News
The latest news at CRESST
CRESST researchers publish well over 150 articles every year, primarily in distinguished peer-reviewed journals but also in more practice- or policy-focused publications such as Educational Leadership, Education Next, Phi Delta Kappan magazine, the American School Board Journal, and the National PTA's Our Children magazine.
CRESST partners publish scholarly books and are regularly quoted for their expertise in America's newspapers such as the New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, or Chicago Tribune.
Our researchers serve as editors, co-editors, and reviewers for a number of national journals including the journal Educational Assessment.
CRESST Research In Leading Journal
CRESST Co-Director Li Cai is co-author of two new measurement studies published in the prestigious journal Educational and Psychological Measurement. Both are helping to make improvements in item response theory.
Kerr and Chung Publish in Journal of Educational Data Mining
In a newly published journal article, center researchers Deirdre Kerr and Greg Chung describe how they used cluster analysis to evaluate student performance on educational games. Such analyses are difficult due to the vast amounts of data generated by games and simulations compared to traditional multiple choice tests.
Click here to download the abstract of the Kerr and Chung article, "Identifying Key Features of Student Performance in Educational Video Games and Simulations through Cluster Analysis."
Click here to download the full article.
New CRESST Report on Impact of
Short-Term Science Teacher
Professional Development
In a new report, CRESST researchers found that short-term professional development for science teachers focused on pedagogical content knowledge was more effective than professional development related to subject matter knowledge at helping teachers identify critical elements of student understanding such as student misconceptions.
Find out more and download CRESST Report 822, The Impact of Short-Term Science Teacher Professional Development on the Evaluation of Student Understanding and Errors Related to Natural Selection now!
CATS Games Help Students Learn Math
Educational games developed by the Center for Advanced Technology in Schools (CATS) at CRESST are helping students improve their math skills. Monster Line, for example, helps students increase their understanding of negative and positive integer addition, subtraction, and multiplication.
Click here for more information about all CATS-developed games.
Click here for more information about CATS research and products.
Research by CRESST Co-Director Published in Major Journal
Considered one of the most important publications in the education field, the Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics (JEBS) recently published an article co-authored by CRESST Co-Director Li Cai, who this year was honored by President Obama as one of the nation's leading early career scientists.
In the article, together with first author Taehun Lee from the University of Oklahoma, UCLA Professor Li Cai proposes an alternative method for conducting multiple imputation-based inference for mean and covariance structure modeling. The authors illustrate the method using three real data sets.
Click here for more information about this Taehun Lee and Li Cai article.
New Resource Paper Describes Games to Help Students Learn Math
A new resource paper describes a series of educational games developed by the Center for Advanced Technology in Schools at CRESST. Combining research on learning, instruction, assessment, and technology, the games help to improve middle school student understanding of fundamental math concepts.
Click here to download Resource Paper 15, "CATS-Developed Games."
Click here for more information about CATS research and products.
Cai and Hansen Publish in Noted Journal
In a recently published article in the British Journal of Mathematical and Statistical Psychology, CRESST Co-Director Li Cai and UCLA Graduate Student Mark Hansen propose and illustrate a new test statistic.
Using simulations, they demonstrate the performance of their new method and illustrate its effectiveness using real data.
Click here to access their article, Limited-Information Goodness-of-Fit Testing of Hierarchical Item Factor Models.
CRESST ELL Research Published
The Applied Measurement in Education (AME) journal recently published CRESST research findings on the effects of glossary and read-aloud accommodations on English Language Learners performance on a mathematics assessment.
Click here to find out if the use of a glossary and read-alouds improved ELL performance.
Click here to read a similar study in the CRESST report series.
Findings from CRESST Evaluation of SimScientists Program
In a recent evaluation of simulation-based science assessments, CRESST researchers found that teachers overall had favorable impressions of the SimScientists program, especially when the technology-based assessments were compared to more traditional paper and pencil tests.
Click here to read the full "CRESST Evaluation of Calipers II: Using Simulations to Assess Complex Science Learning."
Findings from CRESST Evaluation of SimScientists Program
In a recent evaluation of simulation-based science assessments, CRESST researchers found that teachers overall had favorable impressions of the SimScientists program, especially when the technology-based assessments were compared to more traditional paper and pencil tests.
Click here to read the full "CRESST Evaluation of Calipers II: Using Simulations to Assess Complex Science Learning."
