This project is designed to provide new explanations for classroom and school factors that foster student learning of mathematics and science. It involves constructing two studies: one that examines teacher interaction within schools and another that examines reward structures within classrooms. The purpose of these two studies is to construct better frameworks, and thereby to validate existing statistical indicators of how students learn mathematics and science once they have been exposed to the subject matter. The studies will conduct new analyses of two existing national surveys, the National Educational Longitudinal Survey (NELS:88) and the Longitudinal Study of American Youth (LSAY) and will include some on-site interviews with teachers. Each of these surveys include students at the middle and secondary levels of education.
