Educational Data Mining: Pickaxe or Fishing Pole?

In a recent UCLA presentation, CRESST Graduate Student Researcher Deirdre Kerr explained not just what data mining is, but how she has been using it to examine research data from an educational video game. 

Click here to read Deirdre Kerr's UCLA presentation, Educational Data Mining: Pickaxe or Fishing Pole?

Click here to read a related CRESST report written by Deirdre Kerr and Greg Chung, Using Cluster Analysis to Extend Usability Testing to Instructional Content. 

Click here to send a question to Deirdre Kerr. 

Comprehensive Centers Announce Feb. 4th Formative Assessment Webinar

The Center on Standards and Assessment Implementation (CSAI), a partnership between WestEd and CRESST, will share formative expertise during a February 4th Webinar co-sponsored by the North Central Comprehensive Center (NCCC). 

The Webinar, which begins at 4:00 p.m. Eastern Time, will present the Formative Assessment Program, a series of 8 online modules with accompanying materials to assist Comprehensive Centers as they work with states to implement formative assessment in districts and schools across the nation.

Margaret Heritage from the CSAI will be presenting together with Anne Tweed, Kim Malenoski, and Kathleen Dempsey from the NCCC. Email Sue Mutchler at smutchler@mcrel.org for login information. Click here for the Webinar Flyer.

Presenters Share CRESST Work in Monterey

Materials are now available from CRESST presenters and colleagues at the 2012 California Educational Research Association conference. 

Building Teachers' Assessment Capacity by Ellen Osmundson

Professional Development Using Math Video Video Games by Rebecca Buschang

Identifying the Denominator: Lessons from Save Patch by Deirdre Kerr

Developing an Accountability Plan for Consortia Assessments by Ron Dietel; Articles - Testing to the Top; Goodbye #2 Pencil; Master Plan for Accountability ; Communicating Research by Ron Dietel

Teaching for Learning: Learning to Assess by Theresa Slaman

CRESST Research and Dissemination To Be Broadly Shared in Monterey, CA

The November 29th-30th, 2012 California Educational Research Association conference will feature a number of CRESST efforts. Click below for summaries.

Building Teachers' Assessment Capacity by Ellen Osmundson

Developing an Accountability Plan for Consortia-based Assessments by Ron Dietel

Professional Development for Teachers Using Video Games by Rebecca Buschang

Identifying the Denominator: Lessons from Save Patch by Deirdre Kerr

Communicating Research and Information for Results by Ron Dietel

Margaret Heritage Featured Speaker at Kansas State Education Conference

Margaret Heritage, CRESST Assistant Director for Professional Development, is a special guest speaker at the annual meeting of the Kansas State Department of Education in Wichita, Kansas on November 5, 2012.

She will illustrate how teachers can integrate formative assessment together with the Kansas Common Core Standards to improve instruction and learning.

Click here for more information.  

Formative Assessment Is a "Process" Says Margaret Heritage

During a recent presentation at the Council of Chief State School Officers' National Conference on Student Assessment, Margaret Heritage advised that formative assessment is a "process" rather than a product.

Click here to discover what Heritage considers are the key features of an assessment that make it formative. 

Formative Assessment and Culture

In a recent presentation at this year's Council of Chief State School Officer's National Conference on Student Assessment, CRESST researchers Barbara Jones and Margaret Heritage, together with Gabriela Cardenas from the UCLA Lab School, shared their recommendations for addressing student culture and formative assessment. 

Click here to download the presentation, "Leveraging Students' Culture in Formative Assessment."

Stripling Shares at International Conference

At the recent International Conference on Applied Human Factors and Ergonomics, CRESST Assistant Director for Assessment Roy Stripling presented a paper, "Challenges and Opportunities for Inserting Neuroscience Techologies Into Training Systems." 

Click here for a copy of his presentation. 

Dr. Stripling's paper with the same titlte will be published in the conference proceedings, "Advances in Human Factors and Ergonomics 2012 - Proceedings of the 4th AHFE Conference 21-25 July 2012."

Co-director Li Cai Shares at Major Conference

CRESST Co-director Li Cai recently shared new statistical developments in item response theory at the International Meeting of the Psychometric Society in Lincoln, Nebraska. His presentations and co-presentations are available below. 

Empirical Histogram Bifactor Analysis

When Local Independence Diagnostics Mislead

Metropolis-Hastings Robbins-Monro Estimation of Ramsay-Curve IRT Model

Latent Variable Normality Diagnostic in Item Response Theory

A Tucker-Lewis Index for Item Response Theory

Joan Herman Shares CRESST Assessment Research at CCSSO

At the recent Council of Chief State School Officers' National Conference on Student Assessment, Dr. Joan Herman shared CRESST efforts to build multi-purpose tools that support the transition to the Common Core State Standards. 

Click here to download Joan Herman's presentation, "CRESST Integrated Literacy Assessments."