Progress in International Reading and Literacy Study 2001 - International

Abstract
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The PIRLS 2001 aimed to generate a database of student achievement data in addition to information on student, parent, teacher, and school background data for the 35 countries that participated in PIRLS 2001.

Geographic coverage
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The survey had international coverage

Analysis unit
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Individuals and establishments

Universe
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The PIRLS 2001 target populations are all children in "the upper of the two grades with the most 9-year-olds at the time of testing" (PIRLS, 1999) in each participating country. This corresponds to the fourth grade in most countries. This population was chosen because it represents an important transition point in children's development as readers. In most countries, by the end of fourth grade, children are expected to have learned how to read, and are now reading to learn.

The teachers in the PIRLS 2001 international database do not constitute representative samples of teachers in the participating countries. Rather, they are the teachers of nationally representative samples of students. Therefore, analyses with teacher data should be made with students as the units of analysis and reported in terms of students who are taught by teachers with a particular attribute. Teacher data are analyzed by linking the students to their teachers. The student-teacher linkage data files are used for this purpose. The same caveat applies to analyses of schools and parents.

Kind of data
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Sample survey data

Sampling procedure
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To be acceptable for PIRLS 2001, national sample designs had to result in probability samples that gave accurate weighted estimates of population parameters such as means and percentages, and for which estimates of sampling variance could be computed. The PIRLS 2001 sample design is derived from the design of IEA's TIMSS (see Foy & Joncas, 2000), with minor refinements. Since sampling for PIRLS was to be implemented by the National Research Coordinator (NRC) in each participating country - often with limited resources - it was essential that the design be simple and easy to implement while yielding accurate and efficient samples of both schools and students.

The international project team provided manuals and expert advice to help NRCs adapt the PIRLS sample design to their national system, and to guide them through the phases of sampling. The School Sampling Manual (PIRLS, 1999) describes how to implement the international sample design to select the school sample; and offers advice on initial planning, adapting the design to national situations, establishing appropriate sample selection procedures, and conducting fieldwork. The Survey Operations Manual and School Coordinator Manual (PIRLS, 2001b, 2001a) provide information on sampling within schools, assigning assessment booklets and questionnaires to sampled students, and tracking respondents and non-respondents. To automate the rather complex within-school sampling procedures, NRCs were provided with sampling software jointly developed by the IEA Data Processing Center and Statistics Canada (IEA, 2001).

In IEA studies, the target population for all countries is known as the international desired target population. This is the grade or age level that each country should address in its sampling activities. The international desired target population for PIRLS 2001 was the following:
"All students enrolled in the upper of the two adjacent grades that contain the largest proportion of 9-year-olds at the time of testing."

PIRLS expected all participating countries to define their national desired population to correspond as closely as possible to its definition of the international desired population. Using its national desired population as a basis, each participating country had to define its population in operational terms for sampling purposes. This definition, known in IEA terminology as the national defined population, is essentially the sampling frame from which the first stage of sampling takes place. Ideally, the national defined population should coincide with the national desired population, although in reality there may be some school types or regions that cannot be included; consequently, the national defined population is usually a very large subset of the national desired population. All schools and students in the desired population not included in the defined population are referred to as the excluded population.

The international sample design for PIRLS is generally referred to as a two-stage stratified cluster sample design. The first stage consists of a sample of schools, which may be stratified; the second stage consists of a sample of one or more classrooms from the target grade in sampled schools.

For more information on the approach to sampling adopted please consult section 5 of the PIRLS 2001 user guide.

Sampling deviation
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Although countries were expected to do everything possible to maximize coverage of the population by the sampling plan, schools could be excluded, where necessary, from the sampling frame for the following reasons:

• They were in geographically remote regions.
• They were extremely small in size.
• They offered a curriculum or a school structure that was different from the mainstream educational system(s).
• They provided instruction only to students in the categories defined as “within-school exclusions.”

