Presently in Malta, 'learning outcomes' have become a new focus in education, replacing traditional subject syllabi. The difference between the two is that while syllabi are phrased in a way that foregrounds subject content, a learning outcomes approach gives precedence to individual students' learning. For Grade 3 upwards (ages 8+ years), the…

This case study considers some of the methodological challenges encountered when revisiting the professional lives of 27 mid-career teachers from cities in Germany, Norway, and England. I say "revisit" because these teachers were not strangers to me and I am still in touch with many of them today. For my PhD, I had, several years…

This book brings the voices of teachers into the fierce debates about language ideologies and cultural pedagogies in English language teaching. Through interviews and classroom observations in Chile and California, this study compares the controversies around English as a global language with the similar cultural tensions in programs for…

A book that draws equally on Richard Lee Colvin's deep acquaintance with contemporary education reform and the unique circumstances of the San Diego experience, "Tilting at Windmills" is a penetrating and invaluable account of Alan Bersin's contentious superintendency. Between 1998, when Alan Bersin became superintendent of the San Diego…

"Degrees of Inequality" reveals the powerful patterns of social inequality in American higher education by analyzing how the social background of students shapes nearly every facet of the college experience. Even as the most prestigious institutions claim to open their doors to students from diverse backgrounds, class disparities remain.…

"Talk-in-interaction: Multilingual perspectives" offers original studies of interaction in a range of languages and language varieties, including Chinese, English, Japanese, Korean, Spanish, Swahili, Thai, and Vietnamese; monolingual and bilingual interactions; and activities designed for second or foreign language learning. Conducted…

"Policy and Performance in American Higher Education" presents a new approach to understanding how public policy influences institutional performance, with practical insight for those charged with crafting and implementing higher education policy. Public institutions of higher learning are called upon by state governments to provide…

Three major methods of survey research, face-to-face interviews, telephone interviews, and mail questionnaires, are compared with respect to the quality of the data. The literature on experimental comparisons of these methods is reviewed, and the effects of the mode of data collection on aspects of data quality are examined. The effects of the…

A study was designed to investigate the ways in which graduate students respond to the fact that their competence must be repeatedly valued by means of grades, written and oral examinations, letters of recommendations, dissertation approvals, and various less official procedures. Some students, the gamesmen, have developed strategies for evading…

This book discusses the motivations that cause adults to go to the public library. It is grouped into eight sections concerning: (1) the research methodology and results used to determine four motivators that were good predictors of library use; (2) the development of library research; (3) several characteristics of library users in terms of…

This study compares affiliative and attachment behaviors of nontraditional fathers who are their infant's primary caregivers, secondary caregiving fathers, and primary and secondary caregiving mothers. Subjects were 28 mobile infants and their middle-class American parents. In half of the families, the father was the primary caregiver; in the…

This book presents findings from taped interviews of successful inner-city high school students concerning what their lives were like and what accounted for their success in school. Information is also presented from two additional studies involving their parents and teachers. Chapter 1 explores what the students perceive to be the relationship…

This book examines the practices that support and enhance the value of part-time faculty both in and outside the college classroom, offering 43 specific recommendations to help institutions plan and manage their use of part-timers, develop fair employment policies, and invest in part-timers as valued human resources contributing to the quality of…

The purpose of this cross-national descriptive study is to measure the extent of children's sexual knowledge and sexual understanding at various ages and to identify what processes of thought children use in trying to explain biological functions and the phenomena of their own bodies as they grow and change. Sexual thinking is defined as thinking…

This case study of two postsecondary schools in England attempts to assess the effects of a recently established and radically changed administrative structure and funding method on educational quality. These changes allowed schools to opt out of local educational authority control to become semiautonomous corporations and to create a separate…