ethanporcaro/eric-fulltext-meta huggingface dataset:
Teaching Aids and Their Use in the Schools of Jericho
Author: Wahdan, Mohammed Hassan Ali
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Reports - Research
Subjects: Questionnaires,Learning Processes,Use Studies,Technology Uses in Education,Instructional Materials,Teacher Background,Program Effectiveness,Instructional Effectiveness,Influence of Technology,Knowledge Level,Familiarity,Predictor Variables,Foreign Countries,Educational Practices

This study aims to provide the reader with information about the use of teaching aids in Jericho schools. The study is especially designed to measure the teachers' general understanding of teaching aids and their benefits in the process of learning and teaching, it also measures the teachers' use of different types of these aids. In addition, it shows the contribution of schools and their administrations in encouraging the use of teaching aids by teachers. To achieve these goals, the researcher had designed a questionnaire and asked some teachers to answer it. The teachers were selected randomly from Jericho directorate schools. The questionnaire was made of two sections; the first section is for personal information, the second contained 20 items (statements) divided into four dimensions; the benefits of using teaching aids, the teachers' background about teaching aids, the effects of teaching aids on the students and the contribution of schools in encouraging the use of teaching aids. After the answered questionnaire was collected, the researcher applied the analytical statistical techniques and methods to get the results. It was found that teaching aids have their great impact on the educational process. At the end, the researcher drew some conclusions and stated some useful recommendations. The questionnaire is appended. (Contains 4 tables and 1 figure.)
National VET Advisory Taskforces. Joint Communique to Stakeholders
Author: Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations
Date: 2009-04-00
Type: Reports - Descriptive
Subjects: Vocational Education,Advisory Committees,Stakeholders,Organizational Theories,Organizational Communication,Position Papers,Foreign Countries,Disabilities,Indigenous Populations

Over 12 years ago, the Australian National Training Authority (ANTA) first established the ANTA Disability Forum and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples Training  Advisory Council (ATSIPTAC) to provide much-needed focus on creating opportunities for people with disabilities and Indigenous people to successfully participate in training  leading to employment. The Disability Forum and ATSIPTAC produced Bridging Pathways and Partners in a Learning Culture, Australia's national strategies for disability and Indigenous reform in the training system that have been guiding the reform process ever since. Following Ministerial endorsement of the strategies, the ANTA Disability Forum and ATSIPTAC were replaced by the Australian Disability Training Advisory Council (ADTAC) and the Australian Indigenous Training Advisory Council (AITAC)  which oversaw the implementation of the Strategies and provided advice and guidance at the Ministerial, bureaucratic and delivery levels. Each produced a mid-term review of the respective strategies that provided more practical focus on the reform process. Over the years, new arrangements were established to be the primary source of advice to governments regarding student needs in VET, and particularly for students with poorer VET participation and employment outcomes than the general student population. This is the joint communique of the National VET (Vocational Education and Training) Advisory Taskforces and Advisory Alliance. It is intended to inform stakeholders about what has been achieved since their formation, and to outline the new equity advisory arrangements that are currently being established in VET.
Reflections on Effects of Blogging on Students' Achievement and Knowledge Acquisition   in Issues of Instructional Technology
Author: Tekinarslan, Erkan
Date: 2010-11-00
Type: Journal Articles
Subjects: Foreign Countries,Experimental Groups,Control Groups,Undergraduate Students,Web Sites,Research Design,Electronic Publishing,Academic Achievement,Pretests Posttests,Educational Technology,Instructional Effectiveness,Student Attitudes,Interviews,Observation,Computer Science Education

The purpose of the study is to investigate the effects of blogging on Turkish undergraduate students' achievement levels in issues of instructional technology in a computer course. Moreover, this study reflects the observations of the instructor and the opinions of the students regarding contributions of blogging to their knowledge acquisition and information searching and sharing skills. The methodological framework of the study is based on a pretest-posttest experimental design with a control group and qualitative research techniques including interviews, document analyses and observations. A total of 68 undergraduate first year students in two groups (N=34 in experimental, and N=34 in control) participated in the pretests and posttests. In addition, a total of 21 students took part in the interview process. The results showed that there was no significant difference between the mean achievement scores of the experimental and control groups in pretest. However, there was a significant difference between the mean scores of the experimental group and control group in the post test in favor of the experimental group. Also, the results indicated that the students in the experimental group had significantly higher scores in the posttest than in the pretest phase. As a result, both experimental and qualitative findings suggest that blogs can be used as supplementary mediums to promote achievement and knowledge acquisition of students as well as information searching and sharing skills within a learning community. (Contains 6 tables.)
Evaluating Math Recovery: Assessing the Causal Impact of Math Recovery on Student Achievement
Author: Smith, Thomas
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Reports - Research
Subjects: Mathematics Achievement,Academic Achievement,Program Effectiveness,Tutors,Longitudinal Studies,Grade 2,Teaching Experience,Grade 1,Arithmetic,Pedagogical Content Knowledge,Evaluation Methods,Elementary Education,Thinking Skills