Within-school exclusions were limited to students who, because of some disability,were unable to take the PIRLS tests. NRCs were asked to define anticipated withinschool exclusions. Because these definitions can vary internationally, they were also asked to follow certain rules adapted to their jurisdictions. In addition, they were to estimate the size of the included population so that their compliance with the 95 percent rule could be projected. The general PIRLS rules for defining within-school exclusions included the following three groups:

• Educable mentally-disabled students. These are students who were considered, in the professional opinion of the school principal or other qualified staff members, to be educable mentally disabled – or who had been so diagnosed in psychological tests. This category included students who were emotionally or mentally unable to follow even the general instructions of the PIRLS test. It did not include students who merely exhibited poor academic performance or discipline problems.
• Functionally-disabled students. These are students who were permanently physically disabled in such a way that they could not perform in the PIRLS tests. Functionally-disabled students who could perform were included in the testing.
• Non-native-language speakers. These are students who could not read or speak the language of the test, and so could not overcome the language barrier of testing. Typically, a student who had received less than one year of instruction in the language of the test was excluded, but this definition was adapted in different countries. A major objective of PIRLS was that the effective target population, the population actually sampled by PIRLS, be as close as possible to the international desired population. Each country had to account for any exclusion of eligible students from the international desired population. This applied to school-level exclusions as well as within-school exclusions. See Appendix B of the PIRLS 2001 Technical Report for a detailed account of sample implementation in each country.

Mode of data collection
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Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument
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PIRLS Background Questionnaires
By gathering information about children’s experiences together with reading achievement on the PIRLS test, it is possible to identify the factors or combinations of factors that relate to high reading literacy. An important part of the PIRLS design is a set of questionnaires targeting factors related to reading literacy. PIRLS administered four questionnaires: to the tested students, to their parents, to their reading teachers, and to their school principals.

Student Questionnaire
Each student taking the PIRLS reading assessment completes the student questionnaire. The questionnaire asks about aspects of students’ home and school experiences – including instructional experiences and reading for homework, selfperceptions and attitudes towards reading, out-of-school reading habits, computer use, home literacy resources, and basic demographic information.

Learning to Read (Home) Survey
The learning to read survey is completed by the parents or primary caregivers of each student taking the PIRLS reading assessment. It addresses child-parent literacy interactions, home literacy resources, parents’ reading habits and attitudes, homeschool connections, and basic demographic and socioeconomic indicators.

Teacher Questionnaire
The reading teacher of each fourth-grade class sampled for PIRLS completes a questionnaire designed to gather information about classroom contexts for developing reading literacy. This questionnaire asks teachers about characteristics of the class tested (such as size, reading levels of the students, and the language abilities of the students). It also asks about instructional time, materials and activities for teaching reading and promoting the development of their students’ reading literacy, and the grouping of students for reading instruction. Questions about classroom resources, assessment practices, and home-school connections also are included. The questionnaire also asks teachers for their views on opportunities for professional development and collaboration with other teachers, and for information about their education and training.

School Questionnaire
The principal of each school sampled for PIRLS responds to the school questionnaire. It asks school principals about enrollment and school characteristics (such as where the school is located, resources available in the surrounding area, and indicators of the socioeconomic background of the student body), characteristics of reading education in the school, instructional time, school resources (such as the availability of instructional materials and staff), home-school connections, and the school climate.

Cleaning operations
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To ensure the availability of comparable, high-quality data for analysis, PIRLS took rigorous quality control steps to create the international database. Countries used manuals and software provided by PIRLS to create and check their data files, so that the information would be in a standardized international format before being forwarded to the IEA Data Processing Center. Upon arrival at the DPC, the data underwent an exhaustive cleaning process involving several steps and procedures designed to identify, document, and correct deviations from the international instruments, file structures, and coding schemes. The process also emphasized consistency of information within national data sets, and appropriate linking among the student, parent, teacher, and school data files.

