William Schmidt

William Schmidt
Michigan State University | MSU · Statistics and Education

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225
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Publications

Publications (225)
Article
Opportunities to learn related to the use of quantitative reasoning to solve higher-order real-world applications that reflect the messy nature of the world are scarce and vary across countries. Those experiences are essential to the development of quantitative literacy. This literacy, like that related to language, is critical for all children. To...
Article
The recent PISA mathematics results delivered disappointing news for the United States of America (USA). These results underscored the education system’s continuing inequalities. An important question concerns to what extent and to which part of the educational system do these sources of inequality occur? In this paper we use PISA 2012 data merged...
Article
The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2012 utilized data from 63 countries and economies to generate research questions that centered on the contribution of mathematics self-efficacy, opportunity to learn (OTL), and how their interplay affected students’ mathematical performance. This study reveals that in a majority of the survey...
Article
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Countries across the world have seen a growing gap in mathematics performance between low-SES children and those from wealthier backgrounds. The issue of inequality not only relates to student performance, but also to schooling—as defined by the mathematics curriculum and its distribution of the related opportunities to learn. Whether relationships...
Article
Full-text available
In contextual studies, group compositions are often extracted from individual data in the sample, in order to estimate the group compositional effects [e.g., school socioeconomic status (SES) effect] controlling for interindividual differences in multilevel models. As the same variable is used at both group level and individual level, an appropriat...
Article
Continuing efforts have been made in the United States (US) to examine the role of schooling in alleviating the ethnic/racial inequalities in student performance. Using the US data from the 2012 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), this study examines the between-school and within-school racial/ethnic differences in opportunities...
Article
There is an increasing interest of policies and projects to adapt boarding schools as a means to provide quality education for educationally disadvantaged students. However, little evidence is available for the effectiveness of boarding schools. The current study examined the boarding effect on primary and middle school student mathematics achievem...
Article
This study addresses measurement issues around a standards‐based content analysis of mathematics textbooks’ coverage of standards for use in large‐scale monitoring of standards implementation as proposed in a 2013 report by the National Research Council. An earlier study produced an exhaustive content analysis of textbooks using the 2012 Common Cor...
Chapter
Full-text available
IEA’s Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) can potentially be used to address important questions about the role of teachers in influencing student outcomes. To establish the potential relationships between student achievement and different types of teacher quality and instructional metrics and how stable these relationship...
Chapter
Full-text available
To understand whether there are identifiable trends in teacher quality and instructional metrics over time, it is important to first recognize that measures of teacher effectiveness may vary by education system. Descriptive results for the teacher quality measures related to mathematics drawn from twenty years of the IEA’s Trends in International M...
Chapter
Full-text available
After a brief discussion of the history of IEA’s Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), and the implications this has had for comparative research into the influence of teachers on student outcomes, this chapter details the key variables that are employed in the remainder of the book. These include several student-level cont...
Chapter
Full-text available
Inequalities in teacher quality may be examined using several different lenses. To better investigate the relationships between student equity and teacher quality and instructional metrics, educational inequality in student performance across countries and time was explored as (1) variation in student mathematics scores, and (2) differences in soci...
Chapter
Full-text available
Opportunity to learn (measured by time spent on teaching mathematics and mathematics content coverage) potentially acts as a mediator of instructional quality and teacher characteristics. Previous research used a multilevel structural equation model (SEM) to explore the relationship of teacher instructional quality (identified using a latent variab...
Chapter
Full-text available
Internationally, high-quality teachers are often considered to play an essential role in good student outcomes, but there is little research on the relationship between measures of teacher effectiveness and student achievement. Variation across countries in how diverse measures of teacher quality are related to student outcomes has made cross-count...
Chapter
Full-text available
The central aim of this report was to investigate what international comparative assessments could reveal about the role of teachers in influencing student outcomes. A series of analyses attempted to identify potential trends in teacher quality and instructional metrics over time and their relationship with student achievement, but found no strong...
Chapter
Full-text available
Researchers agree that teachers are one of the most important school-based resources in determining students’ future academic success and lifetime outcomes, yet have simultaneously had difficulties in defining what teacher characteristics make for an effective teacher. This chapter reviews the large body of literature on measures of teacher effecti...
