TEACHERS ' JUDGMENTS ABOUT STUDENTS

The common practice of asking teachers to provide ratings of their students is based on questionable assumptions about the ability of teachers to accurately integrate information from their numerous encounters with students. Borrowing from research in social cog-nition, an information-processing model of the rating process was proposed and tested by asking 18 teachers to rate 16 hypothetical student profiles formed by systematically varying information along six different dimensions. The results suggested that teacher rating is a schema-based process in which the covariation among rating items is a function of teachers ' implicit theories concerning the organization of student behaviors. The findings revealed possible biases in teachers ' ratings and indicated the importance of a theoretical model of the rating process. Whenever people are asked to rate themselves or others, the rater becomes the measuring instrument (Jackson & Paunonen, 1980). For example, when teachers are asked to provide ratings of their students' ability, academic performance, effort, or classroom conduct, each teacher serves as the "instrument " that transforms the information obtained through numerous interactions with students into a set of ratings. Yet little is known about how teachers produce such ratings. How are teachers able The authors wish to thank Raurel English for her critical review of the manuscript