Despite its important role in education, significant gaps remain in the literature on homework. Notably, there is a dearth of understanding regarding how homework effects vary across different ...subjects, how student backgrounds may moderate its effectiveness, what the optimal amount and distribution of homework is, and how the causal impact of homework can be disentangled from other associations.
This study examines the different effects of homework frequency and duration on student achievement in both mathematics and science while adopting a causal inference probabilistic framework.
Our data consists of a nationally representative sample of 4118 Irish eighth grade students, collected as part of TIMSS 2019.
We employ an extension of a causal inference machine learning model called Bayesian Causal Forests that allows us to consider the effect of homework on achievement in mathematics and science simultaneously. By investigating the impacts of both homework frequency and duration, we discern the optimal frequency and duration for homework in both subjects. Additionally, we explore the potential moderating role of student socioeconomic backgrounds.
Daily homework benefitted mathematics achievement the most, while three to four days per week was most effective for science. Short-duration assignments proved equally as effective as longer ones in both subjects. Notably, students from advantaged socioeconomic backgrounds did not gain more from homework.
These findings can guide policies aimed at enhancing student outcomes while promoting a balance between academic responsibilities and extracurricular activities.
•Daily homework proved most effective in mathematics.•Three to four days per week was the best frequency in science.•Short homework assignments were equally as beneficial as longer ones.•Advantaged students did not benefit more from homework than their peers.
The article presents results and analysis of data from a national survey conducted among teachers, regarding the science literacy of Bulgarian students.
The conducted international studies PISSA and ...TIMSS show that the results of Bulgarian students are below the average for the study. In the field of natural sciences, the most significant decrease was observed, with the average score of Bulgarian students according to PISSA data falling by 22 points in the study conducted in 2018, compared to 2015.
The research presented in this article was conducted through an online questionnaire with 15 questions of different types. 105 teachers participated in the study. The results show that teachers use different methods to build science literacy in students. Teachers share that they are partially or not familiar with the results of the PISSA and TIMSS international studies conducted in our country, in the years 2015 and 2019. They need additional methodical help and literature for acquiring further knowledge and skills for improving science literacy among students.
To motivate students, intrinsic interest is generally preferred over the instrumental values (useful for future study/work) of the tasks. Such general principles could be complicated by the ...differential work-related values and attitudes across cultures. Understanding and applying the appropriate motivational systems in congruence with students' cultural beliefs is important. Using self-determination theory, we examined the possible differential importance (and other complicated interactions) of motivational factors in representative student samples from 19 countries and economies in two cohorts of large-scale international surveys (in total 188,481 students in the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study TIMSS, 2015 and 2019). Results showed that emphasizing task instrumental values helped academic performance for students with a low intrinsic interest in collectivistic cultures. In contrast, stressing instrumental values did not help low-interest students in individualistic cultures. Notably, intrinsic motivation facilitates academic performance universally in all cultures.
•Low-intrinsic collectivist students will benefit from instrumental motivation.•Only intrinsic motivation was positively influential for individualistic students.•A cultural interactive model is supported.
Different approaches are employed when teaching environmental issues. One approach, termed the “environmental scientific approach,” perceives environmental education as part of life or earth ...sciences, providing factual, scientific knowledge. Another approach, termed the “environmental sustainability citizenry approach”, emphasizes sustainability and balancing between the need to move forward technologically and economically and the need to protect the environments in which we and others live. A synthesis of the two approaches encompasses both environmental scientific literacy and environmental sustainability citizenry. This article examines the degree to which changes in the emphasis given to the two approaches worldwide and in Israel impacted the achievements of Israeli eighth graders in this field. Based primarily on data from the Third Mathematics and Science Study-(TIMSS), the findings indicate that the TIMSS tests were biased toward the “environmental scientific” approach, in contrast to the more recent and accepted trends of the “environmental sustainability citizenry approach” embedded in Israeli curriculum. The assessment of environmental achievements in Israel, that was based on the biased test of the TIMSS study, fails to accurately reflect both the curricular changes that have taken place in Israel in this field and students' achievements, thus rendering this assessment inappropriate for this purpose.
Abstract Inquiry‐Based Teaching Practice (IBTP) is an essential component of science education, and promoting its implementation is at the heart of various reform efforts. Even though science ...teachers regard IBTP as an essential pedagogical method, they rarely use it for various reasons. This study utilizes Bronfenbrenner's ecological framework to examine potential factors at various levels of the educational ecosystem that predict the implementation of inquiry‐based teaching practices among Grade 9 science teachers in South Africa. To this end, quantitative data from 537 educators who participated in the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) 2019 national assessment were utilized. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation, and hierarchical multiple regression analysis. Results revealed that four variables at different socioeconomic levels were perceived to strongly predict teachers' implementation of inquiry teaching practices. These factors include teachers' job satisfaction, instructional resource shortage, and teachers' perception of the significance of various assessment strategies at the mesosystem level as well as teachers' participation in professional development at the exosystem level. Significant correlations exist between some of the predictive variables. Implications for policy are discussed.
