A primary instructional objective of most early science programs is to foster children's scientific curiosity and question-asking skills (Jirout & Klahr, 2011). However, little is known about the relationship between curiosity, question-asking behavior, and general inquiry skills. While curiosity and question asking are invariably mentioned in…

The Multilevel Assessment of Science Standards (MASS) project is creating a new generation of technology-enhanced formative assessments that bring the best formative assessment practices into classrooms to transform what, how, when, and where science learning is assessed. The project is investigating the feasibility, utility, technical quality,…

In collaboration with two other research organizations, the authors integrate principles of the BEAR Assessment System with Universal Design for Learning principles to develop and validate learning progressions and an aligned, universally designed formative and summative classroom assessment system for promoting conceptual understanding of number…

The purpose of this research is to examine whether the effect of mathematics instructional strategies depends on first graders' entering mathematics skills. In particular, the authors compare Saxon Math, which is a highly scripted whole class mathematics core curriculum and Saxon Math supplemented with student/peer assisted learning opportunities.…

This study applies a randomized controlled trial to examine the effects of supplemental instruction using two online mathematics curricula--DreamBox and Reasoning Mind. It is an independent evaluation intended to generate unbiased results that will help inform the ongoing development of a charter school network's hybrid instructional model, which…

This study, sponsored by the Institute of Education Sciences (IES) in the U.S. Department of Education, examines whether some early elementary school math curricula are more effective than others at improving student math achievement in disadvantaged schools. A small number of curricula, which are based on different approaches for developing…

Until recently, few valid and reliable assessments were available to measure young children's mathematics and science learning in a "comprehensive" way. Now, a number of mathematics assessments have been developed and subjected to testing (Klein, Starkey, & Wakeley, 2000; Ginsburg, 2008; Clements & Sarama, 2008), and progress has been made in…

The authors' proposed work builds upon 12+ years of research collectively known as the "SimCalc Projects." SimCalc Connected MathWorlds (SCM) combines two innovative technological ingredients to address core mathematical ideas in deep and sustainable ways for mathematics learners. Software that addresses content issues through dynamic…

The purpose of the study was to design a rigorous experimental study and collect high quality data to determine the effectiveness of the intervention on student achievement. In particular, the authors examined whether diagnostic assessments implemented by schools in Indiana produced rigorous estimates of their effects on student performance on the…

The aim of this study was to test a training program intended to fine-tune the mental representations of double-digit numbers, thus increasing the discriminability of such numbers. The authors' assumption was that increased fluency in math could be achieved by improving the analogic representations of numbers. The study was completed in the…

Due to the lack of effectiveness of the punitive school approach toward challenging behaviors (Luiselli, Putnam, Handler, & Feinberg, 2005; Reynolds, Skiba, Graham, Sheras, Conoley, & Garcia-Vazquez, 2006), public schools have searched for an innovative approach to better serve students who are at risk for academic failure and dropout/expulsion. A…

Credit recovery is one strategy to deal with high failure rates. The primary goal of credit recovery programs is to give students an opportunity to retake classes that they failed in an effort to get them back on track and keep them in school (Watson & Gemin, 2008). Most recently, as schools across the nation struggle to keep students on track and…

Inverse probability weighting (IPW) estimates are widely used in applications where data are missing due to nonresponse or censoring or in observational studies of causal effects where the counterfactuals cannot be observed. This extensive literature has shown the estimators to be consistent and asymptotically normal under very general conditions,…

In this research, the authors present both the design and preliminary testing of a technology-intensive classroom intervention designed to support middle schools students' understanding of an aquatic ecosystem. The goals of their intervention are to help learners develop deep understanding of ecosystems and to use tools that make the relationships…

Despite over thirty years of theoretically based research investigating "how" teacher mathematical knowledge and instructional practice relate to student learning, it is still largely unclear how these constructs are related, and policy makers and practitioners are still situated in a context with insufficient data to make decisions. Thus, there…