Teacher support,instructional practices,student motivation,and mathematics achievement in high school

The authors examined the relationships among teacher classroom practices, student motivation, and mathematics achievement in high school. The data for this study was drawn from the base-year data of High School Longitudinal Study of 2009. Structural equation modeling method was used to estimate the relationships among variables. The results indicate that conceptual teaching positively affected student mathematics achievement, whereas procedural emphasis in mathematics instruction had a negative effect. Teacher support influenced student mathematics achievement indirectly through students' mathematics self-efficacy, and also influenced students' interest in mathematics courses. Finally, students with higher levels of family socioeconomic status and prior achievement were more likely to have teachers who use conceptual teaching strategies. Students with higher prior achievement were also more likely to perceive higher levels of teacher support. The findings have theoretical and practical implications.     

Optimizing Early Mathematics Experiences for Children from Low-Income Families: A Study on Opportunity to Learn Mathematics

Both the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and the National Association for the Education of Young Children recognize that well-designed opportunity to learn mathematics can help improve mathematics achievement of students from low-income families and from minority backgrounds. Using data from a nationally representative sample, the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten cohort, this study empirically examined a subset of children from low-income families to determine whether African American and Caucasian students have differential opportunity to learn mathematics and the extent to which opportunities to learn predict gains in mathematics achievement at kindergarten. Results indicated African American kindergartners have differential opportunity to learn mathematics than their Caucasian peers from low-income families. African American students were found to have received, on average, more reported instructional time spent on mathematics, higher use of math manipulatives, worksheets, textbooks and chalkboard work than their Caucasian peers. Moreover, greater opportunity to learn mathematics predicted higher mathematics achievement for both African American and Caucasian students from low-income families, specifically, opportunity to learn skills such as telling time, using measurement tools accurately, estimating quantities, and knowing the value of coins and cash.     

Organizational Characteristics of Schools That Successfully Serve Low-Income Urban African American Students

A prerequisite for correcting ineffective education is the examination of research on the learning environments of successful schools and the conditions and processes that enable quality outcomes. The research described in this article supports the Talent Development philosophy, which rejects deficit-based "talent sorting" models of schooling and promotes widespread academic success in appropriately supportive environments. The study delineates the common organizational characteristics of schools in low-income areas that defy the odds by producing high numbers of high-achieving African American students. Specifically, it explores how urban elementary schools that successfully serve primarily low-income African American students are configured to support students' academic and personal growth.

Participating schools were selected based on test scores evidencing their students' sustained mathematics and reading achievement. The data for the analysis was obtained from questionnaires mailed to the schools' principals. Patterns in the data and discernable trends across schools are described.     

From Opposition to Engagement: Lessons from High Achieving African American Students

Influential research on African American students has examined their school failure in terms of students’ opposition to school achievement. Only a few studies have explored school engagement and success among these students, and even fewer have examined the experiences of high achieving black students. This study illustrates the school context and school processes that high achieving African American students identify as contributing to their academic success. The findings reveal three main school effects impacting the students’ performance: 1) teacher practices, engaging pedagogy versus disengaging pedagogy; 2) participation in extracurricular activities and; 3) the state scholarship as performance incentive. According to the students, teacher practices were the most instrumental school effect benefiting their outcomes. Recognizing the processes that promote high achievement among African American students can help to improve our understanding of student performance, while promoting success among these students. The author wishes to thank Ron DePeter and Tekla Johnson for their comments on a previous draft of this article     

PREDICTORS OF ACHIEVEMENT IN AFRICAN AMERICAN STUDENTS AT RISK FOR ACADEMIC FAILURE: THE ROLES OF ACHIEVEMENT VALUES AND BEHAVIORAL ENGAGEMENT

The achievement gap between African American and European American youth is a pervasive problem in the United States. This study explored how achievement values and behavioral engagement affect the academic attainment of an academically at‐risk sample of 167 African American youth in late elementary school. Results indicate that achievement values do not have a significant influence on engagement or achievement in late elementary school. However, behavioral engagement significantly influenced math achievement from Grades 4 to 5. The implications of these findings are discussed.     