Book
Schooling matters. The authors' professional pursuits for over twenty-five years have been focused on measuring one key aspect of schooling: the curriculum - what students are expected to study and what they spend their time studying. This documents their conviction that schools and schooling play a vital and defining role in what students know and...
Chapter
Educational opportunity and opportunity to learn (OTL) appear to be simple ideas yet are complex constructs in educational research. At their core is the idea that what students learn or are able to do is shaped, affected by, or somehow a function of the opportunities provided. In the most proximal sense, what students experience in schools are a f...
Article
Employing data from a stratified random survey of newly certified teachers in Texas, we compare the mathematical content preparation of traditional teacher program graduates with graduates of alternative programs. We find that graduates of traditional programs have statistically significantly higher content preparation even when taking precollege p...
Article
Full-text available
Many studies have found a strong relationship between the mathematics students study in school and their performance on an academic or school mathematics assessment but not on an assessment of mathematics literacy (ML). With many countries, like the USA, placing emphasis on finishing secondary education being mathematically literate and prepared fo...
Chapter
International comparative education has developed a rich and complex history to address a variety of questions about how education systems are similar or different in their organization, operation, and outcomes. Despite different approaches and the exploration of different research questions, a common challenge is making these comparisons both trus...
Article
The authors review the influence of state, national and international large-scale assessments (LSAs) on education policy and research. They distinguish between two main uses of LSAs: as a means for conducting research that informs educational reform and LSAs as a tool for implementing standards and enforcing accountability. The authors discuss the...
Article
Full-text available
International assessments, such as the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), are being used to recommend educational policies to improve student achievement. This study shows that the cross-sectional estimates behind such recommendations may be biased. We use a unique data set from one country that applied the PISA mathematics test i...
Article
International comparative studies in education provide a fresh perspective on K-12 education policy by enabling countries to learn from each other’s approaches. The recently conducted Teacher Education and Development Study—Mathematics provides a worldwide lens by which to examine the role of subject-matter in the preparation of US teachers of math...
Article
This paper uses PISA data to explore cross-national comparisons of mathematics performance and educational inequality, with a focus on those countries that are characterized by high PISA scores and greater equity. The authors discuss the dangers of giving too much attention to a single year’s high performer on a given international assessment. Inst...
Article
In this paper, student-level indicators of opportunity to learn (OTL) included in the 2012 Programme for International Student Assessment are used to explore the joint relationship of OTL and socioeconomic status (SES) to student mathematics literacy. Using multiple methods, we find consistent evidence that (a) OTL has a significant relationship to...
Article
Researchers at the Center for the Study of Curriculum at Michigan State University have developed a tool to help teachers implement the Common Core State Standards in mathematics by letting standards, not textbooks, guide their instruction. Using the web-based Textbook Navigator/Journal, teachers can pick a standard and ask which portions of the te...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Two CCSS for mathematics implementation issues were examined: teacher coverage and the coverage in available textbooks. Textbook series were compared to K-8 teachers recorded daily coverage of the standards as well as expert ratings of instructional time should be devoted to the standards according to their complexities and relative importance for...
Article
What effects do various modes of defining an instructional outcome, i.e., behavioral objectives, instructions, and precriterion tests have on students’ learning of a relatively complex cognitive task? Graduate students (N=72) were taught to operate a mechanical game. Three independent variables were experimentally manipulated, which included the pr...
Chapter
Items addressing the Opportunity to Learn (OTL) construct, the idea that the time a student spends in learning something is related to what that student learns, was included in the mathematics portion of PISA 2012 for the first time. Several questions on the student survey were designed to measure students’ opportunity to learn important concepts a...
Article
Purpose – This paper presents a moderated discussion on popular misconceptions, benefits and limitations of International Large-Scale Assessment (ILSA) programs, clarifying how ILSA results could be more appropriately interpreted and used in public policy contexts in the USA and elsewhere in the world. Design/methodology/approach – To bring key is...
Chapter
The Teacher Education and Development Study in Mathematics (TEDS-M) tested students in their final year of teacher preparation on their knowledge of mathematics undergirding secondary school mathematics (MCK). Several articles have explored the relationship between students exposure to specific opportunities to learn (OTL) in their programs to thei...
