Inspired by complex system theory, this study adopts a multilevel piecewise regression model to examine the relationship between homework time and the development of students in different grades using a large-scale testing database in China. The results indicate that the relationship between homework time and students' performance is positive when…

Students' understanding of the meaning of the equal sign develops slowly over the primary grades. In addition to updating their representations of equations to recognize that the equal sign represents an equivalence relation rather than signaling an operation, students need to move beyond full computation to efficiently solve equivalence problems.…

This quantitative study examined the impact of professional learning communities (PLCs) implementing a "Focus on Learning" in a Title I school in north central Georgia. The purpose of this study was to determine the impact PLCs can have on student growth and achievement in fourth and fifth-grade mathematics, once teachers spend time…

This quantitative, nonexperimental study addressed the gap between research-established benefits and outcomes of social/emotional learning (SEL) implementation as compared to actual instances of implementation. Focusing on SEL and the specificity of use of CASEL SELect programs, the research questions of this study explored differences between…

Considering problem-solving ability as an important qualification in the 21st century that could be developed by instructional methods that allow learners to construct their knowledge via questioning through cooperative learning activities, we conducted action research with the purpose of investigating the effectiveness of inquiry-based and…

Teachers have long struggled with the tension between ensuring a rigorous education for all their students and the reality that students arrive at the start of a school year with vastly different skills and conceptual understandings. The tension can be even more acute in math, which relies heavily on students mastering foundational concepts in…

The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in substantial unfinished learning for U.S. students, but to differing degrees for various subgroups. Students of color, from low-income families, or who attended high-poverty schools experienced greater unfinished learning. In this study, we examined the degree of unfinished learning for students who went into the…

Educators are always looking for new ideas and best practices to positively impact student learning. Particularly after the learning interruptions of the COVID-19 pandemic, schoolteachers and leaders are seeking strategies to increase the rate of student academic growth. One approach that can be borrowed from leadership development is the…

This study reports achievement and growth from kindergarten to 4th grade for three groups of English Learners (ELs): (a) ever-ELs; (b) ELs consistently eligible for service; and (c) EL and Special Education dually-identified students. All three EL groups had lower test scores than never-ELs throughout K-4. In math, ELs grew more than never-ELs…

This case study investigates how teachers supported below-level readers who made reading comprehension gains in a virtual reading clinic during the COVID-19 pandemic. Data sources included case reports, lesson plans with reflections, and recorded instructional sessions for 10 participants--5 teachers and 5 students. All student participants were…

Dynamic Measurement Modeling (DMM) is a recently-developed measurement framework for gauging developing constructs (e.g., learning capacity) that conventional single-timepoint tests cannot assess. The current project developed a person-specific DMM Trajectory Deviance Index (TDI) that captures the aberrance of an individual's growth from the…

The study examines students' skills at kindergarten entry and gains in skills across the kindergarten through first-grade period (pre-COVID-19) for predicting literacy, language, math, inhibitory control, and social-adjustment outcomes in the spring of fourth grade, after schools reopened. In a large US school district, longitudinal data were…

To date, few online game-based learning studies have focused on developing children's growth creativity mindset (growth CM). This study, therefore, aimed to develop a game-based learning system to help children develop their growth CM. Additionally, we investigated the relationship between growth CM, hope belief, and creativity self-efficacy after…

High-quality early childcare and education (ECE) has demonstrated long-term associations with positive educational and life outcomes and can be particularly impactful for children from low-income backgrounds. This study extends the literature on the long-term associations between high-quality caregiver sensitivity and responsiveness and cognitive…

Purpose: Previous studies examining the inter-relations between serial and discrete naming with reading have found that the ability to efficiently process multiple items presented in a sequence (indexed by serial naming) is a unique predictor of word- and text-reading fluency. However, conclusions have been tempered by the concurrent nature of the…