影響學生學業成就因素，是值得關注的議題。本研究欲瞭解教育指標和家庭資本對學生學業成就之間的影響關係，以臺灣、日本、韓國、美國和義大利五個國家已公佈的教育指標資料和TIMSS 2007資料庫問卷調查結果的24383份追蹤樣本，進行現況分析、變異數分析、相關分析、多元逐步回歸分析、結構方程式分析，結果發現： 一、教育指標中，在學率和數學及科學學業成就為正相關。中等教育師生比、識字率、教育經費占國民所得比與數學及科學學業成就為負相關。 二、教育指標對數學學業成就的解釋變異量為25%，對科學學業成就的解釋變異量為9.7%。 三、家中藏書量和學習資源對數學及科學學業成就的變異數分析中可得知擁有越多藏書和資源的組別大於擁有較少藏書和資源的組別。 四、父母親學歷對數學及科學學業成就的變異數分析中可得知美國在此分析中未達顯著，臺灣、日本、韓國和義大利都是學歷越高的組別大於學歷低的組別。 五、自我期望對數學及科學的學業成就的變異數分析中可得知自我期望越高學歷的組別大於自我期望低學歷的組別，但美國學生在數學及科學學業成就及韓國學生在數學學業成就的自我期望皆以「不知道」的組別最高。 六、家長支持對學生數學及科學學業成就的變異數分析可得知家長支持度高的組別普遍大於支持度低的組別，但是義大利的家長支持在數學及科學學業成就和臺灣的家長支持在科學學業成就上都是支持度最高的組別小於支持度最低的組別。 七、家長參與對學生數學及科學學業成就的變異數分析可得知家長參與度高的組別普遍大於參與度低的組別，但是臺灣的家長參與在科學學業成就上是參與度最高的組別小於參與度最低的組別。 八、家庭資本和學業成就之間的相關分析可得到母親學歷和學業成就無關，家庭資本變項中的自我期望與數學學業成就也無關，父親學歷與學業成就為負相關，其它變項與學業成就為正相關。 九、家庭資本對學業成就的解釋變異量以台灣最高，家庭資本對數學學業成就的解釋變異量為27.5%，對科學學業成就的解釋變異量為28.8%。 十、由SEM結果得知家庭資本中的家長支持和家長參與對數學及科學學業成就未達顯著差異。教育指標和家庭資本對學業成就具有一定的解釋力。 依據上述研究結果將提出相關結論與建議以供參考。 / The issue of student achievement has been concerned. In this research, will focus on the relationships between educational indicators and family capital on student academic achievement, the participants include students in Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, the United States and Italy. The published educational indicators and TIMSS 2007 survey results of 24,383 samples for the analysis of variance, Pearson correlation, stepwise multiple regression, structural equation modeling found that: 1. The relationship between educational indicators, student academic achievement in mathematics and science as a positive. Secondary education teacher/ student ratio, literacy, education expenditure/ GDP ratio of and academic achievement in mathematics and science as a negative. 2. The educational indicators of academic achievement in mathematics accounts for 25% variance, in science accounts for 9.7% variance. 3. In analysis of variance, the collection of books and learning resources on academic achievement in mathematics and science indicate that a group has more is higher than the group has fewer. 4. In analysis of variance, parental education on academic achievement in mathematics and science find that in United States is not significant in this analysis. In Taiwan, Japan, South Korea and Italy, groups of higher education is the highest. 5. In analysis of variance, self expectation on academic achievement in mathematics and science indicate that a group with high self expectation is highest, but U.S. students in math and science academic achievement and Korea students in mathematics can find out that the students who "do not know" is the highest group. 6. In analysis of variance, parental support in student academic achievement in mathematics and science that groups with high parental support is higher than those with low parental support, but parental support on student academic achievement in mathematics and science in Italy, and parental support on academic achievement in science in Taiwan indicate that the highest group is less than the lowest one. 7. In analysis of variance, parental involvement in student academic achievement in mathematics and science that groups with high parental involvement is higher than those with low parental involvement, but in Taiwan, parental involvement on academic achievement in science indicate that the highest group is less than the lowest one. 8. The correlations between family capital and student academic achievement indicate that mother’s education is in no relation with academic achievement in mathematics and science, self-expectation is in no relation with mathematics academic achievement, the relationship between father’s education and academic achievement is negative, other variables and academic achievements is positive. 9. The variance of family capital in academic achievement in Taiwan is the highest: 27.5% in mathematics and 28.8% in science. 10. SEM results show that parental support and parental involvement is in no relationship with academic achievement in math and science. Educational indicators and family capital on academic achievement can be explained. Based on the results of the study, conclusions and recommendations will be presented for reference. Key words: Educational indicator, Family capital, Student academic achievement, TIMSS 2007.

