The use of research evidence to inform practice has become an expectation of those working in many professions. There is a dearth of research on teacher use of scholarship to inform their practice. While there is an abundance of research that can be used to inform teacher practice, there are unknowns about how much teachers seek, access, read,…

Closing the achievement gap in public education is a worthy goal that has been included as a top priority in the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (2002). This study analyzed the most salient predictors at the student and school levels to identify their long-term impact on mathematics achievement from the elementary grades to high school. The…

The authors aim to identify characteristics of democratic schools. The Delphi technique used in this study is based on attaining a consensus among a group of experts over 3 rounds with 22 experts from 9 countries participating in the first round. By the end of the third round, 339 items referring to democratic school characteristics were…

Utilizing latent transition analysis and multidimensional scaling growth analysis, the authors studied the emerging developmental trajectories in word literacy (i.e., word-reading competence) of a group of 1,503 kindergarteners. Specifically, 3 hypotheses with respect to growth patterns in word literacy from kindergarten to Grade 2 were examined:…

The researcher utilized block-entry regression analysis to determine the impacts of teacher characteristics, school characteristics, organizational characteristics, and teacher efficacy on retention in teaching from 782 teacher surveys. Findings indicated that 83.50% of participants planned to teach until retirement. Wald statistics indicated that…

The author aimed to explore primary pupils' perceptions of learning and to what extent they perceive learning is important to them. Fifty-five primary school pupils in Istanbul and Canakkale (Turkey) were interviewed. To analyze the data, A. Strauss and J. Corbin's (1998) grounded theory methodology was followed. NVivo 7 (QSR, Australia) a…

Middle school mathematics teacher quality is questionable because the number of certified mathematics teachers considered highly qualified is low (Birman et al., 2009). The author examined Grade 8 data from the 2005 National Association of Educational Progress mathematics assessment. The purposes of the study were to (a) determine the impact of…

The authors conducted a third-party study of the student achievement effects of Struggling Schools, a user-generated approach to Comprehensive School Reform (CSR). The design was a quasiexperimental, pre-post matched sample (N = 180) with school as unit of analysis, drawing on 3 years of achievement data from standardized external assessments.…

The author examines 1 experienced teacher's image of teaching and how it was purposely changed--through external intervention and against the individual's will--from the view of teacher as curriculum maker to the view of teacher as curriculum implementer. Laura's account of the "butterfly under a pin" image, a version of the…

Following a meta-analysis study conducted by Y. P. Xin and A. Jitendra (1999), the authors carried out a follow-up meta-analysis of word problem-solving interventions published from 1996 to 2009 for students with learning problems in mathematics. The authors examined the influence of education reforms as moderator variables on intervention…

This article presents the authors' response to Asha K. Jitendra's Response to Xin and Zhang ("The Journal of Educational Research," 2009, Vol. 102, No. 6). The claim of "factual errors, including inappropriate quotes, misrepresentation of information, and inadequate scholarship in Xin and Zhang's text" are not justified. In this rejoinder, the…

Educational researchers frequently study the impact of treatments or interventions on educational outcomes. However, when observational or quasiexperimental data are used for such investigations, selection bias can adversely impact researchers' abilities to make causal inferences about treatment effects. One way to deal with selection bias is to…

This article presents the author's response to Yan Ping Xin and Dake Zhang's recent critical evaluation of her and colleagues' work in "Exploring a Conceptual Model-Based Approach to Teaching Situated Word Problems," published in "The Journal of Educational Research" in 2009 (Vol. 102, No. 6). Most critiques of prior research are written in a fair…

The authors examined, by direct observation and 1 hr interval self-reporting, teacher time use in 4 types of special education programs (adaptive behavior units, content mastery, coteaching, resource room). Over 7,000 pieces of data were collected across an academic year from 31 teachers in 24 schools within 9 districts in the Southwestern United…

Previous studies have shown that teachers' aggressive classroom management impacts negatively on students. The authors compared student reaction to teachers' use of aggressive management techniques in Australia, China, and Israel. Reactions included distraction negativity toward teachers and perceptions that teachers' responses were unjustified,…