respondents based on context scales derived from largescale assessments like PIRLS, TIMSS, and NAEP. Context scales use Likert scale items to measure latent constructs of interest and classify respondents into meaningful ordered…