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Looking collaboratively at the quality of teacher assignments and student work in Singapore schools
Citation
Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Francisco, 2006.
Abstract
This study examined the quality of teacher assignments and associated student work in
Singapore schools. Using the authentic intellectual quality framework, two sets of
standards and scoring rubrics were developed for the training of teachers to judge the
quality of assignments and student work. The samples of teacher assignments and student
work were collected in English, Social Studies, Mathematics, and Science subject areas
from 30 elementary schools and 29 high schools. There were significant differences for
the authentic intellectual quality of teachers’ assignments by subject area, stream, and
grade level. Subject area effect was found to be larger than stream and grade level
effects. Likewise, the differences of authentic intellectual quality for student work were
significant and varied by subject area, stream, and grade level. Subject area effect was
large. The correlations between the quality of teachers’ assignment tasks and student
work were strong and significant at both grade levels. The findings suggest that teacher
professional development in high authentic intellectual quality task design is necessary
for improving student learning and performance.
Date Issued
April 2006
Project
Core - Panel 5