With many states adopting new standards and evaluation systems, teachers must adopt effective instructional strategies and assessment methods aligned to the rigor of new standards and assessments. One way to improve student achievement is through supporting student ownership of learning, a core component of formative instructional practices. Teaching students to take an active role in their learning can benefit students by promoting student goal setting, self-assessment, and self-determination. As students become meaningfully engaged in their learning, they gain a better understanding of learning targets, how to collect and document evidence of their learning, and how to evaluate and clarify additional learning needs, leading to the ultimate goal of improving student achievement. This article (a) describes how promoting student ownership benefits students, (b) identifies some evidence-based practices that promote student ownership of learning, and (c) illustrates the important role student ownership plays in formative instructional practices.

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The Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP) Standards requires educator preparation programs (EPPs) to ensure instruments used to assess their candidates are both valid and reliable. Due to size and limited financial resources, this task may be challenging for some EPPs. In an effort to address CAEP's expectations, 26 EPPs in one state formed a collaboration to develop and implement an instrument for use during student teaching, and then conducted analyses of its data to determine the validity and reliability. This article uses a case study methodology to investigate the EPPs' motivations for participating in the collaboration, and the benefits, challenges, and learning that resulted from participation. The findings, principally related to aspects of individual program improvement, have implications not only for EPPs pursuing CAEP accreditation but also for any higher education institutions interested in collaborative assessment development.

With many states moving toward increased accountability for all teachers, special educators, who have long been held accountable through the implementation of individualized education programs and the use of evidence-based practices, have much to offer. Formative instructional practices are evidence-based techniques that are familiar to special educators and can be implemented in classrooms filled with students of all skill and ability levels. Formative instructional practices are the way that teachers and students document evidence of student learning and make instructional decisions based on that evidence. These effective and versatile practices help teachers continuously assess their students, make data-based decisions, and ensure optimal learning. This article suggests that special educators are well positioned to make an important contribution as schools adopt more rigorous standards and the formative instructional practices necessary to guide students to mastery of these standards. An overview of these practices is provided.

This column provides brief summaries of transition-related articles published in 2012 in other professional journals. The 44 articles included descriptive, experimental, and qualitative research as well as program descriptions, conceptual papers, and practitioner pieces. All areas of Kohler’s Taxonomy for Transition Programming were addressed: family involvement, interagency collaboration, program structure, student development, and student-focused planning.