New Report: Effect of Classroom Practice on Student Achievement

Posted by on June 6, 2003

EFFECT OF CLASSROOM PRACTICE ON STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT

Over the past 40 years, researchers who have attempted to measure the effect of schools on student achievement have often come to the conclusion that student background characteristics (e.g., race, parental education, income) exert a greater influence on achievement than do the schools; perhaps the best known of these studies was the 1966 Coleman Study. Some studies that followed the Coleman Study have found stronger school effects; however, the effects still tend to be relatively small and outweighed by student characteristics. More recently, a body of research has begun to emerge that does support the contention that schools, and specifically teachers, do have a significant impact on student learning. In his research, William Sanders has found that teacher effectiveness is “the single biggest factor influencing gains in achievement, an influence many times greater than poverty or per-pupil expenditures.”

http://www.ascd.org/publications/researchbrief/volume1/v1n11.html