Political perspectives on the advisability of state achievement comparisons have changed substantially over the last half-century. As Selden (2004) noted regarding the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), "[w]hen it began in the 1960s, NAEP specifically was designed "not" to provide comparisons among states. This was…

Although software testing has been well-studied in computer science, it has received little attention in natural language processing. Nonetheless, a fully developed methodology for glass box evaluation and testing of language processing applications already exists in the field methods of descriptive linguistics. This work lays out a number of…

Managing a business requires vigilance and diligence. Small business owners are often ignored by IT vendors and inundated by the choices of software applications and therefore, need help finding a viable operating software solution for small business decisions and development. The extent, if any, of a significant influence of operational software…

Data driven decision making emphasizes the importance of the teacher using objective sources of information in developing the social studies curriculum. Too frequently, decisions of teachers have been made based on routine and outdated methods of teaching. Valid and reliable tests used to secure results from pupil learning make for better…

Dissections of single species (e.g., fetal pig) are a common student learning activity in introductory biology courses. Such dissections demonstrate location of anatomical parts and provide dissection practice but provide less opportunity for student critical thinking, numeracy and demonstration of the scientific method. A comparative anatomy lab…

The central amygdala nucleus (CeA) plays a critical role in cognitive processes beyond fear conditioning. For example, intact CeA function is essential for enhancing attention to conditioned stimuli (CSs). Furthermore, this enhanced attention depends on the CeA's connections to the nigrostriatal system. In the current study, we examined the role…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the quality (reliability and validity) of large-scale fitness testing in Texas and determine if reliabilities and validities were related to potential confounding variables. Four test administration scenarios were conducted to investigate the quality of data collected statewide as part of the Texas…

One of the goals of Montessorians is to spread Montessori education and make quality Montessori education available for children. However, one of the obstacles is the lack of information in the world (and an abundance of misinformation) about the Montessori philosophy. In 2009, these two issues came to a head in what evolved into a battle of…

Visual information can specify spatial layout with respect to the observer (egocentric) or with respect to an external frame of reference (allocentric). People can use both of these types of visual spatial information to guide their hands. The question arises if movements based on egocentric and movements based on allocentric visual information…

Using 3 experiments, I examined false memory for encoding context by presenting Deese-Roediger-McDermott themes (Deese, 1959; Roediger & McDermott, 1995) in usual-looking fonts and by testing related, but unstudied, lure items in a font that was shown during encoding. In 2 of the experiments, testing lure items in the font used to study their…

The neurodevelopmental sequelae of early deprivation were examined by testing (N = 132) 8- and 9-year-old children who had endured prolonged versus brief institutionalized rearing or rearing in the natal family. Behavioral tasks included measures that permit inferences about underlying neural circuitry. Children raised in institutionalized…

One of the major roles of a school psychologist is psychoeducational testing and the preparation of psychoeducational reports. Unfortunately, parents often have difficulty understanding psychoeducational reports. This difficulty might be ameliorated by supplementing psychoeducational reports with graphs. This hypothesis was tested with 144 parents…

People were trained to decode noise-vocoded speech by hearing monosyllabic stimuli in distorted and unaltered forms. When later presented with different stimuli, listeners were able to successfully generalize their experience. However, generalization was modulated by the degree to which testing stimuli resembled training stimuli: Testing stimuli's…

Is there validity to the claim that national standardized curriculum and testing will bring about the necessary education reform in the United States? To answer this question, the author has looked at and learned from Singapore, a country that has traditionally excelled and outperformed U.S. students in the international comparative studies. This…

The extensive literature on classroom-based second language learning makes little attempt to situate the classroom itself in social and multilingual sociolinguistic space, in the complex and iterative networks of encounters and interactions that make up daily life. Daily life is routinely evoked and "brought into" the classroom as a…