摘要
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PIRLS 2001旨在构建一个包含学生学业成绩数据，以及参与PIRLS 2001的35个国家学生的、家长的、教师的和学校背景信息的数据库。

地理覆盖范围
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该调查具有国际覆盖范围。

分析单位
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个人和机构。

总体
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PIRLS 2001的目标总体是每个参与国家“当时测试时两个年级中9岁儿童最多的那个年级的上半年级”中的所有儿童”（PIRLS，1999）。在大多数国家，这相当于四年级。这个群体被选中，因为它代表了儿童作为读者发展过程中的一个重要转折点。在大多数国家，到四年级结束时，孩子们预计已经学会了如何阅读，现在开始通过阅读来学习。

PIRLS 2001国际数据库中的教师并不构成参与国家教师的代表性样本。相反，他们是全国代表性学生样本的教师。因此，使用教师数据进行分析时，应以学生为分析单位，并以由具有特定属性的教师所教的学生为报告单位。通过将学生与其教师关联起来分析教师数据。学生-教师关联数据文件用于此目的。对学校和家长的分析也应遵循同样的原则。

数据类型
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样本调查数据。

抽样程序
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为了符合PIRLS 2001的要求，国家样本设计必须产生概率样本，这些样本能够给出关于人口参数（如均值和百分比）的准确加权估计，并且可以计算抽样方差。PIRLS 2001的样本设计源于IEA的TIMSS（参见Foy & Joncas，2000）的设计，并进行了少量改进。由于PIRLS的抽样将由每个参与国家的国家研究协调员（NRC）执行——通常资源有限——因此，设计必须是简单且易于实施的，同时能够产生准确和高效的学校和学生的样本。

国际项目团队提供了手册和专家建议，以帮助NRC适应PIRLS样本设计以适应其国家体系，并指导他们通过抽样阶段。学校抽样手册（PIRLS，1999）描述了如何实施国际样本设计以选择学校样本；并提供有关初始规划、适应国家情况、建立适当的样本选择程序以及开展实地工作的建议。调查操作手册和学校协调员手册（PIRLS，2001b，2001a）提供了有关学校内抽样、将评估手册和问卷分配给样本学生以及跟踪受访者和非受访者的信息。为了自动化学校内相对复杂的抽样程序，NRC获得了由IEA数据处理中心和加拿大统计局共同开发的抽样软件（IEA，2001）。

在IEA的研究中，所有国家的目标总体被称为国际期望目标总体。这是每个国家在其抽样活动中应解决的年级或年龄水平。PIRLS 2001的国际期望目标总体如下：
“在测试时包含最大比例9岁儿童的相邻两个年级中的上半年级的所有学生。”
PIRLS期望所有参与国家将它们的国家期望总体定义为尽可能接近其国际期望总体的定义。以它们的国家期望总体为基础，每个参与国家必须以抽样目的的操作术语定义其总体。这个定义在IEA术语中被称为国家定义的总体，实际上是抽样第一阶段中发生的抽样框架。理想情况下，国家定义的总体应与国家期望总体相一致，尽管在现实中可能有一些学校类型或地区无法包括在内；因此，国家定义的总体通常是国家期望总体的一个非常大的子集。在定义的总体中未包含的期望群体中的所有学校和学生在定义总体中被称为排除群体。

PIRLS的国际样本设计通常被称为两阶段分层聚类样本设计。第一阶段包括对学校的抽样，这些学校可能是分层的；第二阶段包括对目标年级中抽样学校的一个或多个教室的抽样。

