This interview highlights and extends Dr. Barbara Rogoff's keynote address at the 2019 annual convention. Specifically, in the interview, Dr. Rogoff discusses her framework for learning, Learning by Observing and Pitching In, as well as other aspects of learning, including notions of childhood, age-based social ordering, and conflict as an aspect…

In this webinar, Dr. Carol Tomlinson of the University of Virginia presented the research base supporting the practice of differentiation and described the characteristics of effective differentiation. She led a discussion of how quality preparation can build and strengthen teachers' knowledge and skills in implementing differentiated instruction…

Jerome B. Jones, superintendent in Providence (Rhode Island), explains why a return to K-8 grade organization may solve this city's declining enrollment and other educational problems. (JM)

Teacher shortages, like the one schools face today, are not new. Periodically over the last 50 years there were fewer teachers available than were needed, and the response was primarily to step up recruitment efforts and issue temporary teaching credentials to those without qualifications. Three things are new however: (1) The requirement that…

Case study from the Providence, Rhode Island School District demonstrates how an outside planning group acted as the instrument for organizational change, while the superintendent provided the impetus for change. Reveals how internal and external factors influence decision making. (APM)

Some of the justifiable criticisms of our educational system are due to the inadequacy of the current educational structure for our information society, and the inability of the current system to motivate students to learn. An alternative structure would involve the use of teachers as educational guides, with parents choosing a guide based on…

School design must reflect deep-seated changes in educational practices such as using outcome-based education, reorganizing traditional grade structures, grouping students in "houses," and mainstreaming handicapped children. Describes designs for five school buildings that are intended to enhance and undergird what goes on in classrooms.…

Summarizes research on middle level schools and students that contributes to ongoing debates concerning grade span, school size, grouping of students, departmentalization, curriculum, instruction, advisory groups, interdisciplinary teaming, school-transition activities, extra-help programs, and student evaluation practices in the middle grades.…