This paper emerges from a broader study that investigated the strategies employed by teachers to continue mathematics teaching and learning during South Africa's COVID-19 lockdowns and through subsequent phased and partial re-opening of schools. In this paper, we focus on teacher views of the role of parents in these efforts gathered through two…

The purpose of this study is to investigate teacher perceptions of Value-Added Models specifically as they relate to students with disabilities. Value-Added Models are designed to reward teachers for student growth while taking into account factors such as socioeconomic status and disabilities (Weigert, 2012). The study also examines the alignment…

As result of several federal policies over the last few decades, accountability measures for student learning and success have increased tremendously. Therefore, many school districts, including East Tennessee School District which was the subject of this study, implemented district-wide benchmark testing such as the Collaborative Assessment…

Las Americas Middle School is a newcomer program within Houston Independent School District (HISD) that serves students in Grades 4 through 8 who have been in the U.S. for less than one year. As a non-zoned school of choice, Las Americas has no attendance boundary, meaning that students and families must opt to enroll in the school. This brief…

A Concept-Based Curriculum is designed to help students uncover important, transferable understandings about what it means to be a capable reader, writer, speaker, viewer, listener, and thinker. But, too often, a well-designed, conceptual curriculum does not translate into conceptual teaching. "Concept Based Literacy Lessons" helps…

Most students with reading difficulties struggle to read words. We examined intervention effects for students with "significant" word reading difficulties (SWRD; standard score of 80 on at least one pretest measure of word reading), which includes individuals with or at risk for dyslexia. We investigated: (a) What are the effects of…

The impact of the International Baccalaureate (IB) curriculum on Chinese teachers' self-efficacy has been unknown. The purpose of this causal-comparative study was to determine the impacts of the International Baccalaureate curriculum on Chinese teachers' reports of self-efficacy. Two groups were studied, the first comprised Chinese public…

Attending to the whole unit that a number refers to in a mathematical problem situation and showing flexibility in coordinating different units are foundational for mathematical understanding. In this study, we explored teachers' attention to and flexibility with referent units in situations involving fractions and fraction multiplication. Using…

The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in an unanticipated, near-universal shift from in-person to virtual instruction in the spring of 2020. During the 2020-21 school year, schools began to reopen, and families were faced with decisions regarding the instructional mode for their children. We leverage administrative, survey, and virtual-learning data to…

For the effective expression of feelings and thoughts, handwriting should be produced fluently at a certain speed. The aim of this study was to examine the development of handwriting speeds in 4th-8th grade primary and secondary school students in terms of some variables. In line with this aim, answers were sought to the question, "Do 4th-8th…

The Conover Solution is a nonparametric method used to analyze relative growth in students' achievement on state tests administered on two or more occasions. However, there has been very little research assessing the robustness of this method in the presence of missing data. Using vertically scaled and non-vertically scaled data from the math…

Although it is critical for students with autism to be included in large-scale assessment and accountability systems, it is not clear how to best measure their underlying academic skills and knowledge. Additional empirically-supported guidance is necessary to assist school teams that need to make decisions about how to best include students with…

We used the Stanford education data archive (SEDA) data to examine the heterogeneity among urban school districts in the United States. The SEDA 2.1 includes data sets on students' mathematics (Math) and English language arts (ELA) achievement from 2008 to 2014 at the district level. Growth mixture modeling was used to uncover the underlying…

Research has shown links between emotion regulation strategies and child mental health. However, it is not well known how the characteristics of children may moderate these links. The aim of this study was to explore whether environmental sensitivity--the ability to perceive and process information about the environment--moderates links between…

Stories of children moving in and out of refugee camps are not uncommon yet are often overshadowed by the dominant narratives of oppression, political failure, and war -- the stories "told of" rather than "told by" refugees. Dominant narratives on refugees largely shape perceptions about children and youth in displacement as…