How student and parent goal orientations and classroom goal structures influence the math achievement of African Americans during the high school transition

This study examined the effects of student and parent goal orientations and perceived classroom goal structures on grades and self-efficacy in mathematics during the high school transition. From a sample of 50 African American families living in a low-income school district, student survey data and open-ended parent interviews were examined. There were three significant findings. First, students who espoused more mastery goals in high school mathematics experienced more positive changes in self-efficacy and grades in mathematics during the high school transition than did their peers. Second, students who perceived more mastery and less performance goal structures in their high school math classrooms experienced more positive changes in mathematics self-efficacy during the transition than did their peers. Third, adolescents whose parents espoused mastery goals had higher grades than did their peers whose parents did not espouse mastery goals. Results indicate that mastery goals may be more influential in determining achievement and motivation in mathematics for African American students than are performance goals during the high school transition.     

Closing the Achievement Gap: Examining the Role of Cognitive Developmental Level in Academic Achievement

The achievement gap in mathematics between African American and Caucasian students has been observed for several decades, though previous research has been unable to fully explain why the gap exists. Using a sample of 56 kindergarten and first grade students, this study examined the role that cognitive developmental level plays in the achievement gap. Results indicated that African American students scored significantly lower than the Caucasian students on a test of mathematical achievement. Furthermore, proportionally more African American students remained in the preoperational stage of development as compared to their same-age Caucasian peers. Finally, after controlling for cognitive developmental level, the achievement gap between the two groups became statistically indistinguishable, suggesting that cognitive developmental level mediates the relationship between ethnicity and mathematic achievement.     

A Socioecological View of Higher-Performing Diverse Elementary Schools

This multiple case study relied upon a socioecological framework and the lens of resilience to investigate practices and processes that are correlated with higher academic achievement among African American, Hispanic, and English language learners. Utilizing quantitative measures for sample selection of 10 higher-performing and 5 average-performing schools and qualitative data collection and analysis methods, findings indicate that 4 interrelated practices characterize higher-performing diverse schools: close engagement with and understanding of the student population; intensive literacy- and technology-enriched instruction; a collaborative and iterative approach to curriculum revision and data use; and fluid adaptation and deployment of resources. One of the 15 diverse high-poverty case study schools is discussed in detail as an exemplar. The findings from this study suggest that research cutting across levels of classrooms, schools, and districts sheds light on the interrelated proximal and distal processes that promote resilience and higher academic achievement among ethnically and linguistically diverse students.     

Relationship Between Psychosocial Factors and Academic Achievement Among African American Students

Abstract

The authors of this cross-sectional study used surveys based on the noncognitive model of W. E. Sedlacek and C. G. Brooks (1976) to determine psychosocial factors associated with African American students' high school achievement Psychosocial variables explored included community service, academic motivation, social support, and students' methods of handling unfair treatment. Results showed that after gender and absenteeism were controlled for, only the method of handling unfair treatment was positively associated with grade point average (GPA), p < .05. Those findings suggest that students who talk to others about being treated unfairly instead of keeping it to themselves are more likely to have higher GPAs; the findings also have important implications for individuals involved in the counseling and education of high school students. Sedlacek and Brooks's model provides an effective guide for predicting academic achievement and for developing programs to improve academic achievement among students of color. Further research is needed into psychosocial factors and their effects on academic achievement.     