We examined the predictability of non-cognitive variables for students' mathematics achievement, based on large-scale international databases of the TIMSS 2003, 2007, and 2011, and the PISA 2003 and ...2012. We synthesized empirical evidence about 65 non-cognitive variables, which were categorized into 13 research domains of educational psychology—affect, curriculum/content exposure, homework, learning and instructional time, motivation, personality traits, planned behavior, school climate, self-beliefs/social-cognitive theory, self-regulatory learning style/strategies, teacher behavior, value, and vocational interest. Our analyses showed that a group of self-beliefs constructs, in particular, self-efficacy in PISA, confidence in TIMSS, and educational aspiration, in both TIMSS and PISA, were the best predictors of individual-level student achievement in mathematics. The present review supports the claim that students' projective judgements about their own ability and future selves are particularly important for their academic achievement. We discuss potential educational initiatives to maximize educational outcomes of students from diverse cultural and national backgrounds.
•Self-beliefs are the best predictors of individual-level student achievement.•The effect of self-efficacy belief is stronger than that of SES at the individual-level.•SES was the strongest, positive predictor of country-level student achievement.
•Do the school-factors teaching quality, climate, and SES influence the within-school slope of achievement on student SES?•Data from TIMSS 2011 Grade 8 for 50 educational systems was analysed with ...two-level random slopes models.•School SES was the strongest determinant of within-school slope differences for many educational systems.•When school SES relates negatively to within-school slope the system is compensatory with respect to student SES.
The main aim of the study was to identify school characteristics that can reduce the relation between socio-economic status (SES) and achievement, so that equity of educational outcomes can be improved. Data from 50 countries participating in the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) conducted in 2011, focusing on Grade 8 mathematics, was analysed. Two-level random slopes models fitted at school- and student-levels were used to investigate the influence of quality and quantity of instruction, school climate, and school SES on the within-school regression slope for achievement on SES. The results showed school SES to be the strongest determinant of slope differences across schools and educational systems. Whether school SES relates negatively or positively to the within-school regression of achievement on student SES is an indicator of whether the educational system is compensatory or anti-compensatory with respect to student SES.
Abstract Standardised tests of academic basic skills are an established feature of contemporary Australian schooling. Assessment results are widely reported and directly influence educational ...policymaking. Furthermore, Australian national educational priorities are linked to educational system accountability via the results of standardised tests. Given the influence and importance of assessment data, this paper aimed to collate publicly available data from four assessment programmes undertaken by Australian students, and document long‐term trends in average achievement across all available assessments. Results are reported from three international assessments, the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study, the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study and the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), along with the only Australian assessment, the National Assessment Program: Literacy and Numeracy. Of these four, only PISA demonstrated systematic declines in average scores over time. For the remaining three programmes, results in the primary school years showed initial improvements that were subsequently maintained over remaining iterations of the tests. In secondary school, students' average results neither declined nor increased appreciably over time. The consensus of the four largest assessment programmes undertaken by Australian students since 1995 thus fails to support the prevailing narrative of a broadscale decline in academic skills attainment.
In this study, the effects of some student (e.g., gender, bullying, etc.) and school variables (e.g., emphasis on academic achievement, clarity of teaching, etc.) on the TIMSS 2015 science and ...mathematics achievement of eighth grade students in Türkiye were examined by controlling for the socioeconomic status of the students at the student and school level. The analyses were performed using the multilevel modelling method and the HLM8 package program. The findings show that school variables account for 34% of the variability in the TIMSS 2015 science achievement of eight grade students, while student variables account for 66%. Similar to this, school variables account for 35% of the variability in these students' mathematics achievement and student variables for 65% of it. The socioeconomic status of the school at the school level and students' confidence in learning the lesson at the student level are the two variables that have the strongest effects on students' achievement in science and mathematics. According to the results, other variables that have a significant effect on students' achievement in both science and mathematics at the school level are the clarity of teaching, the emphasis on academic achievement, and the school bullying level. Furthermore, school discipline problems have an effect on students' mathematics achievement. However, school resources and teacher qualifications do not have a significant effect on student achievement. Home educational resources and bullying among students are two important variables that effect how well students do in science and mathematics. The effect of gender and value learning the lesson on science achievement was significant, whereas the effect on mathematics achievement was not. The effect of like learning lesson on student achievement is significant only for mathematics.
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