This paper aims to contribute to reflection on how rural research can better serve rural communities. Using the results of literature searches across the disciplines, it explores some major 21st Century debates about improving the usefulness of research for policy and practice. The paper begins with an examination of different debates in…

This paper is divided into two parts. The first part, "Speaking Pictures and Visual Poems," briefly considers the origin of the term "sister arts." Discussed are the three main features of the historical relationship between painting and literature in the 18th and 19th centuries in Britain and draws out their educational implications. Part 2,…

This report seeks to build a case for the potential value of arts-centered cross-disciplinary approaches as a possible way to integrate an often-fragmented high school curriculum. Stressing that there is no universal panacea for the complex and multi-layered issues of school reform and change, the report suggests a possible vision that could lead…

Papers presented at this conference focus primarily on the development of critical thinking and problem solving skills. Topics related to critical thinking include metacognition, curriculum development, and teaching strategies in foreign languages; teaching critical reading of literature to develop critical thinking skills; use of guided design in…

This book advocates that teachers of history create for their students a workshop environment where they actually can practice being historians. Adolescents, rather than thinking analytically, prefer to identify strongly with heroes and heroines and to explore their own lives and identity, character and convictions, through heroic stories. This…

Describes research conducted on the organization of information from many disciplines to teach social issues raised by nuclear technology. States that the social sciences provided the organizational base for most courses examined, courses emphasized moral responsibility and political choice, and syllabi emphasized technological, strategic, and…

Illustrates the social construction of scientific knowledge by examining the modernist literary works of Chekhov, Ibsen, and Kafka. Demonstrates philosophical conflicts among the authors centering on the benefits and drawbacks of scientific inquiry and modernism. Students also read textbooks and treatises on the history of science. (MJP)

Argues that, far from being a dangerous and destructive break with the past, various factions of postmodernism actually parallel modernist beliefs. Both movements share groups whose creative revisionists approach seeks a constructive accommodation. Similar parallel destructive approaches also exist. (MJP)

Examines spirituality in music, not as a historical perspective, but as an essential, experiential component. Discusses transcendent states engendered in religion, music, and art. Calls for a new conceptualization of arts education and curriculum incorporating spirituality into humanistic education and self actualization. (MJP)