The so-called "good-teacher doctrine" has long perpetuated the idea that good teachers don't use pre-packaged curriculum materials. Rather, they create their own lessons intended for the students sitting in front of them. In this article, Janine T. Remillard challenges this assumption and contends that good teachers can--and…

The term "best practice" is widely used throughout education despite lack of evidence or consensus concerning which practices are "best." The pervasive use of this term creates three problems. First, it promotes a plug-and-play approach, in which teachers are encouraged to adopt new methods and use them as much as possible but…

School improvement programs that work in some places don't work in others. School improvement programs that work with some students don't work with others. Programs that appear to have positive effects in the hands of some teachers don't work for other teachers. If we can't be confident that a program will travel well, from one…

Watch one of the Japan videos from the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS)--more specifically, mathematics video 3 on solving inequalities1--and you'll see that after giving his students a word problem to solve, the 8th grade math teacher strolls among the students' desks for almost 15 minutes, leaning over to see what…

Although teachers sometimes view mastery learning approaches skeptically, members of the business community are committed to helping spread these approaches. (Author/JM)

A total of 411 public school teachers participated in a project researching the highly personal experiences and phenomena encountered by individual educators in schools and colleges as they "adopt" educational innovations. (Author/MLF)

Although needed reforms of the social studies curriculum have been identified, recommendations for procedures for achieving these reforms are lacking. The author offers practical and simple steps to take in three areas: scope, sequence, and classroom realities. (Author/JM)

The integration of computers into the school curriculum can be aided by collaborating with the technical and corporate community and developing strategies for systemwide cooperation, communication, and coordination. (Author/MLF)

Change strategies must include informal school networks and norms. Implementation plans must involve teachers and principals prior to training. (Author/JM)

The National Diffusion Network (NDN) not only alerts educators to exemplary education programs, but also provides inservice training before and after a program adoption. (Author)

Administrators in Red Bank, New Jersey, are confident that mastery learning is the key to their students' higher achievement. (Author)

Having established that mastery learning works, researchers are beginning to investigate components of the system and theorists are integrating it with other recent trends. (Author)