This article focuses on curriculum-based learning communities (LCs). In these LCs, manipulation of the curriculum is intentional and often innovative, with the overarching goals of developing meaningful connections among students, between students and faculty, and between students and their coursework. The variety of curriculum-based models…

Reasons for a national shift from traditional to alternative assessment practices are examined, and the philosophical beliefs and theoretical assumptions of traditional and alternative assessment are examined. Classroom implications of this paradigm shift for instructional strategies, formative and summative evaluation, development of rubrics used…

A discussion of group dynamics in collaborative learning describes use of this approach in an experimental biology course. Three approaches to group dynamics are outlined (personality and learning style, cognitive style, and group life). Identified are variables that teachers either have little power to affect, can address in course design, or can…