Explore the vast range of titles available.

Among the four macro skills in English language learning, writing plays a critical role in indicating students’ overall English proficiency. It is an essential skill, as essay writing is usually a key component of both national and international examinations. This study aims to examine English teachers’ perspectives on Grade 12 students’ underperformance in English essay writing in national examinations in Cambodia. It utilizes a qualitative case study approach and draws on in-depth interviews with 18 Grade 12 English teachers from various high schools across Cambodia. The findings revealed 10 key challenges contributing to Cambodian Grade 12 students’ underperformance or failure in English essay writing. These challenges included (a) students’ poor English backgrounds, (b) a lack of understanding of essay organizational structures, (c) limited English vocabulary, (d) difficulties with English grammar, (e) negative attitudes toward English essay writing, (f) English as an elective subject, (g) a lack of regular essay writing practice, (h) the limited quality of Grade 12 English teachers, (i) a lack of extensive English reading habits, and (j) other factors related to the education system. The study also identified several recommendations for improving students’ performance in English essay writing, such as improving students’ English language proficiency, making English a core exam subject, increasing essay writing practice, enhancing the quality of Grade 12 English teachers, and improving the overall education system. The study concludes with practical implications for concerned stakeholders in Cambodian general education and offers suggestions for future research.

This study examined the influence of teacher-related factors on Grade 12 Accounting learners’ performance in the Accounting General Certificate Secondary Examination (GCSE) in Eswatini. A sequential, explanatory, mixed-methods design was employed. A stratified random sample for the quantitative phase comprised 400 Accounting learners and 80 Accounting teachers from 10 schools performing well, and from 10 schools performing poorly. Purposive sampling was used for the qualitative phase to select 6 learners and 4 teachers from schools performing well, and 6 learners and 4 teachers from schools performing poorly to participate in the study. The data collection instruments were questionnaires and semi-structured interviews. Quantitative data were analysed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS), while qualitative data were analysed thematically. The study revealed that teacher variables affecting learners’ performance in Grade 12 Accounting GCSE in Eswatini were teachers’ attitude, teachers’ absenteeism, non-completion of the syllabus, revision before the examination, assignments to learners, and regularly giving up-to-standard tests. The researcher recommended inter alia that teachers should teach the relevant Accounting content thoroughly during the first and second terms so that enough time is available for revision intended to address knowledge gaps that may occur as a result of learners having not understood some content during the teaching sessions.

The aim of this study was to investigate the predictors of academic success of South African students. The study focused on 164 first to fourth year students. The extent to which students’ grade 12 performance, the type of high school they attended and their academic self-concepts contributed to their academic success during the entry and integration stages of students’ academic careers were examined. The combination of the three variables predicted a significant amount of the variance in the academic success of students in both the entry and integration stages of their academic careers. While all three variables made a unique and significant individual contribution in the entry stage, only grade 12 performance and academic self-concept explained a significant amount of the variance in the academic success of the students in the integration stage. Academic self-concept explained the largest amount of variance in academic success for both groups.

Informally testing the fit of a probability distribution model is educationally a desirable precursor to formal methods for senior secondary school students. Limited research on how to teach such an informal approach, lack of statistically sound criteria to enable drawing of conclusions, as well as New Zealand assessment requirements led to this study. Focusing on the Poisson distribution, the criteria used by ten Grade 12 teachers for informally testing the fit of a probability distribution model was investigated using an online task-based interview procedure. It was found that criteria currently used by the teachers were unreliable as they could not correctly assess model fit, in particular, sample size was not taken into account. The teachers then used an interactive goodness of fit simulation-based visual inference tool (GFVIT) developed by the first author to determine if the teachers developed any new understandings about goodness of fit. After using GFVIT teachers reported a deeper understanding of model fit and that the tool had allowed them to take into account sample size when testing the fit of the probability distribution model through the visualization of expected distributional shape variation. Hence, a new informal test for the fit of a probability distribution is proposed.

This article examined parenting styles and prosocial behaviors as longitudinal predictors of academic outcomes in U.S. Mexican youth. Adolescents (N = 462; Wave 1 Mage = 10.4 years; 48.1% girls), parents, and teachers completed parenting, prosocial behavior, and academic outcome measures at 5th, 10th, and 12th grades. Authoritative parents were more likely to have youth who exhibited high levels of prosocial behaviors than those who were moderately demanding and less involved. Fathers and mothers who were less involved and mothers who were moderately demanding were less likely than authoritative parents to have youth who exhibited high levels of prosocial behaviors. Prosocial behaviors were positively associated with academic outcomes. Discussion focuses on parenting, prosocial behaviors, and academic attitudes in understanding youth academic performance.