The authors' goal was to evaluate the potential of Math Recovery (MR), a pullout, one-to-one tutoring program that has been designed to increase mathematics achievement among low-performing first graders, thereby closing the school-entry achievement gap and enabling participants to achieve at the level of their higher-performing peers in the regular mathematics classroom. Specifically, the research questions were as follows: (1) Does participation in MR raise the mathematics achievement of low performing first-grade students?; (2) If so, do participating students maintain the gains made in first grade through the end of second grade? The two-year evaluation of Math Recovery was conducted in 20 elementary schools (five urban, ten suburban and five rural), representing five districts in two states. Students were selected for participation at the start of first grade based on their performance on MR's screening interview and follow-up assessment interview. The authors recruited 18 teachers to receive training and participate as MR tutors from the participating districts--all of whom had at least two years of classroom teaching experience. The findings of this study have theoretical, practical, and policy significance. Practically, the positive causal effect of MR tutoring demonstrates that programs that are diagnostic rather than scripted in nature can overcome fidelity concerns and have an impact on student early mathematics performance. Theoretically, the findings indicate that investing in tutors' knowledge of student reasoning and pedagogical content knowledge can pay off in terms of improvement in student's mathematical learning, particularly if tutors use carefully designed tools such as the MR Learning and Instructional Frameworks that codify and schematize this knowledge. With regard to policy, the authors' finding that the MR program can reduce some of the pre-K mathematics achievement gap provides an initial indication that the cost of the program per student might be justified, although further work is needed to understand why initial gains made by participants appear to diminish after tutoring ends. It is possible that the forms of arithmetic reasoning that MR develops needs to be further supported in the regular classroom to see the full benefit of this form of tutoring. Longitudinal studies that track MR students and their initially higher performing peers until the end of elementary school are needed to address this question adequately.
Making Schools Work. 2010 Annual Report
Author: New Mexico State Dept. of Education, Santa Fe
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Reports - Descriptive
Subjects: Strategic Planning,Schools of Education,School Readiness,Recognition (Achievement),Community Involvement,Educational Change,Public Education,Achievement Gap,Educational Improvement,Change Strategies,Educational Quality,Accountability,Parent Participation,Teacher Qualifications,Educational Environment,College Preparation,Job Skills,State Standards,Academic Standards,Achievement Gains,American Indian Education,State Legislation,Health Promotion,Minority Groups,Hispanic American Students,African American Students,English (Second Language),Nutrition,Educational Finance,Teacher Salaries,Teacher Certification,Educational Technology,Rural Schools,Advanced Placement,Standardized Tests

The New Mexico Public Education Department 2010 Annual Report was created as a way to reflect on the accomplishments in education that occurred under Governor Bill Richardson's administration from 2002-2010. In 2003, the Governor outlined a reform agenda and pledged his commitment to improve education in New Mexico. In the fall of 2003, Governor Richardson nominated New Mexico's first cabinet level Secretary of Education, Dr. Veronica Garcia. She began her term by outlining an aggressive, integrated action plan to raise expectations and close the achievement gap in New Mexico. Together with the Governor, Secretary Garcia drafted a state strategic plan for education, Making Schools Work, to address the unique needs of New Mexico students. They identified the following reform areas to target: (1) Academic Rigor and Accountability; (2) Closing the Achievement Gap; (3) School Readiness; (4) Quality Teachers; (5) Parent &amp; Community Involvement; (6) 21st Century Classrooms; and (7) College &amp; Workforce Readiness. These seven areas provide the structure for this annual report. Due to Secretary Garcia's effort up to her retirement in July of 2010, New Mexico leads the nation in comprehensive approaches to education reform and has received significant national recognition. In August 2010, Dr. Susanna Murphy was appointed Secretary Designate and continued the momentum of reform. The accomplishments listed in this report illustrate the profound transformation that took place in education in New Mexico over the past eight years, truly confirming Bill Richardson as the Education Governor for the state.
Evaluating Math Recovery: Investigating Tutor Learning
Author: Green, Sarah Elizabeth
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Reports - Research
Subjects: Tutorial Programs,Mathematics Instruction,Tutors,Teacher Characteristics,Knowledge Base for Teaching,Knowledge Level,Mathematics Achievement,Low Achievement,Grade 1,Elementary School Students

