Latent classes from complex assessments

Latent variable mixture models are commonly used to examine patterns of students' knowledge. These models, including Latent Class Analysis (LCA), have proven valuable for uncovering qualitative variation in students' knowledge that is hidden by traditional variable-centered approaches, particularly when testing a particular cognitive or developmental theory. However, it is far less clear that these models, when applied to broader measures of student knowledge, have practical applications, such as identifying meaningful and actionable knowledge patterns on standardized achievement tests. In the present study, we probe the practical effectiveness of LCA for identifying valid patterns of students' knowledge on broadly defined achievement tests that provide added predictive value beyond overall scores and other known indicators of success. We examined the performance of 3481 fifth-grade students from a mid-sized school district in the western United States on two benchmark assessments of their mathematics achievement during the school year. Latent classes extracted from pass-fail scores on specific standards measured by these assessments were then used to predict students' end-of-year performance on a statewide-standardized mathematics assessment. Latent classes generally showed face validity and identified qualitatively different knowledge patterns. The predictive value of class membership for end-of-year test scores was greatly reduced when adjusting for overall benchmark scores and very small after also adjusting for additional pre-existing differences among students. These results suggest that, although LCA might improve the interpretability of achievement test scores, their predictive value is largely redundant with overall scores. These results are tentative; we encourage replication with different kinds of data, especially with finer-grained measures.

The Effects of Assigning Homework on the Achievement of Students at the Primary School Level

Assigning homework to students make they are learning more effective and they comprehend the assigned task in depth by applying drill and practice activities. The current study examines the effects of assigning homework on the achievement of students at the primary level. The population of the study was 100 boys’ primary schools. The sample respondents of the study were students of class 5th consist of a total of sixty students and each group such as experimental, comparison, and control group was twenty students. The experimental, comparison and control groups of the students were selected by the flipping of the coin as to which will be experimental, comparison, and the control group. The researcher adopted a simple random sampling technique. The data were collected through pre and post-standardized achievement tests based on mixed items (mix tests) developed by the researcher. The researcher developed fourteen lesson plans to teach the fourteen lessons. The pre and post standardized achievement tests were conducted, collected, and evaluated under the supervision of the researcher. Data were analyzed in the form of one-way ANOVA to find out the significant difference in f-value and p-value of the experimental, comparison, and control group regarding the 14 selected topics taught. The research concluded that there was no statistically significant difference in p-value and f-value in the achievement of the students in experimental, comparison, and control group from the lessons 1-6 due to repetition and diffusion in lessons and there was a statistically significant difference in p-value and f-value in experimental, comparison and control group from the lessons 7-14 taught. The data were presented in the form of tables.

Unraveling the Relationship Between Teacher-Assigned Grades, Student Personality, and Standardized Test Scores

The Big Five personality traits play a major role in student achievement. As such, there is consistent evidence that students that are more conscientious receive better teacher-assigned grades in secondary school. However, research often does not support the claim that students that are more conscientious similarly achieve higher scores in domain-specific standardized achievement tests. Based on the Invest-and-Accrue Model, we argue that conscientiousness explains to some extent why certain students receive better grades despite similar academic accomplishments (i.e., achieving similar scores in domain-specific standardized achievement tests). Therefore, the present study examines to what extent the relationship between student personality and teacher-assigned grades consists of direct as opposed to indirect associations (via subject-specific standardized test scores). We used a representative sample of 14,710 ninth-grade students to estimate these direct and indirect pathways in mathematics and German. Structural equation models showed that test scores explained between 8 and 11% of the variance in teacher-assigned grades in mathematics and German. The Big Five personality traits in students additionally explained between 8 and 10% of the variance in grades. Finally, the personality-grade relationship consisted of direct (0.02 | β| ≤ 0.27) and indirect associations via test scores (0.01 | β| ≤ 0.07). Conscientiousness explained discrepancies between teacher-assigned grades and students’ scores in domain-specific standardized tests to a greater extent than any of the other Big Five personality traits. Our findings suggest that students that are more conscientious may invest more effort to accomplish classroom goals, but fall short of mastery.

In Pursuit of Engaged Learning with Latinx Students: Expanding Learning beyond Classrooms through Performance-Based Engagements

Background/Context Urban public high schools serving low-SES communities historically have underserved nondominant culturally and linguistically diverse students by divesting them of social and cultural resources and delivering impoverished curriculum and instruction. Associated with such subtractive schooling, many Latinx youth have suffered from academic disengagement and limited academic success and futures. Focus of Study This study investigates one school's efforts to promote Latinx students’ academic and intellectual engagement through a schoolwide system of performance-based assessments (PBAs) that featured meaningful, embodied, discourse-rich activities, many of which occurred beyond classrooms during after-school hours. We examine the scope of PBA opportunity across the school and the ways educators enacted PBAs to optimize nondominant students’ engagement. We also report the organizational structures that enabled the PBA system and some implementation challenges/tensions. Setting This study features Mario Molina High, a small urban Title 1 public California school serving 262 students, of whom 90% received free/reduced-price lunches, 76% were Latinx, and 33% were emergent bilinguals. MHS emphasized an explicit social justice mission and had a record of some success with Latinx students, as measured by graduation and college-going rates, course completion for admission to California universities, and standardized achievement tests. Research Design We treat MHS as a “critical case,” holding strategic importance to the problem on which the study focuses. Using qualitative methods, we employed a bi-level design to uncover links between school organization and instruction. Data Collection and Analysis We drew on 240 hours of school observations, with special attention to PBA enactments. We also drew on 45 interviews with key stakeholders; faculty survey responses; school documents; student work; and email list communications. Our analysis involved thematic coding, memos, metamatrices, and situated/discourse analyses. Findings/Results MHS's PBAs drew school actors out of the spatial/temporal boundaries of classrooms and fostered serious, spirited, interactive spaces for learning. Three aspects of PBAs—authentic audiences, embodied action, and dialogic argumentation—transformed these assessments into what we call performance-based engagements (PBEs). This shift enhanced students’ engagement and contributed to a schoolwide culture of engaged learning. We argue that sustained participation in PBEs encouraged students to experiment with and adopt expanded practice-based identities as critical thinkers and change agents. Conclusions/Recommendations Our study suggests how the schoolwide implementation of dynamic, innovative, and culturally sustaining forms of assessment can expand and revivify traditional school learning in ways that promote the academic and intellectual engagement of historically underserved students.

