Time to learn mathematics in public and private schools: Understanding differences in aspects of the implemented curriculum in the Dominican Republic

How do educational opportunities influence students' academic achievement in the Dominican Republic? How do students grow, in knowledge and skills, as a result of their passage through the elementary grades? This study aims to explore and understand the differences between the implemented curriculum in public and private schools in 4th, 5th, and 6th grades, specifically with respect to the instructional time allocated by teachers in Mathematics Activities and Mathematics Contents.;Two principal research questions are explored: (a) Are there significant differences in the implemented curriculum used to learn mathematics in 4 th, 5th, and 6th grades in public and accredited-private schools in the DR with respect to specific time-to-learn variables? and (b) If these differences do in fact exist, then do they help to explain differences in student mathematics achievement between public and private institutions?;The data for this study were collected by the Educational Evaluation Research Consortium 2005-2007 (EERC 2005 - 2007), and are based on a stratified sample with probabilities proportional to size. The sampling strata were public rural schools, public urban schools, and private schools. This study uses HLM modeling procedures on 3 years of evaluation data from a nationally representative sample of 198 primary schools to explore how differences in the opportunity to learn afforded children in public schools compare to those afforded their peers in accredited-private schools in relationship with specific time to learn variables.;The findings suggest that differences in educational opportunities help to understand differences in Mathematics Achievement in 4th, 5th, and 6th grades. The differences in mean frequency, at which Dominican teachers covered Mathematics Contents and engaged in Mathematics Activities in public and private schools, suggest that the national curriculum is implemented in different ways from one school type to the next. The cross-grade analysis presented in this study reveals those variables and models that help to explain differences in students' Mathematics Achievement in Dominican classrooms across 4th, 5th , and 6th grades.