The COVID-19 pandemic and resulting stay-at-home orders created a need for assessing elementary, middle, and high school students' experienced stressors associated with the coronavirus situation. In collaboration with a school district wanting information about their students' well-being during the pandemic school shut-down, the current study investigated students' reported types and levels of COVID-19 stressors. Data were collected from 2,738 students from fourth through 12th grade in a suburban Midwestern school district in the United States following school closure related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Data on stress associated with the COVID-19 pandemic were gathered from students via an online survey using Qualtrics. The students rated 20 items (e.g., not motivated to do schoolwork, not going to my school) on stress level. Stressor categories found included Social Isolation, Schoolwork Stress, Fear of COVID-19 Illness, and Missing Events. Middle and high school students reported higher schoolwork stress than did elementary students, and overall, females had higher reported stress on several stressors. The current study has implications for school psychologists including utilizing a tool to assess pandemic-related stressors, using prepandemic normative data in schools with caution, promoting education about COVID-19 to reduce fear, supporting teachers regarding addressing schoolwork stress experienced by students, and teaching students anxiety-reducing strategies such as mindfulness or coping strategies.

With all learning institutions pre-maturely closed on 20 March 2020 and all citizens advised to self-isolate in a bid to control the spread of COVID-19, it was hypothesized that COVID-19 would negatively impact on the performance of students in the 2020 Grade 12 national examinations vis-à-vis mathematics, science and design and technology subjects. An observed steady increase in the number of COVID-19 confirmed cases and the low levels of technology use in secondary schools in Zambia due to limited technology resources signifies a very difficult period in a young country which has just rolled out a nation-wide implementation of STEM education, This study collected data from three teachers at a public secondary school in Chipata District of Eastern Province in the Republic of Zambia. The Head of Department for Mathematics, the Head of Natural Sciences Department and one science teacher were interviewed. Semi-structured interviews via mobile phone were used to collect views of what these specialists thought would be the COVID-19 effects on the general performance of students in their subject areas. Results of this study revealed that there is likely to be a drop in the pass percentage of secondary school students in this year’s national examinations if the COVID-19 epidemic is not contained in the shortest possible time considering that the school academic calendar was abruptly disturbed by the early untimely closure of all schools in the country.

The authors intended to (a) identify the association between gender or grade level and teachers' homework (HW) feedback and (b) examine the relationship between teachers' HW feedback, HW-related behaviors (e.g., amount of HW completed), and academic achievement. Four hundred fifty-four students (Grades 5-12) participated in this study. The results showed that (a) at higher grade levels, there is a lower perceived amount of teachers' HW feedback; (b) teachers' HW feedback as perceived by students is positively and significantly related to the amount of HW completed and to the perceived quality of HW time management but not to the amount of time spent on HW; (c) the amount of HW completed and the perceived quality of HW time management positively and significantly predict academic achievement; and (d) teachers' HW feedback as perceived by students has an indirect relationship with students' academic achievement by its effect on students' HW-related behaviors.

This article introduces novel sensitivity-analysis procedures for investigating and reducing the bias that mischievous responders (i.e., youths who provide extreme, and potentially untruthful, responses to multiple questions) often introduce in adolescent disparity estimates based on data from self-administered questionnaires (SAQs). Mischievous responders affect a wide range of disparity estimates, including those between adoptees and nonadoptees, sexual minorities and nonminorities, and individuals with and without disabilities. Thus, the procedures introduced here have broad relevance to research and can be widely, and easily, implemented. The sensitivity-analysis procedures are illustrated with SAQ data from youths in Grades 9–12 (N = 11,829) to examine between-group disparities based on sexual identity, gender identity, and physical disability. Sensitivity analyses revealed that each disparity estimated with these data was extremely sensitive to the presence of potentially mischievous responders. Patterns were similar across multiple approaches to dealing with mischievous responders, across various outcomes, and across different between-group comparisons. Mischievous responders are ubiquitous in adolescent research using SAQs and can, even in small numbers, lead to inaccurate conclusions that substantively affect research, policy, and public discourse regarding a variety of disparities. This article calls attention to this widespread problem and provides practical suggestions for assessing it, even when data are already collected.

BackgroundThere is a need to arm students with noncognitive, or 21st Century, skills to prepare them for a more STEM-based job market. As STEM schools are created in a response to this call to action, research is needed to better understand how exemplary STEM schools successfully accomplish this goal. This conversion mixed method study analyzed student work samples and teacher lesson plans from seven exemplary inclusive STEM high schools to better understand at what level teachers at these schools are engaging and developing student 21st Century skills.ResultsWe found of the 67 lesson plans collected at the inclusive STEM high schools, 50 included instruction on 21st Century skills. Most of these lesson plans designed instruction for 21st Century skills at an introductory level. Few lesson plans encouraged multiple 21st Century skills and addressed higher levels of those skills. Although there was not a significant difference between levels of 21st Century skills by grade level, there was an overall trend of higher levels of 21st Century skills demonstrated in lesson plans designed for grades 11 and 12. We also found that lesson plans that lasted three or more days had higher levels of 21st Century skills.ConclusionsThese findings suggest that inclusive STEM high schools provide environments that support the development of 21st Century skills. Yet, more can be done in the area of teacher professional development to improve instruction of high levels of 21st Century skills.