How big is the role of classroom teaching play on improving student achievement?

Why is this question important? The past 40 years we have witnessed significant attention paid to improving student performance. In the United States billions of dollars have been spent in school reform efforts designed to improve student test scores through structural interventions such as class size reduction, school size reduction, charter schools, school vouchers, and accountability through high stakes testing. Unfortunately, the results achieved through these have been disappointing, as test score remain virtually flat. The question should be asked, have we been focusing on the wrong class of interventions? Might interventions designed to improve classroom instruction provide better results?

See further discussion below.

Source:  Visible Learning: A Synthesis of over 800 Meta-analyses Relating to Achievement (2009)

Results: This book provides data that strongly suggests that effective practices are currently available capable of making significant differences student achievement. The data display above provides examples of 4 areas in which teachers and teaching that demonstrate medium effect size impacts on achieving student success, classroom management, active learning, formative assessment, and well designed curricula (math, science, writing, and reading). Not surprisingly, these correspond to what we already know about what skills teachers require in order to be effective at their jobs.

Implications: By focusing school reform on proven practices that achieve results we increase the likelihood of meeting the goals established in No Child Left Behind and at the same time save money. To accomplish this goal it is important that teacher preparation programs be held accountable for preparing teachers to implement classroom interventions backed up by rigorous research.

Authors:  John Hattie

Publisher: Routledge

Study Description: The book is a synthesis of over 800 meta-analyses that provide data on the effects of educational interventions on student achievement. The book is based on a review of over 50,000 individual studies. The book does not include qualitative studies, but relies on quantitative research and make use of effect size to communicate the power of interventions identified in these meta-analyses.

Definitions:
1. Effect Size: A standardized measure of the effect of an intervention (treatment) on an outcome. The effect size represents the change (measured in standard deviations) in an average outcome that can be expected if that person is given the treatment. Because effect sizes are standardized, they can be compared across studies.

Citation: Hattie, J. (2009). Visible Learning: A Synthesis of over 800 Meta-analyses Relating to Achievement