This book presents essays by researchers, practitioners, and policy makers who study the impact of classroom portfolios in the assessment of writing achievement by elementary and middle-grade students. Essays in the book report on a national survey of exemplary projects and presents contributions to a Portfolio Conference held at Stanford…

Previous research has examined either the effects of strategy instruction or the effects of literature-based instruction on children's literacy learning. Much less is known, however, about the combination of teacher-led strategy instruction within a literature-based framework. A qualitative case study explored what diverse second-grade students…

A study investigated the effectiveness of the Success for All (SFA) program developed at Johns Hopkins University. The program emphasizes prevention of failure, personal tutoring, family-school program, and regular evaluation of student progress. In 1996, the program involved schools in northern Israel--Arabic and Jewish, religious and secular.…

A multi-year study examined whether elementary school students can engage in historical thinking in a meaningful way, and what kind of writing activities best serve this purpose. Subjects were 17 students of varying language proficiency levels selected as the focus of research from the entire class of 31 primarily Hispanic and African-American…

As part of the mandate of the Alberta Government's Student Evaluation Branch to monitor changes in student achievement, the Humanities Diploma Examinations Unit compared the written work from 1984 and the 1990 English 30, Social Studies 30, and English 33 Canadian provincial diploma examinations. Full-length essays written by over 30,000 students…

The Computerized Inventory of Developmental Writing Traits (CIDWT) is meant to provide a valid reliable measure of program improvement, particularly for teachers implementing a process writing approach in their classrooms. While standardized tests, portfolio, and holistic scoring all have something to offer, the CIDWT is an inexpensive direct…

A study examined how metacognition and motivation related to performance among college learners seeking to improve their skills in reading and writing. Subjects, 27 female and 16 male students representing a range of ethnicities and socio-economic conditions who were enrolled in a pre-freshman summer program at a major northern university, had…

A study examined the concurrent development of reading and writing behaviors in a cross section of preschool and kindergarten children across diverse language and literacy tasks. Subjects, 16 preschool children attending a university laboratory school and 12 kindergarten children from two classrooms in a large suburban school district, were…

A three year study on assessment and grading beginning with preservice reading education teachers and continuing through their student teaching and into their first year of teaching reveals indications that instructor modeling and group work on specific instructional units for developing and using alternative assessment and evaluation procedures…

This practicum report describes a 12-week intervention to enhance the journal writing skills of six students in a second grade class. Expected outcomes were that all students will: (1) improve journal writing skills as measured by the Holistic Scoring Checklist; (2) show a 100 percent increase in the number of words used in journal writing; and…

Intended for English-language arts teachers, principals, curriculum and testing specialists, and superintendents, this handbook assists educators in preparing students for California's writing assessment. The handbook begins with a program overview and a discussion of writing assessment and the curriculum. The handbook then provides high school…

The purpose of a project was to develop and test curriculum-based procedures and measures to monitor and assess the reading and writing progress of adults in a basic education program. The most efficient, reliable, and feasible measure of reading performance from beginning reading level through eighth-grade level was the repeated oral reading…

Convergent validity and divergent validity were studied in several basic skill areas using the multitrait-multimethod procedure outlined by D. T. Campbell and D. W. Fiske (1959). The academic skill domains considered were: (1) reading; (2) mathematics; (3) writing and language arts; and (4) spelling. A total of 297 students in grades 1 through 5…

Designed for courses on the diagnosis and remediation of reading, this book introduces readers to running records, informal reading inventories, miscue analysis, retellings, think-alouds, writing rubrics, portfolios, and student self-evaluation while offering theoretical background for decision making. The book emphasizes careful observation of…

This guide to Indiana's academic standards in language arts, mathematics, science, and the social studies for Grade 1 students begins with a note to students and another note to parents. The guide spells out what students should know and be able to do in each subject, at each grade level. The guide also lists 10 things parents can do to help…