Describes ways in which well-intentioned efforts to protect young children from inappropriate school practices have had the opposite effect. Readiness testing, retention, transition classes, tracking, and increased entrance age are discussed. Alternative strategies are proposed. (BB)

Administered System of Multicultural Pluralistic Assessment (SOMPA) to 700 White, 700 Black, and 700 Hispanic elementary school students. Ten years later, again tested 1,184 of original 2,100 students with SOMPA in high school. Results suggest that some subtests of the SOMPA may have some validity for predicting school achievement for students…

Toddlers in the lowest 10th percentile for lexical production were compared with age- and language-matched controls on measures of phonetic complexity, lexical development, and grammatical complexity. Results indicate an overlap between phonology, lexicon, and grammar and suggest the importance of true consonant production for lexical development.…

Reports on research to develop a descriptive framework capable of revealing relevant linguistic features of aphasic speech. Spontaneous speech samples collected from aphasic and normal speakers in dyadic conversational settings and from monologic picture descriptions are transcribed; lexical, phrasal and causal elements are coded and quantified.…

Seventeen of the Child Well-Being Scales were used as measures of the physical and psychological care of children. Comparisons between neglectful families and low-income control families yielded predicted differences. Composite indices showed good internal consistency. Concurrent validity was supported. Scales reliably classified neglectful and…

Demographic projections concerning the shortage of teachers in Canada, their pay scale, the feminization of teaching, the gender gap in salaries, and teacher autonomy have often been incorrect, or correct for the wrong reasons. Instead of relying on demographic predictions, teachers should contemplate who they really want to be professionally,…

This study evaluates the validity of two aggression scales for predicting observations of malicious or disruptive behavior at school. Subgroups of a sample of 1,560 children (age 8.6 plus or minus 1.5 years) were assessed using (a) peer nominations of aggression, (b) teacher reports on the Teacher Report Form (TRF) of the Child Behavior Checklist…

Following their first year of advanced study, two samples of students were polled. Study one analyzed the attitudes of 4,248 studnets toward the admission test they had taken: Graduate Record Examinations (GRE), Law School Admission Test (LSAT), Medical College Admission Test (MCAT), Admission Test for Graduate Study in Business, or the Miller…

The ability of three measures to predict teaching employment was examined: National Teacher Examinations; Education in the Elementary School Specialty Area Test; and supervisors' ratings of student teachers, Student Teacher Rating Form (STRF). The test scores were moderately correlated, but the STRF was a more valid predictor of employment.…

Investigates the relationship between topic-specific background knowledge and measures of overall quality, coherence, syntactic complexity, audience, and function in the expository writing of tenth grade students. (HOD)

This research attempted to interrelate several methods of producing option weights (i.e., Guttman internal and external weights and judges' weights) and examined their effects on reliability and on concurrent, predictive, and face validity. It was concluded that option weighting offered limited, if any, improvement over unit weighting. (Author/CTM)

Summarizes some of the findings of recent study of tests designed to determine the English language proficiency of nonnative speakers. (CFM)

The relationship between 15 emotional indicators on the Bender Gestalt Test and the acting out behavior of 93 children, ages 5 to 12, as rated by their teachers, was investigated. Use of the Bender as a projective measure was seriously questioned. The ten-item behavioral rating scale is appended. (MH)

Describes a study to identify factors related to academic success at the College of Basic Studies at Boston University. Creativity, Scholastic Achievement Test scores, high school grade point average (GPA), and academic motivation variables were factor analyzed, and included with sex in a stepwise regression, with college GPA as the criterion.…

Investigates numerous individual difference measures to determine their underlying dimensions, to contrast their predictive validities and to evaluate their contributions in a causal model of second language acquisition. Findings indicate that substantial links exist among affective measures and achievement. (56 references) (Author/CK)