The main objective of this thesis was to explore issues related to student achievement motivation in the Swedish TIMSS 2003 (Trend in International Mathematics and Science Study) context. The thesis comprises of five empirical papers and a summary. The expectancy-value theory of achievement motivation was used as the general theoretical framework in all empirical papers, and all papers are concerned with construct validation in one form or another. Aspects of student achievement motivation were measured on a task-specific level (motivation to do well on the TIMSS test) and on a domain-specific level (self-concept in and valuing of mathematics and science) and regressed on test performance. The first paper reports the development and validation of scores from an instrument measuring aspects related to student test-taking motivation. It was shown that a number of items in the instrument could be interpreted as a measure of test-taking motivation, and that the test-taking motivation construct was distinct from other related constructs. The second paper related the Swedish students’ ratings of mathematics test-taking motivation to mathematics performance in TIMSS 2003. The students in the sample on average reported that they were well motivated to do their best on the TIMSS mathematics test and their ratings of test-taking motivation were positively but rather weakly related to achievement. In the third and the fourth papers, the internal structure and relation to performance of the mathematics and science self-concept and task value scales used in TIMSS internationally was investigated for the Swedish TIMSS 2003 sample. For mathematics, it was shown that the internationally derived scales were suitable also for the Swedish sample. It was further shown that ratings of self-concept were rather strongly related to mathematics achievement while ratings of mathematics value were basically unrelated to mathematics achievement. For the science subjects, the internal structure of the scales was less simple, and ratings of self-concept and valuing of science were not very strongly related to science achievement. The study presented in the fifth paper used interviews and an open-ended questionnaire item to further investigate student test-taking motivation and perceptions of the TIMSS test. The results mainly corroborated the results from study II. In the introductory part of the thesis, the empirical studies are summarized, contextualized, and discussed. The discussion relates obtained results to theoretical assumptions, applied implications, and to issues of validity in the TIMSS context.

The purpose of study is to investigate the effects of school characteristics on students&rsquo / mathematics achievement across Turkey by analyzing the data collected from school questionnaire, student background questionnaire and mathematics achievement test in Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study 2007. The analyzed sample was comprised of 4,498 students in 146 schools. Student level factors were highest level of education of either parent, students speak the language of test at home, students&rsquo / parents born in country, books in home, computer and internet connection, computer use, index of time students spend doing mathematics homework in a normal school week, index of students&rsquo / positive affect toward mathematics, index of students&rsquo / valuing mathematics, index of students&rsquo / self confidence in learning mathematics. School related factors were principals reports on the percentages of students in their schools coming from economically disadvantaged homes, principals report on the percentage of students having the language of test as their native language, index of good attendance, principals time spent on various school related activities, schools encouragement of parental involvement, index of school resources for mathematics instruction, index of principals perception of school climate. Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM) was used for analysis. The result of the study showed that 45% of variance between schools, 54.6 % of variance was in schools, 57.33 % of school variance in mathematics achievement accounted by principals&rsquo / report on percentages of students coming from economically disadvantaged homes, parents to volunteer for school programs, school resources for mathematics instruction and principals&rsquo / perception of school climate.

Magister Philosophiae - MPhil / The South African schools act, (number 5, 1996), asserts that all learners have a right to access both basic and quality education without discrimination of any sort. Since the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals there has been a drive by the Department of Education to ensure that all learners have access to basic education by 2015. However what remains a challenge after almost 20 years of democracy is the poor quality of education and this is clear from the results of international assessment studies. Results from studies like the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study and Southern and East Africa Consortium for Monitoring Educational Quality, show that South African children perform well below international averages. In this study learner Mathematics achievement scores taken from the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study 2011 cycle will serve as a proxy for educational quality. Using multilevel analysis the current study aims to use a 2-level Hierarchical Linear Model to firstly; determine the learner and family background factors associated with education quality. Secondly; factors at the school level will be identified and proven to be associated with education quality. Variables selected for the study was based on Creamer’s theory of school effectiveness which looked at school, classroom level inputs as well as learner background variables to explain student level achievement. The results show that at the learner’s level the most significant factors were the age of the leaner, in the sense that grade age appropriate learners obtained higher scores than overage learners. Learner’s perception of mathematics is extremely important and has a positive effect on mathematics performance. In the current study mathematics perception refers to learners valuing and liking mathematics as well learner confidence in learning mathematics. Learners who said they were bullied as school generally scored lower than learners who were not bullied. At the school level the most significant factors were teacher working conditions, teachers’ specialisation in mathematics, school socio-economic status, and general infrastructure. Interesting to note at the school level is when socioeconomic status was included in the model as a single variable the score difference between low socio-economic status and high socio-economic status schools was almost 46 points. However when the factors mentioned above were added to the model the difference in scores dropped by almost half.