Chapter
Motivating the recently conducted Teacher Education and Development Study – Mathematics (TEDS-M) was the question of how high performing countries prepare their teachers to teach their challenging curriculum to primary and lower secondary students? The study found that countries prepared teachers in substantially different types of programs. These...
Chapter
Although students at more selective schools generally demonstrate greater academic performance, it is unclear whether the gains from attending an elite postsecondary institution are due to the quality of educational services provided, or merely from peer and/or selection effects. Employing data drawn from the U.S.-TEDS study, we assess the relation...
Chapter
This article examines the teacher preparation program learning opportunities afforded future lower secondary mathematics teachers and future elementary teachers who may teach mathematics. Data from U.S. participation in the recent international Teacher Education and Development Study in Mathematics are explored against international profiles to add...
Chapter
For more than two decades, three components of teacher knowledge have been discussed, namely, content knowledge (CK), pedagogical content knowledge (PCK), and general pedagogical knowledge (GPK). Although there is a growing body of analytic clarification and empirical testing with regard to CK and PCK, especially with a focus on mathematics teacher...
Chapter
In this paper we explore the dynamics of teacher beliefs about mathematics with a special focus on future primary teachers. After reviewing earlier research about teacher beliefs, with special attention to the MT21 study and other work based on TEDS data, we examine the relationship among the different dimensions of teacher beliefs and the extent t...
Book
This book presents a collection of papers that examine the TEDS-M data results in terms of knowledge and beliefs, the relationship between opportunities to learn during teacher education and outcomes, as well as the relationship between the future teachers’ background and teacher education outcomes. TEDS-M, under the auspices of the International A...
Article
Full-text available
Many international comparisons of education over the past 50 years have included some measure of students’ opportunity to learn (OTL) in their schooling. Results have typically confirmed the common sense notion that a student’s exposure in school to the assessed concepts, operationalized in some sort of time metric, is related to what the student h...
Article
In this article, the authors review International Large-Scale Assessment (ILSA)-based research over the last several decades, with specific attention on cross-national analysis of mean differences between and variation within countries in mathematics education. They discuss the role of sampling design and ‘opportunity to learn’ (OTL) indicators to...
Article
Preparing and educating high-quality mathematics and science teachers is a crucial challenge internationally in the twenty-first century as these subjects can be regarded as decisive for the future of our societies. However, the structure and the content of teacher education depend on a deeper rationale, which is often a result of cultural boundari...
Article
Full-text available
If there is to be a next generation of great US scientists and engineers, the system of science education must inspire students’ interest in STEM and help them reach their potential.
Book
Full-text available
The Center for the Study of Curriculum at Michigan State University conducted a survey of school district curriculum directors/supervisors in the 41 states that had officially adopted the new Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (CCSSM). The Center’s goal was to provide baseline information to inform and guide the efforts of states, local di...
Article
In this work, we explored the relationship of the Common Core State Standards in Mathematics (CCSSM) to student achievement. Building on techniques developed for the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), we found a very high degree of similarity between CCSSM and the standards of the highest-achieving nations on the 1995 TIMSS....
Conference Paper
Full-text available
The US K-12 science curriculum lacks focus and coherence. While some progress has been made, standards include many topics which seem like shopping lists for classroom instruction. A group of research scientists, science educators and statisticians worked to identify a few fundamental core concepts that would provide coherence and make connections...
Chapter
This chapter demonstrates a method to summarise instructional materials that can be used to distinguish different types of curriculum. Using a U.S. national longitudinal sample, indices derived from textbook content coverage were used in quantitative analyses to illustrate curricular differences. Textbook data collected from mathematics teachers of...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
This paper uses data from all 50 state standards, over 100 district standards, as well as survey results from teachers in 61 school districts to examine Opportunity to Learn (OTL) in elementary, middle and high school mathematics, identifying how variations in the organization of content coverage (length, sequence, topic) indicates substantial ineq...
Article
According to a variety of metrics (NAEP, PISA, TIMMS, college completion, etc.), the mathematics knowledge of U.S. students can be described, at best, as mediocre. In light of the growing importance of mathematics for both individual and national economic competitiveness, this weak performance has rightfully alarmed policymakers and the public. The...
