A kindergarten teacher recounts her classroom experience introducing children to reading via the whole language approach, which is based on the belief that children learn to read and write naturally by listening, watching, speaking, and writing. Classroom photographs and samples of student work illustrate the article. (DB)

Pacey, a likable and literate eighth-grader, saw school as "a place that kills your reading." With this alarming condemnation in mind, the author uses literacy narrative--a short, concise, digital video in which students meld still images, motion, print text, and soundtrack (both narration and music) in communicating ideas/insights/discoveries…

This book is based on the belief that learners who are making meaning draw simultaneously on different dimensions of knowing--different forms of expression, different kinds of ideas, and different cultural frameworks. When honored and recognized in the classroom these differences create a richer way to explore the path to knowledge, according to…

Describes the "Global Method" of Celestin Freinet, a French educator whose teaching methods (similar to language experience, writing process approach, and whole language) are used by teachers in Europe. Offers excerpts of Freinet's ideas on democratic pedagogy, having children write their own books, teaching writing, moral civic…

Asserts the function of narrative as a method of thinking is important in the lives of children as well as adults. Maintains that, by examining a story or narrative in children's art, it is possible to account for its importance in their lives. Describes three aspects of narrative: (1) invention; (2) description; and (3) negotiation. (CFR)

For an entire school year, two low-achieving severely learning disabled third-grade students ("Billy" and "Bonny") spent 30 minutes each day working with a Resource Room teacher on a variety of holistic activities. Activities were added, discarded, or modified to maximize the children's motivation and success. "Cut-up sentences" were used early in…

Designed for fifth grade mathematics teachers, the three inservice sessions described in this booklet balance the theoretical with the practical and show teachers how to help students through the activity of writing word problems based on their own experiences. Using a total language-thinking approach to helping students read and solve word…

The adult English literacy program at the Phanat Nikhom Refugee Camp has developed techniques for actively engaging the sometimes reluctant students in the skill development process leading to literacy. A literacy warm-up chart used daily for five minutes develops the prereading skills of sequencing and left-to-right eye coordination; a variety of…

This volume contains an advice column and five papers on teaching behaviorally disordered youth. The "Grand Rounds" column offers advice on two teaching situations involving extremely disruptive classroom behavior and elective mutism. "The Franklin-Jefferson Program: Demonstration of an Integrated Social Learning Approach to…