This diploma thesis deals with the topic negative numbers, especially with strategies and difficulties of 7th and 8th grade primary school pupils when solving selected tasks with negative numbers. This thesis is divided into theoretical and experimental parts. The theoretical part deals with negative numbers, their development, didactic difficulty and work with them. The thesis deals with selected international comparative and foreign researches with the focus on negative numbers. The most extensive part of the thesis contains an analysis of mathematics textbooks used in schools in the Czech Republic with the focus on negative numbers. The experimental part, which aim is the identification of pupils' difficulties and the analysis of mistakes they make when working with negative numbers, is the key part of the thesis. 185 pupils of 7th and 8th grade from three different schools took part in the research. The methodology consisted of the preparation of a didactic test on negative numbers and assigning it to the pupils. After completing the test, selected pupils were asked to explain their written solutions. The didactic test was prepared on the basis of mentioned research results and the analysis of mathematics textbooks. The data were analysed in terms of pupils' strategies and mistakes. The thesis...

This thesis discusses the charts and their teaching. I study in it how graphs are introduced at Czech schools, ie how graphical outputs of statistical survey (graph types, their relevance, their description, etc.) are presented in textbooks. Then I analyze examples from international research TIMSS and PISA engaged in graphs depending on the success of results of Czech pupils. It turned out that pupils have no problem with reading values from graph, while their creation or solving nonstandard given exercises makes large difficulties to pupils. Last but not least I test the ability of students correctly but also critically interpret graphs, ie whether pupils can consider if graphs present actual data or are deliberately distorted and modified. For this purpose I create questionnaire where I test through three exercises pupils of graduation classes from grammar school and vocational school and pupils of study with vocational certificate. Results of graduates from both schools were comparable. Grammar school pupils succeeded especially in solving complicated or complex tasks, vocational school pupils got better results at solving tasks that require only orientation in graph and reading values. Pupils of vocational programs reached approximately half worse results. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

National rank on international assessments, as measured in Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), gives a limited view of the data presented. This study used average scale score data from the TIMSS (1995, 1999, 2003, 2007, 2011) that were then disaggregated based on content domains (i.e., number, algebra, measurement, geometry, data, earth science, life science, physical science, biology, physics, and chemistry). These data were graphed to show the growth of the U.S. national average scale scores in comparison to three top scoring countries (i.e., Hong Kong, Japan, and Singapore), and three other post-industrial countries similar to the U.S. (i.e., England, Italy, and Australia) It was found that the eastern nations outperformed the western nations on science math question for the fourth and eighth grade. The gap between eastern and western nations grew from the fourth to eighth grades. For fourth- and eighth-grade science content domains, Singapore outperformed all other nations except in earth science where all nations were evenly matched. Additionally, percent correct statistics from the 2011 TIMSS Released Items were disaggregated based on subject (i.e., science and mathematics) and cognitive domain (i.e., knowing, applying, and reasoning). The released item scores, based on cognitive domain, were then averaged and the U.S. averages were compared with the averages of the above mentioned nations, using a series of t-tests. Singapore scored significantly higher in all categories except fourth-grade science cognitive domains knowing and applying. Hong Kong scored significantly higher in fourth- and eighth-grade mathematics cognitive domains knowing and applying and eighth-grade mathematics cognitive domain reasoning. Japan scored significantly higher in eighth-grade mathematics cognitive domains applying and reasoning as well as science cognitive domain applying. These findings suggest that the U.S. is lagging behind in some content domains and cognitive domains, but not all. The current study informs teachers, administrators, and policy makers of the specifics areas the U.S. needs improvement.