Testing, Accountability, and the American Economy

Recent research highlights the importance of academic achievement as a determinant of economic well-being. Individual earnings, income growth in states, and national growth rates for GDP are each significantly determined by the population’s cognitive skills, which in turn are proxied by scores on standardized achievement tests. This well-documented relationship between education and economic outcomes underscores the importance of using test information to guide both school policy and school operations. While test-based accountability has been controversial, scientific evidence about the economic value of school improvement and about the efficacy of various accountability approaches points to holding schools and teachers accountable for their contributions to the academic performance of students.

Self-Control and Academic Achievement

Self-control refers to the alignment of thoughts, feelings, and actions with enduringly valued goals in the face of momentarily more alluring alternatives. In this review, we examine the role of self-control in academic achievement. We begin by defining self-control and distinguishing it from related constructs. Next, we summarize evidence that nearly all students experience conflict between academic goals that they value in the long run and nonacademic goals that they find more gratifying in the moment. We then turn to longitudinal evidence relating self-control to academic attainment, course grades, and performance on standardized achievement tests. We use the process model of self-control to illustrate how impulses are generated and regulated, emphasizing opportunities for students to deliberately strengthen impulses that are congruent with, and dampen impulses that are incongruent with, academic goals. Finally, we conclude with future directions for both science and practice.

A History of Achievement Testing in the United States Or: Explaining the Persistence of Inadequacy

Background/Context For more than a century, standardized achievement tests have been a feature of American education. Throughout that time, critics of standardized tests have argued that their use has detrimental effects on students, schools, and curriculum. Despite these critiques, the number and uses of standardized tests have increased steadily. Though a great deal of research has focused on the technical design of tests, the history of individual tests, and general critiques of testing, there is little research that helps explain the continued use of standardized tests in American education despite near constant criticism. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study This article develops a framework for understanding a basic paradox in the history of standardized testing in American education: the durability of standardized testing in the face of persistent criticism. Seeking to address this paradox, the article asks why tests have persisted and proliferated even though students dislike taking tests, educators believe that tests distort the learning process, and experts challenge the validity of test results. Research Design This article involves a historical analysis of structural and cultural aspects of American education that help explain the particular uses and durability of testing. Conclusions/Recommendations First, we identify three master critiques of standardized tests: distortion, waste, and misclassification. We find that, despite these persistent critiques, four important contextual features of the American education system help explain the continuous hold that standardized tests have had on American education: that the American education system is decentralized, avowedly meritocratic, publicly funded, and central to aspirations of upward mobility. These contextual factors, along with the historically contingent development of testing expertise, testing culture, and development of testing infrastructure, provide a framework for understanding the persistence of testing. Together, these factors create a dynamic system in which critiques of tests lead not to the elimination of testing, but to its further elaboration and evolution.

The Use and Validity of Standardized Achievement Tests for Evaluating New Curricular Interventions in Mathematics and Science

We investigated the use and validity of standardized achievement tests for summative evaluation of 78 educational intervention projects funded by the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) math and science education program. Investigators from 46 projects evaluated curricular interventions with standardized achievement tests as outcome measures. Twenty-five of the projects had potential validity problems related to a misalignment between the achievement test and the intervention. A closer analysis of 11 of those projects flagged as high risk for validity problems showed that only 6 projects attended to the validity of the test, and only 1 project provided adequate validity evidence. We conclude that there is widespread inappropriate use of achievement tests that threatens the validity of educational evaluations. To better support innovation, evaluators must dedicate more attention to the validity of the outcome measures they use.

A Meta-Analysis of Gifted and Talented Identification Practices

Researchers consider the underrepresentation of Black, Hispanic, and Native American students is largely due to the use of traditional methods of identification (i.e., IQ and standardized achievement tests). To address this concern, researchers created novel nontraditional identification methods (e.g., nonverbal tests, student portfolios, affective checklists). This meta-analysis of 54 studies, consisting of 85 effect sizes representing 191,287,563 students, provides evidence that nontraditional identification methods, while able to narrow the proportional identification gap between underrepresented (Black, Hispanic, and Native American) and represented (Asian and White American) populations, are still unable to address the issue of education inequity. An overall risk ratio of 0.34 was calculated for nontraditional methods of identification in comparison with a 0.27 risk ratio for traditional methods. While the nontraditional methods help identify more underrepresented students as gifted, the results of this meta-analysis show that better identification methods are needed to address inequities in identification.

Leadership

Standardized achievement tests are deeply flawed, and test-based accountability has been terribly damaging to public education, the author notes. But even so, it’s impossible for school and district leaders to ignore state test results. Plus, such tests have their uses — as long as we treat the results as a starting point for further assessment, they can help steer us in the right directions.