Disturbing the boundaries: The science/literature membrane

Specializations: the language of science textbooks, relations between science and literature.     

A Framework for Evaluating and Planning Assessments Intended to Improve Student Achievement

Assessments labeled as formative have been offered as a means to improve student achievement. But labels can be a powerful way to miscommunicate. For an assessment use to be appropriately labeled "formative," both empirical evidence and reasoned arguments must be offered to support the claim that improvements in student achievement can be linked to the use of assessment information. Our goal in this article is to support the construction of such an argument by offering a framework within which to consider evidence-based claims that assessment information can be used to improve student achievement. We describe this framework and then illustrate its use with an example of one-on-one tutoring. Finally, we explore the framework's implications for understanding when the use of assessment information is likely to improve student achievement and for advising test developers on how to develop assessments that are intended to offer information that can be used to improve student achievement.     

The development of comparable European cultural statistics

UK cultural statistics are far from complete, so the development of comparable European cultural statistics sounds like an ambitious task and one for which clear objectives are needed. One spin‐off from comparing the statistical systems of different countries should be some improvement in national statistics, as best practice is examined and taken up by other countries. However, the essence of the on‐going programme of work described in this chapter is the search for a common statistical language, to be used whenever cross‐country comparisons are wanted or European totals are to be compiled.

Compiling cultural statistics for different countries on a comparable basis sounds like a contradiction: how can the cultures of one country be harmonised with those of another? The key is to identify why the comparison needs to be made. In this chapter, therefore, current developments in European cultural statistics are reviewed by first exploring the needs for pan‐European cultural statistics that flow from policy.

The chapter describes and reviews a European Union project to develop cultural statistics that reported at the end of 1999. The results of this project have been taken into the European statistical system. Hardly any statistical results have yet been published. The chapter questions how far this work will progress beyond the UNESCO framework for cultural statistics. One significant issue is that the UNESCO framework, compiled some 15 years ago, gave relatively little attention to the creative industries. These industries now feature more strongly in policy responses to the wider economic and social challenges facing European countries and the European Union. The new work on cultural statistics gives some recognition to the creative industries but it does not embrace the full extent of the creative industries as defined in the UK.