This thesis addresses the local reception and use in Sweden of the major international large scale assessments (ILSAs) of student performance: Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) and International Civic and Citizenship Education Study (ICCS). The aim is to describe and analyze how Swedish teachers, principals and school directors interpret and possibly use ILSAs in their professional practice. ILSA is treated here as a new idea or a new social technology defining what constitutes good (or bad) education. The theoretical framework combines a top-down perspective provided by Rogers’ (2003) Diffusion of Innovation theory, and a complementary, more critical Policy Enactment approach (Ball et al. 2012), stressing the import-ance of context and local actors’ perspectives. Empirically, the thesis is based on 40 semi-structured interviews carried out in the 2011-2012 school year with teachers, principals and municipal school directors in five municipalities and 12 compulsory schools, selected to cover diverse municipalities, schools, and respondents. The respondents perceive ILSAs as valid evaluations of the Swedish school system. Most think it is important to compare results of different nations, although ILSA is not expected to cover the whole curriculum. Most interviewees are aware that Swedish ILSA results have been declining for years and perceive an urgent need to reverse this trend. However, few of the directors, principals or teachers believe that Swedish schools are in a deep crisis, as described in Swedish media. The participants frequently regard schools as primary determinants of ILSA results, and few blame family, socio-economic, cultural and contextual factors for the Swedish decline in ILSA rankings. There are significant differences between the three occupational groups in their reception and use of ILSA. Municipal school directors who are very well-informed emphasize the influence of ILSA on their local development efforts. Principals and teachers say that ILSAs have had modest direct effects on their work, but they argue that poor Swedish results in international assessments have had indirect effects, for instance by prompting the introduction of a new national curriculum. / <p>Contains an English summary.</p>

由國際教育學習成就調查委員會統一命題之國際數學與科學教育成就趨勢調查測驗，為便於台灣中小學生施測與理解，英文原文試題內容需要經過許多人工討論及翻譯時間。為了增進翻譯內容一致性及其效率，我們設計一套符合測驗試題的輔助翻譯系統，將不同格式的試題文件，經執行語法分析式的片語擷取和字典查詢，透過使用者介面，選擇合適的片語詞彙翻譯選項和詞序調整，以及提供目前常用之線上翻譯服務、回顧翻譯類似句、以及加減詞彙等功能。為了能提昇翻譯詞彙的選擇正確性，我們記錄翻譯者選詞動作，讓翻譯者能回顧過去曾處理過的翻譯類似句，並且按照系統提供之選詞頻率資訊、科學領域的期刊語料之詞頻統計，以及利用統計式中英詞彙對列和語言模型，更改選詞的優先順序。我們嘗試以過去試題為實驗對象，按年級及學科區分6大試題類別，搭配4種選詞策略，透過BLEU及NIST之翻譯評估指標比較線上翻譯系統和本系統，實驗結果顯示在各實驗組的評估上均有優於線上翻譯系統的效果。 / Test items used in the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) are designed by The International Association for the Evaluation of Education Achievement, for facilitating education scientists to measure students’ competence in science and mathematics. Translating the English items into Chinese items demands a lot of work. Therefore, we would like to offer a computer-aided translation environment to improve the consistency and efficiency of the translation process. Through the user interface, translators could input different document format of test items, use phrase analysis and dictionary to find different phrase translations, and adjust word orders. Users of our system may obtain translations from on-line translations provided by Google and Yahoo, can look for previously translated items that contain specific word patterns, and so on. For selecting appropriate Chinese translations for English words, we considered users’ past selection, word frequencies in relevant corpora, and other language-related information in parallel corpora. We employed test items used in TIMSS 1999 and TIMSS 2003 to evaluate the effectiveness of our translation environment. Translations recommended by our system were compared with actual Chinese translations of the test data, and the similarity was measured with the BLEU and NIST metrics. Experimental results indicate that our system performed better or similarly with Google and Yahoo on-line translation systems.

>Magister Scientiae - MSc / An analysis of South African school mathematics results indicates that one of the problem areas in the mathematical performance of learners is proof and proving. In an endeavour to improve the mathematical proving ability of first year students at UWC, the MAM 112 class (a first year elective mathematics course) was taught a course in elementary logic. In the initial part of the study, logic puzzles were utilized as a tool to teach students to make logical connections between and from mathematical statements using the rules of inference. Subsequently research was done to determine if knowledge and understanding of logic would translate into improved proving abilities of students. To put proof and proving into perspective the origins and functions of proof was explicated and proving in South African schools was investigated. Consequently reasons are advanced for the dismal high school mathematics results in terms of proof and possible solutions are discussed. Recent discoveries of neuroscience are utilized to delineate the brain structures and cognitive processes involved in learning so as to gain a better understanding of the learning of mathematics. The findings of neuroscience, cognitive psychology and educational psychology are employed to elucidate the influence of emotion, confidence, experience and practice on the learning of mathematics in order to determine which factors can be applied to improve the proving abilities of students. The findings of the study indicate that knowledge of logic does help to improve the ability of students to make logical connections (deductions) between and from statements. The results of the study, however, do not indicate that knowledge and understanding of logic translates into improved proving ability of mathematical statements by students.