Are effective or meritorious schools meretricious?

Data on student achievement gain in a large urban school district during the 1984–85 school year were analyzed to identify schools with achievement consistently higher or lower than schools with similar student and school characteristics. Before calculating gain scores, students were grouped with others of the same sex, ethnicity, initial grade level, and initial achievement level. After residuals for students who were above or below similar students were summed and averaged for reading and math at each grade, school-level regression analysis was used to further control for student and school characteristics. Results indicated that schools with reading gains one standard deviation above the mean had average raw scores less than two items higher than the district average on the sixty-item reading test, while schools with math gains this large had raw scores little more than one item higher than the average on the 44-item math test. In addition, examination of data on schools with residual (combined) reading and math gain scores 1.5 or more standard deviations above the average showed that after taking account of student background information and salient school characteristics, only one elementary school among 173 and no secondary school among 71 had unusually high achievement scores. Implications are discussed regarding efforts to identify and reward meritorious schools which allegedly have improved achievement more than other similar schools.     

学术期刊网络化进程的思考与探索

学术期刊网络化是我国学术期刊出版界所面临的一大课题，借助期刊网络化的种种优势，推动我国期刊国际化、网络化的进程，必须解决当前网络出版过程中所面临的各种问题，要实事求是地评价期刊网络化的优势，对存在的问题提出切实可行的解决方案，才能推动学术期刊网络化的健康发展。     

Sensory, cognitive, and linguistic factors in the early academic performance of elementary school children: The Benton-IU project

Standardized sensory, perceptual, linguistic, intellectual, and cognitive tests were administered to 470 children, approximately 96% of the students entering the first grade in the four elementary schools of Benton County, Indiana, over a 3-year period (1995--1997). The results of 36 tests and subtests administered to entering first graders were well described by a 4-factor solution. These factors and the tests that loaded most heavily on them were reading-related skills (phonological awareness, letter and word identification); visual cognition (visual perceptual abilities, spatial perception, visual memory); verbal cognition (language development, vocabulary, verbal concepts); and speech processing (the ability to understand speech under difficult listening conditions). A cluster analysis identified 9 groups of children, each with a different profile of scores on the 4 factors. Within these groups, the proportion of students with unsatisfactory reading achievement in the first 2 years of elementary school (as reflected in teacher-assigned grades) varied from 3% to 40%. The profiles of factor scores demonstrated the primary influence of the reading-related skills factor on reading achievement and also on other areas of academic performance. The second strongest predictor of reading and mathematics grades was the visual cognition factor, followed by the verbal cognition factor. The speech processing factor was the weakest predictor of academic achievement, accounting for less than 1% of the variance in reading achievement. This project was a collaborative effort of the Benton Community School Corporation and a multidisciplinary group of investigators from Indiana University.     

探索教学规律 提高教学质量——高中物理教学中“四轮教学法” 的实施

在教学过程中,有好的教学方法,才能更好地提高教学质量.“四轮教学法”通过讲授、提高、系统、训练达标四个教学过程,理顺了学生的思路,对不同程度的学生因材施教,使学生的知识综合能力得到了逐步提高,提高了高中物理的教学质量.     

Must Evolution Education that Aims at Belief Be Indoctrinating?

Science & Education - Can a teacher aim for students to believe evolution without indoctrinating them? Recent discussions of indoctrination in evolution education suggest that such teaching...     

Educating Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Exceptional Learners: The Need for Continued Advocacy

Recent political, fiscal, and educational equity challenges require a renewed emphasis in our efforts to advocate for increased culturally and linguistically responsive education, making certain to further advance the accomplishments of the past four decades. The education of diverse exceptional learners is well established within the fields of special education and culturally and linguistically diverse education. However, drawing on several contemporary features that currently shape education in today’s schools, the authors examine the need for continued special education advocacy to ensure appropriate referral, assessment, and instruction of all culturally and linguistically diverse exceptional (CLDE) learners within the changing pre-K-postsecondary teaching and learning environments. Implications and recommendations for educator preparation at the pre and inservice levels are provided to guide the future development of teachers of CLDE learners.     

A Story of a Journey in Implementing an E-Assessment System at a South African University

Following the challenges faced in the selection and implementation of e-assessment tools for student assessment, I undertook a journey of implementing an e-assessment system within the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN). This article describes the path traversed and highlights the potholes and expressways on this road towards e-assessment implementation. Thus, the aim of this article is to present the journey, faced by an academic, in the process of implementing an e-assessment system. This study adopted a narrative inquiry approach. The findings indicate both student and academic acceptance of this form of e-assessment, with students showing particular excitement in this novel assessment mode. This journey serves to highlight the importance of determination, resilience and perseverance in applying a new form of technology within an academic context. Furthermore, support of senior management is also essential to its success. Essentially this article shows that the successful implementation of e-assessment at a university is possible but reliant on motivated academics and institutional buy in.     

科技编辑方法论研究的若干贡献及启示

从科技编辑方法论研究的历史和主要成果出发，探讨了科技编辑方法论研究繁荣哲学的三大贡献，即从形式内容的认识途径的论证、特征法建立和从范畴到范畴方法的发展。总结了科技编辑方法论研究对深入开展纺编辑学研究的三大启示，即搞科学研究要重视哲学指导、强调联系实际和善于综合创新。     

Cultural problems in minority education: Their interpretations and consequences—Part two: Case studies

Culture has featured prominently in minority educational research, policies, and intervention since the early 1960s. It is receiving even more attention today in minority education discourse due to the emergence of cultural diversity and multicultural education as popular national issues. A careful analysis of the new discourse suggests, however, that the issue has shifted from how cultural differences enhance or deter the school adjustment and academic performance of minority children to the problem of cultural hegemony and representation in school curriculum and other domains of education. In my two-part essay I argue for a reconsideration of the earlier question about how culture affects minority school adjustment and academic performance. In the first part of this essay l (1) argued that there are real cultural differences which confront minority children in school and (2) proposed thecultural frame of reference as a conceptual tool to understand minorities' interpretations of and responses to the cultural problems they encounter. More specifically, I suggested that voluntary minorities who interpret the cultural differences as barriers to be overcome are more successful in crossing cultural boundaries. Involuntary minorities with an oppositional cultural frame of reference are ambivalent in their interpretation of cultural differences as barriers and markers of group identity. They are less successful-in crossing cultural boundaries. In this second part, I will demonstrate my explanations with two case studies: blacks, an involuntary minority group and Chinese Americans, a voluntary minority group. Part One of this paper appeared in Volume 27, Number 3, September 1995.