Student Achievement for Whom? High-performing and Still ‘Playing the Game,’ the Meaning of School Achievement Among High Achieving African American Students

The preponderance of the research on African American students has generally focused on issues of school failure and underperformance. While the literature on high achieving Black students is sparse, very little is known about these students’ school experiences and the meanings that they assign to achievement. Using student-based inquiry research, this study investigates the meaning of school achievement among high-performing African Americans. The findings reveal that the students were not convinced that standardized examinations, and to a lesser extent course grades, were accurate or valid measures of achievement. Thus, they challenged the dominant achievement paradigm and created their own sense of school success, which included social dimensions such as community involvement and personal growth and development. Although collectively the students concluded that standardized exams and grades were not achievement or accurate measures of achievement, yet they clearly knew how to ‘play the game.’ While students must meet the norms of standardized measures and end-of-course testing related to the Common Core, schools can respond to their diverse assessment needs by incorporating broader measures that include, but are not limited to standardized tests. The findings of this study and student recommendations have great implications for teacher education and student assessment.     

The Experiences of African American Physical Education Teacher Candidates at Secondary Urban Schools

Presently, most physical education teachers in the United States are White Americans and from middle class families. In fact, 83 % of all teachers in public schools are White Americans, whereas approximately 10 % of all African American teachers are representative of all teachers in the United States. A student might feel cultural dissonance that she or he is behaving appropriately based on the student’s cultural norm and upbringing, but the teachers who have different cultural and ethnic backgrounds than the students may inappropriately interpret or respond to the behavior. Therefore, it is important to study African American pre-service physical education teachers’ student teaching and field-based experiences with ethnically diverse adolescence (e.g., African American students), because they have the potential to develop a positive relationship between school support, teacher support, and academic achievement and influence student learning, motivation, and engagement in physical education. The purpose of this study was to describe and explain the experiences of African American physical education teacher education (PETE) candidates at secondary urban schools. The research design was explanatory multiple-case study situated in activity theory. Participants were seven African American PETE candidates. The qualitative data sources were interviews, weekly journal reflections, and e-portfolios. The results were (a) navigating power relationships between cooperative teachers and students, (b) a ‘shocking’ experience: Feeling under-prepared, and (c) encountered cultural normalcies and stereotypes in teaching physical education. PETE programs must better prepare teacher candidates for working in urban schools with greater cultural competence and higher self-efficacy.     

Field dependence, sex role self-perceptions, and mathematics achievement in college students: A closer examination

This study was performed to examine the relationships among intelligence, field dependence, sex role, and mathematics achievement, and involved 287 college students. In addition, information was gathered on subjects' mathematics background. Although the number of mathematics courses taken and intelligence were the two best predictors of mathematics achievement, other variables were found to have indirect contributions. Path analysis revealed that field dependence and sex role affected mathematics achievement by influencing the number of mathematics courses taken by students while in high school and college.     

Family interdependence and academic adjustment in college: youth from immigrant and U.S.-born families

This study is an examination of family interdependence and its implications for academic adjustment among late adolescents and young adults in college (18 to 25 years). Survey data and university records were collected on 998 American youth with Asian Pacific, Latino, African/Afro-Caribbean, and European backgrounds. Results indicate that Asian Pacific Americans placed more importance on family interdependence than did European Americans. Across all panethnic groups, youth with immigrant parents placed greater emphasis on family interdependence than did youth with U.S.-born parents. The study distinguished between family interdependence attitudes and behaviors and found that they had counteracting influences on academic adjustment: Family obligation attitudes contributed to greater academic motivation among youth from immigrant as compared with U.S.-born families, but greater behavioral demands detracted from achievement.     

Facilitators and barriers to African American high school students' self-determination skill expression

We conducted four focus group interviews with 24 high school youth to examine facilitators and barriers to African American high school students' expression of various self-determination skills (e.g., choice/decision making, self-advocacy, goal setting, and attainment etc.). The majority of our research participants were African American, with one student identifying as multiracial (African American and White). Key findings revealed that personal (e.g., desire to graduate from school) and contextual factors (e.g., school counselor and teacher support) influenced the participants' expression of multiple self-determination skills. We also found that some of the participants' motives for utilizing or not utilizing specific skills were influenced by what they perceived as racist, punitive, and restrictive school practices (e.g., teachers holding negative perceptions about African American students and school counselors restricting their access to advanced courses). Findings from this study support ongoing calls for educators to consider students' cultural backgrounds and lived experiences when promoting their expression of self-determination skills.     