Article
The recent movement in the United States toward common (national) mathematics standards brings to the fore issues of implementation which includes how teachers are prepared to teach. The Teacher Education and Development Study in Mathematics (TEDS-M) provide an international context for an in depth analysis of the US primary future teachers’ TEDS-M...
Article
Full-text available
Poor precollege math abilities, and too little emphasis on college-level math, can reduce the number of highly capable math teachers.
Article
This paper utilizes data from U.S. districts that participated in the 1999 TIMSS-R study to explore the consequences of variation in opportunities to learn specific mathematics content. Analyses explore the relationship between classroom coverage of specific mathematics content and student achievement as measured by the TIMSS-R international mathem...
Article
Full-text available
This article examines the teacher preparation program learning opportunities afforded future lower secondary mathematics teachers and future elementary teachers who may teach mathematics. Data from U.S. participation in the recent international Teacher Education and Development Study in Mathematics are explored against international profiles to add...
Article
For more than two decades, three components of teacher knowledge have been discussed, namely, content knowledge (CK), pedagogical content knowledge (PCK), and general pedagogical knowledge (GPK). Although there is a growing body of analytic clarification and empirical testing with regard to CK and PCK, especially with a focus on mathematics teacher...
Article
Full-text available
Efforts to promote academic achievement by increasing access to courses, especially in mathematics, may mask educational disparities if variations in curriculum are not also monitored. A multi-dimensional description of students’ mathematics curricula during high school was obtained from analyses of surveys, transcripts, and textbooks collected for...
Article
Full-text available
This article draws upon teacher and curriculum data collected in the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) to document cultural differences in what constitutes school mathematics. These differences are explored with each curriculum instantiation: The intended curriculum as found in official content standards, the potentially imp...
Article
Full-text available
Despite being known as the land of opportunity, the United States is far from equitable when it comes to the mathematics that students have the opportunity to learn.
Article
Full-text available
The study "Mathematics Teaching in the 21st Century (MT21)" focuses beyond others on the measurement of teachers’ general pedagogical knowledge (GPK). GPK is regarded as a latent construct embedded in a larger theory of teachers’ professional competence. It is laid out how GPK was defined and operationalized. As part of an international comparison...
Article
Cross-national research studies such as the Program for International Student Assessment and the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) have contributed much to our understandings regarding country differences in student achievement in mathematics, especially at the primary (elementary) and lower secondary (middle school) levels....
Article
Full-text available
Following the long tradition of attending to the importance of educational opportunity in the understanding of educational progress, 1995 TIMSS International Curriculum Analysis (ICA) was designed to capture country's curriculum standards as intended curricula and their textbooks as potential implemented curricula. The vision of education opportuni...
Article
Improving mathematics education in the United States has taken many forms. Our work has focused on two aspects: the content knowledge of teachers and a well-articulated coherent curriculum. Our aim was teacher “capacity building” that is enabling teachers to teach to coherent and significant mathematical curricular goals and describe the implementa...
Article
Full-text available
Book Review: Teacher Education Matters: A Study of Middle School Mathematics Teacher Preparation in Six Countries, william h. schmidt, sigrid blomeke, and Maria Teresa Tatto, 2011. 352 pp. ISBN 978-0-8077-5162-6. Teachers College Press; www.tcpress.com. Mathematics Teaching in the 21st Century (MT21), an international study funded by the National...
Article
Two reports, released in conjunction with the original TIMSS (Third International Mathematics and Science Study) in 1997, analyzed the curriculum component of the study and offered one significant explanation for the relatively poor performance of U.S. students in mathematics.1 The data indicated that the U.S. curriculum typically covered more topi...
Article
Full-text available
Recent studies show that national control of K-12 curriculum yields important payoffs in terms of greater curricular coherence and, as a result, higher test performance on international tests such as those used in the Third International Mathematics and Science Study. This paper examines the connection between national control of curriculum and cur...
Article
Contends that individual teachers have ultimate control over what content is taught in their classrooms. Reports a study of the factors which influenced the curriculum decision-making of 18 elementary teachers. (BSR)