The goal of the overall study was to evaluate the potential of Math Recovery (MR), a pullout, one-to-one tutoring program, to increase mathematics achievement among low-performing first graders, thereby closing the school-entry achievement gap by enabling them to achieve at the level of their higher-performing peers in the regular mathematics classroom. An additional purpose of the study is to inform the design of future effectiveness and scale-up studies, should they be warranted, as well as policy decisions regarding adopting the program and selecting tutors. In order to achieve these purposes, the authors used two measures of tutor knowledge, the LMT (Learning Mathematics for Teaching) and a developer created test covering the understanding and use of the MR frameworks.
Using State or Study-Administered Achievement Tests in Impact Evaluations
Author: Olsen, Robert B.
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Reports - Research
Subjects: Standardized Tests,Achievement Tests,Academic Achievement,Intervention,Reading Instruction,Science Instruction,Measurement,Computation,Error of Measurement,Elementary School Students,Middle School Students

This report, which has been prepared by Abt Associates for the Institute of Education Sciences' National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance, takes an important first step in sorting out the implications of relying on state tests for general, student-level measures of reading and math achievement in evaluations of educational effectiveness. More specifically, this report provides empirical evidence that may help evaluation designers decide whether to rely on state tests to measure student achievement  in studies of educational effectiveness. This study is designed to inform some of the choices that evaluation designers face with respect to state and study-administered standardized tests for a broad but well-defined class of study designs. This class, which covers many IES-sponsored evaluations, has two key defining features: (1) randomization (at either the student or cluster level) and (2) measurement of student achievement at two points in time--at &quot;baseline&quot; (prior to the implementation of the intervention) and (2) at &quot;follow-up&quot; (at least one point after the intervention has been implemented). (Contains 1 exhibit.)
Teacher Attitudes about Compensation Reform: Implications for Reform Implementation. Working Paper 50
Author: Goldhaber, Dan
Date: 2010-06-00
Type: Reports - Descriptive
Subjects: Teacher Salaries,Merit Pay,Opinions,Teacher Attitudes,Compensation (Remuneration),Finance Reform,Salary Wage Differentials,Personnel Policy,State Surveys,Program Implementation,Predictor Variables,Teaching Conditions,Educational Policy,Educational Research

Reform advocates and policymakers concerned about the quality and distribution of teachers support proposals of alternative compensation for teachers in hard-to-hire subject areas, hard-to-staff schools, and with special knowledge and skills. The successful implementation of such proposals depends in large part on teacher attitudes. The current body of research on teacher attitudes toward compensation reform paints an inconsistent picture of teachers' views, largely ignoring the influence of individual and workplace characteristics on teacher attitudes. Results from a 2006 survey of teachers in Washington State linked to school and district data confirm earlier findings that teacher opinion about pay reform is not uniform, and further illustrates teacher preferences for different pay structures vary substantially by individual and workplace characteristics. Nearly three quarters of teachers favored higher pay for hard-to-staff schools. In contrast, only 17% favored merit pay. Teachers with a high degree of confidence in their principal were more likely to support merit pay than those with greater sense of trust and respect for their fellow teachers than for their principal. Policymakers interested in implementing new pay systems should carefully assess teacher opinion in determining where (and how) they invest in them. Appendices include: (1) Descriptive Statistics; (2) Administrative Data, Survey Design, and Response Rates; and (3) Variable Coding. (Contains 6 tables and 27 footnotes.)
Teacher Mobility, School Segregation, and Pay-Based Policies to Level the Playing Field. Working Paper 44
Author: Clotfelter, Charles T.
Date: 2010-05-00
Type: Reports - Research
Subjects: Teaching (Occupation),Teacher Effectiveness,School Segregation,Salary Wage Differentials,Faculty Mobility,Minority Groups,Low Income Groups,Teacher Recruitment,Teacher Qualifications,Disadvantaged,Teacher Salaries,School Demography,Incentives,Teacher Persistence,Labor Market,Educational Policy,Educational Research

Research has consistently shown that teacher quality is distributed very unevenly among schools to the clear disadvantage of minority students and those from low-income families. Using information on teaching spells in North Carolina, the authors examine the potential for using salary differentials to overcome this pattern. They conclude that salary differentials are a far less effective tool for retaining teachers with strong pre-service qualifications than for retaining other teachers in schools with high proportions of minority students. Consequently, large salary differences would be needed to level the playing field when schools are segregated. This conclusion reflects the finding that teachers with stronger qualifications are both more responsive to the racial and socioeconomic mix of a school's students and less responsive to salary than are their less well qualified counterparts when making decisions about remaining in their current school, moving to another school or district, or leaving the teaching profession. Data Definitions is appended. (Contains 10 tables, 2 figures and 30 footnotes.)
Evaluating Math Recovery: Measuring Fidelity of Implementation
Author: Munter, Charles
Date: 2010-00-00
Type: Reports - Research
Subjects: Tutorial Programs,Mathematics Instruction,Program Implementation,Measurement,Mathematics Achievement,Low Achievement,Grade 1,Elementary School Students

