National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) data for 9-, 13-, and 17-year-old students in the United States are provided, highlighting trends in science achievement from 1969-70 to 1990, mathematics achievement from 1973 to 1990, reading achievement from 1971 to 1990, and writing achievement from 1984 to 1990. Trends in academic proficiency…

This report presents a summary of information about the use in Massachusetts of open-ended questions in the Massachusetts Educational Assessment Program's biennial assessment of mathematics at grades 4, 8, and 12. These questions appeared in one form of the tests in each grade. One-twelfth of the fourth-graders, one-sixteenth of the…

The Fort Worth (Texas) Board of Education, Superintendent, and Texas State Legislature have implemented changes in the schools to increase student learning time. The purposes of this study were to determine (1) the percentage of allocated class time used for instruction; and (2) whether overall time utilization has changed since a similar 1979-80…

The revised Iowa Developed Energy Activity Sampler (IDEAS) was compiled using the original IDEAS program and the Energy Conservation Activity Packets (ECAPS). This booklet provides activities for teachers in the intermediate elementary grades (3-5) and is designed to enable students to develop a comprehensive understanding of energy concepts. Each…

This study investigated the "customization" of a standardized achievement test to measure the effect on group and individual scores. "Customization" refers to the modification of an existing test to more closely match test specifications of the entity using the test, usually a state or large school district. Results of an…

Designed for use with fourth and fifth grade combination classes, this student worktext combines concepts and content from both California and U. S. history courses. Material is arranged into the following seven chapters: Discovery and Exploration; Colonizing a New Land; A New Nation and New Californians; Westward Expansion; Civil War,…

Using a cross-cultural perspective, researchers studied the "math avoidance syndrome," which has reached crisis proportions among American Indians, at two elementary schools on Utah's Northern Ute Reservation and Wisconsin's Oneida Indian Reservation in 1980. Researchers gathered data by observing math instruction at the schools and by…

The revised Iowa Developed Energy Activity Sampler (IDEAS) was compiled using the original IDEAS program and the Energy Conservation Activity Packets (ECAPS). This booklet provides activities for teachers in the intermediate elementary grades (3-5) and is designed to enable students to develop a comprehensive understanding of energy concepts. Each…

Six experienced teachers of fourth and fifth grades read and made judgments about the appropriateness, attractiveness, usefulness, and effectiveness of each of 32 short descriptions of language-arts activities. The activity descriptions had been edited to vary systematically on five features: amount of student involvement; difficulty for students;…

In 1983-84, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) administered a 15-task writing assessment in grades 4, 8, and 11. The tasks involved informative, persuasive, and imaginative writing, and were evaluated at one of four levels of success: unsatisfactory; rudimentary or minimal performance; satisfactory; or detailed and controlled…

Evidence suggests that a significant proportion of school children consider themselves lonely and isolated from peers. However, less data exists as to (1) the accuracy of children's perceived loneliness when compared with their reported popularity with peers; (2) specific behavioral attributes that might contribute to popularity; and (3) stability…

Four forms of a 36-item adaptation of the Stanford Achievement Test were administered to 484 fourth graders. External factors potentially influencing test performance were examined, namely: (1) item order (easy-to-difficult vs. uniform); (2) response location (left column vs. right column); (3) handedness which may interact with response location;…

Results of the fifth year of testing by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction are presented. In 1980, objective-referenced tests in mathematics and reading were given to a sample of Wisconsin's public school students in grades 4, 8, and 12. Students were also given the Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills (CTBS) in mathematics, reading,…

Results from the third national writing assessment of nine-year-old students conducted in 1979 by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) are presented in this volume. Chapter one provides highlights of the results of the test assessment which indicate both decline and improvement on different tasks in the writing performance of…

This study attempted to replicate and extend previous aptitude-treatment interaction (ATI) findings for students' learning in large-group and small-group teaching approaches. Two elementary teachers each taught a two-week geometry unit to two classes of fourth- and fifth-grade students. One teacher used a small-group teaching approach and the…