This study is an investigation into factors that encourage and/or inhibit the use of social media in the academic learning process between Australian and Malaysian students at higher learning institutions. Push-pull-mooring theory was used as a guide, resulting in seven independent variables ("convenience", "social influence",…

This paper explored the effects of the amount of extensive reading (ER) on writing ability. Participants were 157 first and second-year non-English majors at a private university in Japan who took a writing test in class. Some of them were reading extensively, while others had no experience in ER. The outcomes of Pearson's correlation indicated…

Research in Educational Data Mining could benefit from greater efforts to ensure that models yield reliable, valid, and interpretable parameter estimates. These efforts have especially been lacking for individualized student-parameter models. We collected two datasets from a sizable student population with excellent "depth" -- that is,…

The ability to reflect and self-assess are essential attributes for graduates to develop during their education. At many tertiary institutions, peer and lecturer-assessment contribute to summative assessment, but self-assessment, whilst recommended for development, does not. In order to make a case for the inclusion of self-assessment as a…

Purpose: Ankle accelerometry allows for 24-hr data collection and improves data volume/integrity versus hip accelerometry. Using Actical ankle accelerometry, the purpose of this study was to (a) develop sensitive/specific thresholds, (b) examine validity/reliability, (c) compare new thresholds with those of the manufacturer, and (d) examine…

Statistics suggest the prevalence of grade inflation nationwide, and researchers perform many analyses on student grades at both university and college levels. This analysis focuses on a one-credit library instruction course for undergraduate students at a large public university. The studies examine thirty semester GPAs and the percentages of As…

Youth mentoring can have a profound impact on the lives of high-risk youth. This study presents the Campus Corps program, a time-limited (12-week), structured mentoring program for high-risk youth (ages 11--18), and results from a quasi-experimental pilot evaluation. Baseline and post-intervention problem behavior data from 315 offending youth…

This article reports the validation and application of an English language teacher education (LTE) version of the Constructivist Learning Environment Survey (CLES). The instrument, called the CLES-LTE, was field tested with a sample of 622 Iranian English language student teachers in 28 classes. When principal components analysis led to the…

Initiatives to increase leadership accountability coupled with efforts to promote data-driven leadership have led to widespread adoption of instruments to assess school leaders. In this paper we present a decision matrix that practitioners and researchers can use to facilitate instrument selection. Our decision matrix focuses on the psychometric…

Reliability of test scores is one of the most pervasive psychometric concepts in measurement. Reliability coefficients based on a unifactor model for continuous indicators include maximal reliability rho and an unweighted sum score-based omega, among many others. With increasing popularity of item response theory, a parallel reliability measure pi…

The constructs of complexity, accuracy and fluency (CAF) have been used extensively to investigate learner performance on second language tasks. However, a serious concern is that the variables used to measure these constructs are sometimes used conventionally without any empirical justification. It is crucial for researchers to understand how…

This article describes psychometric testing of an Icelandic adaptation of the "Adult Reading History Questionnaire" (ARHQ), designed to detect a history of reading difficulties indicative of dyslexia. Tested in a large and diverse sample of 2,187 adults, the Icelandic adaptation demonstrated internal consistency reliability (Cronbach's…

This study examines students' procedural and conceptual achievement in fraction addition in England and Taiwan. A total of 1209 participants (561 British students and 648 Taiwanese students) at ages 12 and 13 were recruited from England and Taiwan to take part in the study. A quantitative design by means of a self-designed written test is adopted…

The Tuning-Medicine Project produced a set of "level one" and "level two" learning outcomes/competences to be met by European medical graduates. In the learner-centered era self-assessment becomes more and more important. Our aim was to develop a self-completion questionnaire ("iCAN!") evaluating graduates' learning…

One method to investigate classroom quality is for a person to observe what is happening in the classroom. However, this method raises practical and technical concerns such as how many observations to collect, when to collect these observations and who should collect these observations. The purpose of this study is to provide empirical evidence to…