In the age of standardized testing, science and social studies are not given the same priority as mathematics and reading in the curriculum of United States schools. High stakes testing is viewed as having heavily biased schools toward teaching tested subjects and away from less frequently tested subjects. This paper is premised on the notion that…

In the last two decades, there have been various calls for reform in teacher education programs to address the needs of students from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds and students with disabilities. Consequently, many teacher education preparation programs are reviewing and redesigning their programs to meet the needs of the…

In January 2006, the College of Business at Eastern Michigan University (EMU) instituted a cross-disciplinary program in international business (IB). Business communication is a major component of the program. Moreover, the need for business communication in other languages contributed greatly to the cross-disciplinary nature of the program. This…

A team-taught interdisciplinary undergraduate unit in Sustainable Development has been developed and run over the past two years at the University of Bristol. This has been a unique initiative for this university to take. As in most other research-intensive higher education institutions, teaching generally follows rather traditional disciplinary…

One reason we have difficulty finding sustainable solutions is in part because we are unable to see the bigger picture. Capra (2000) argues, "To become ecologically literate we must learn to think systemically--in terms of connectedness, context and processes" (p. 270). We have attempted to structure connected learning experiences through our…

Using longitudinal curriculum data which they have collected over a ten year period from a nationally representative sample of primary schools (funded by grants from the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority), the authors report on evidence of changing models of subject provision within the primary curriculum. The period 1997-2007 has evidenced…

Articles for developing an integrated secondary curriculum are presented in this book. The articles include: "Synthesis Versus Fragmentation: The Way Out of Curriculum Confusion," by Daniel Tanner; "The Interrelated Curriculum," by Steven S. Means; "Integrated Teaching and Learning in Essential Schools," by Richard Lear; "Interdisciplinary Teaming…

Rote teaching and learning have their place, but not in a music course and an art and design course in which two dozen students at Queensborough Community College (QCC) enrolled together. In addition to a shift toward increasing cultural relevance in their courses, QCC began to explore a learner-centered pedagogy that would better respond to the…

Integrating the arts from the preschool level through graduate school enables students to develop their creativity and their ability to reason, draw abstractions, analyze, give personal meaning to what they are learning, and to express themselves in very powerful and fulfilling ways. Students must be taught with a variety of approaches to…

The co-authors have been co-Principal Investigators on two large-scale National Science Foundation-funded teacher enhancement projects for the past eight years. One of the projects focused on middle and high schools and the second focused on the elementary school. The design of each was different, reflecting the differing natures of the…

This report describes four components of an instructional management program that was implemented by a large public school system in Jackson, Mississippi, in 1981. The four program components are the following: (1) A districtwide uniform curriculum; a districtwide standardized criterion referenced testing program; a performance-based student…