In this paper, the authors describe a case of measuring implementation fidelity within an evaluation study of Math Recovery (MR), a pullout tutoring program aimed at increasing the mathematics achievement of low-performing first graders, thereby closing the school-entry achievement gap by enabling them to achieve at the level of their higher-performing peers in the regular mathematics classroom. Two research questions guided the conduct and analysis of the larger study: 1) Does participation in MR raise the mathematics achievement of low performing first-grade students? 2) If so, do participating students maintain the gains made in first grade through the end of second grade? The analysis reported in this paper follows from a third question: 3) To what extent does fidelity of implementation influence the effectiveness of MR? The two-year evaluation of Math Recovery was conducted in 20 elementary schools (five urban, ten suburban and five rural), representing five districts in two states. The findings suggest it is possible to create a reliable instrument to measure implementation fidelity for differentiated interventions--an endeavor that has, heretofore, been largely avoided in evaluations of educational interventions. Many potentially high-quality interventions are unscripted, instead relying on teacher knowledge and professional development, requiring considerable differentiation by implementers. As individuals work to rigorously evaluate such programs, they need to develop reliable fidelity measures that are both feasible and true to program components, so that evaluators can adequately link measures of treatment integrity to outcomes, to more accurately determine the relative strength of interventions (Cordray & Pion, 2006). This paper outlines the development and use of one such measure as a case of how such fidelity instruments might be developed and used in the future. Critical aspects of the process included: (1) the identification of the core implementation components of the intervention (Fixsen et al., 2005); (2) close work with program developers to operationalize those components; (3) training of coders in both the program itself and the coding schemes/process; and (4) collaborating with the coding team to further refine operationalizations and coding decisions, to strike a balance of feasibility and adherence to program components.
A Reflective Journey through Theory and Research in Mathematical Learning and Development
Author: Belbase, Shashidhar
Date: 2010-12-20
Type: Reports - Evaluative
Subjects: Mathematics Education,Learning Theories,Learning Processes,Epistemology,Classroom Environment,Student Evaluation,Phenomenology,Reflection,Research,Foundations of Education

This paper is an attempt to reflect on class sessions during the fall 2010 in a course "Theory and Research in Mathematical Learning and Development". This reflection as a learning journey portrays discussions based on foundational perspectives (FP), historical highlights (HH), and guiding questions (GQ) related to mathematics learning and development. I think these three key areas: FP, HH, and GQ became the central in all sessions explicitly or implicitly. FP covered the key areas of philosophical and psychological theories of learning and development; HH captured historical developments of psychology and philosophy of mathematics learning and development; and GQ turned critical eye toward theories and research in mathematical learning and development. Complexities of classroom dynamics have been discussed in relation to course contents, lectures, discussions, reviews and presentations as stepping stones in the progress of course with multiplicities of ontologies, epistemologies, and methodologies in actions and operations.
Getting Results from the Learning Investment: A Report from CAEL's Tuition Strategy Group. CAEL Forum & News, Winter 2007
Author: Klein-Collins, Becky
Date: 2007-00-00
Type: Reports - Descriptive
Subjects: Educational Finance,Experiential Learning,Adult Learning,Corporations,Human Resources,Financial Support,Tuition,Employment,Employees,Outcomes of Education

Employers are one of the largest sources of financial support for adult learning today. Some of this support goes to in-house training, but a significant amount--in the tens of billions of dollars, according to some estimates--goes to tuition reimbursement for employees. The Council for Adult and Experiential Learning (CAEL) has managed tuition programs for employers and their workers for more than two decades. In the last few years, it has convened human resource managers to discuss tuition strategies--how tuition programs can be structured and positioned to best help the workforce and the corporation itself. The last meeting of the CAEL Tuition Strategy Group (TSG) was attended by twenty-four representatives of companies with tuition assistance programs, and the focus of the day-long session was how to get more bang for one's tuition dollar. Headlining the agenda was Michael E. Echols, PhD, Vice President of Strategic Initiatives at Bellevue University, who discussed the demand for high skills and why demographic changes will make it difficult for corporations to rely solely on recruitment for getting the skills they need in the workplace. Three themes emerged from his presentation and were echoed throughout the day as attendees discussed their own challenges in getting the most return for their tuition dollars. These themes are: (1) Corporations will increasingly need to "grow their own" high-skilled workforce; (2) A key tension within corporations is the treatment of tuition programs as "benefits" when they need to be seen as "investments"; and (3) Corporations need to start using their tuition program more strategically in order to gain a greater return for that investment.