Over the course of six years, a diverse group of school districts and charter management organizations in California ran a substantial experiment in implementing the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) in elementary and middle grades. WestEd led an extensive evaluation of that effort, the California K-8 NGSS Early Implementers Initiative,…

In July 1992, American College Testing convened a 5-day meeting to set achievement levels in writing for grades 4, 8, and 12 to be recommended for use in reporting the 1992 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). Sixty-six panelists (teachers, non-teacher educators, and non-educators) attended the meeting and participated in the…

A practicum developed and implemented an integrated reading program to raise reading vocabulary and comprehension scores and reading attitudes in a fourth-grade classroom. A classroom of 23 students was used to implement the program. A standard diagnostic test was used to record pre- and post-test scores in vocabulary and comprehension, and a…

An evaluation of a foreign language experience program for fourth graders in an inner-city school is presented. First, an introductory section reviews literature on the rationale for and structure of foreign language programs in the elementary school. In the program, students learned about Russian foreign language and culture in a weekly 30-minute…

This practicum set up a classroom-based model for peer mediation in grades 3 and 4. During the project's implementation, the school psychologist delivered, individually to each of 6 different third and fourth-grade classrooms, 8 weeks of classroom instruction on conflict resolution. When all 6 classes were familiar with conflict resolution…