有关采用抽样方法的更多信息，请参阅PIRLS 2001用户指南的第5节。

抽样偏差
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尽管预计各国将尽一切可能通过抽样计划最大化对总体的覆盖范围，但在必要时，可以排除以下原因的学校：
• 地理位置偏远。
• 规模极小。
• 提供的课程或学校结构不同于主流教育体系。
• 仅向被定义为“校内排除”的类别中的学生提供教学。
校内排除仅限于因某些残疾而无法参加PIRLS测试的学生。NRC被要求定义预期的校内排除。由于这些定义在国际上可能有所不同，它们还被要求遵循适用于其司法管辖区的某些规则。此外，他们还必须估计包含群体的规模，以便可以预测其遵守95％规则的合规性。PIRLS定义校内排除的一般规则包括以下三个群体：
• 可教育的精神残疾学生。这些是那些根据学校校长或其他合格人员专业意见被认为可教育的精神残疾的学生——或者已经在心理测试中被诊断出这样的状况。这一类别包括那些情感或精神上无法遵循PIRLS测试的一般指令的学生。它不包括仅仅表现出学业成绩差或纪律问题的学生。
• 功能性残疾学生。这些是永久性身体残疾，以至于他们无法在PIRLS测试中表现的学生。能够表现的功能性残疾学生包括在测试中。
• 非母语使用者。这些学生无法阅读或说测试语言，因此无法克服测试的语言障碍。通常，接受了不到一年测试语言教学的学生被排除在外，但这个定义在不同的国家有所不同。PIRLS的主要目标之一是确保有效目标总体——PIRLS实际抽样的总体——尽可能接近国际期望总体。每个国家都必须解释任何合格学生从国际期望总体中被排除的情况。这适用于学校层面的排除以及校内排除。有关每个国家样本实施的详细情况，请参阅PIRLS 2001技术报告附录B。

数据收集方式
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面对面（f2f）。

研究工具
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PIRLS背景问卷
通过收集有关儿童经历以及PIRLS测试阅读成就的信息，可以确定与高阅读素养相关的因素或因素的组合。PIRLS设计的一个重要部分是一套针对与阅读素养相关的因素的问卷。PIRLS进行了四次问卷调查：对测试学生、学生家长、阅读教师和学校校长。

学生问卷
参加PIRLS阅读评估的每个学生都完成学生问卷。问卷询问学生的家庭和学校经历方面的问题——包括教学经历和阅读作业、自我认知和阅读态度、课外阅读习惯、计算机使用、家庭阅读资源和基本人口统计信息。

学习阅读（家庭）调查
学习阅读调查由参加PIRLS阅读评估的每个学生的家长或主要照顾者完成。它涉及儿童与家长之间的阅读素养互动、家庭阅读资源、家长的阅读习惯和态度、家庭与学校的联系以及基本的人口统计和社会经济指标。

教师问卷
参加PIRLS的每个四年级班级的阅读教师完成一份旨在收集有关发展阅读素养的课堂背景信息的问卷。问卷询问教师关于测试班级的特征（例如规模、学生的阅读水平以及学生的语言能力）。它还询问教学时间、阅读教学和促进其学生阅读素养发展的材料和活动，以及学生的阅读教学分组。问卷还包括关于课堂资源、评估实践和家校联系的提问。问卷还询问教师对专业发展机会与其他教师合作的看法，以及有关其教育和培训的信息。

学校问卷
参加PIRLS的每个学校的校长回答学校问卷。它询问校长关于学校的招生和学校特征（例如学校的位置、周边地区的资源以及学生群体的社会经济背景指标），学校的阅读教育特征、教学时间、学校资源（例如教学材料和人员的可用性）、家校联系以及学校氛围。

数据清理操作
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为确保分析可用的高质量、可比数据，PIRLS采取了严格的质量控制措施来创建国际数据库。各国使用PIRLS提供的手册和软件创建和检查它们的数据文件，以确保在转发到IEA数据处理中心之前，信息将以标准化的国际格式存在。在DPC到达后，数据经过彻底的清理过程，涉及多个步骤和程序，旨在识别、记录和纠正与国际工具、文件结构和编码方案偏差。该过程还强调了国家数据集中信息的一致性，以及学生、家长、教师和学校数据文件之间适当的链接。