Socioeconomic status, self-efficacy, and mathematics achievement in Australia: a secondary analysis

Previous studies have shown that both student and school socioeconomic status (SES) are strongly associated with student outcomes, but less is known about how these relationships may vary for different students, schools and nations. In this study we use a large international dataset to examine how student SES, school SES and self-efficacy are associated with mathematics performance among 15-year-old students in Australia. We found that increases in school SES are consistently associated with substantial increases in achievement in mathematics and this phenomenon holds for all groups, regardless of their individual SES. Furthermore, our findings show that the association of school SES with maths achievement persists even when subject-specific self-efficacy is taken into account. However, our findings also suggest modest differences among student groups disaggregated by these factors. In particular, the association between maths achievement and school SES appears moderately stronger for students with higher levels of self-efficacy compared with their peers with lower self-efficacy. Furthermore, among students with similar levels of self-efficacy, the association between maths achievement and school SES tends to be stronger for lower SES students than for their more privileged peers. From these findings, we highlight the importance of the Australian case for comparable systems of education, and provide a discussion of policy implications and strategies for mitigating the influence of school socioeconomic composition on academic achievement more generally.     

Math Corps Summer Camp: An Inner City Intervention Program

The underrepresentation and underachievement of African American students in mathematics is a national tragedy. One response to these problems is the design and implementation of mathematics intervention programs aimed at primarily African American student populations living in the inner city, many of whom are placed at risk. This article describes such a program and presents a philosophical framework grounded in empirical studies of effective schools. The authors suggest that key aspects of the program design help students avoid the trap of disidentification with the educational system. They also suggest that a large number of factors that have been demonstrated to be associated with higher student achievement (acting in combination) contribute to the effectiveness of this intervention program.     

An assessment of a social–cognitive model of academic performance in mathematics in Argentinean middle school students

This study tested a set of hypotheses derived from the model of academic achievement in mathematics of the Social Cognitive Career Theory in a sample of Argentinean middle school students. To this aim, 277 students (male and female; age: 13–15 years) were assessed using the following instruments: logical–mathematical self-efficacy scale, mathematics outcome expectations, mathematics performance goals, and mathematics ability test. All of these instruments had been adapted for use in Argentinean students. Academic achievement in mathematics (i.e., grades obtained on regular school exams) was the variable to be modeled through the path analysis technique. The analysis allowed identification of interrelations among the variables and identification of direct and indirect effects. Academic achievement in mathematics was partially explained by the model. Overall, the results support the theoretical postulates of Social Cognitive Career Theory.     

The impacts of student-, teacher- and school-level factors on mathematics achievement: an exploratory comparative investigation of Singaporean students and the USA students

Reports from the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) consistently show that there is a substantial gap in average mathematics achievement between Singapore and the USA. This study conducts an exploratory comparative investigation on the multilevel factors influencing the mathematics achievement of students from these two countries. A conceptual framework together with an integrated model is proposed for the analysis. The TIMSS 2011 eighth grader mathematics data were chosen for this study. Results reveal that the common features influencing mathematics achievement for the students of both countries are student self-confidence, school composition by student background and teacher confidence in teaching mathematics. The cause of the different effects of American students’ mathematics achievement is more associated with resources, whereas the effects of Singaporean students’ mathematics achievement are more related to attitudes, expectations and motivations. The major elements that affect Singaporean student mathematics performances are at the teacher level. Suggestions for future research are discussed.     

Mathematics classrooms in Japan, Taiwan, and the United States

Observations were conducted in Chinese, Japanese, and American classrooms during mathematics classes. Activities in 20 representative classrooms were observed in each of 2 grades (1 and 5) and in each country. Some observations focused on individual children and others on the teachers. Large cross-cultural differences were found in many variables related to classroom structure and management. These differences paralleled differences in achievement in mathematics among the 3 countries. A number of these variables also were significantly related to average level of mathematics achievement within the American classrooms.