For educators, the content of the curriculum really is like oxygen: it is the necessary precondition for improving schools, closing the achievement gap, engaging parents, and preparing teachers. However, when educators take the content of the curriculum for granted, they lose opportunities to coordinate and collaborate. Good curriculum instruction…

Edmond Holmes was His Majesty's Chief Inspector of Elementary Schools from 1905 to 1910. No full biography of Holmes has been published nor any detailed critique of his contribution to the theory and practice of education. Yet his post-retirement observations on education were widely quoted and, in some quarters, very influential. They remain…

This article presents the experiences of nursery and primary head teachers (n = 12) on the English Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) after its first year of implementation in 2010. Findings are drawn from a subset of data (head teachers of primary and nursery schools) which forms part of a larger Department for Children, Schools and Families…

The development of aesthetic sensitivity in creative students is discussed, and sample techniques are described. The importance of valuing the individuality and uniqueness of the artistically creative and aesthetically sensitive child is stressed. (CL)

This document is an English-language abstract (approximately 1,500 words) of six teachers manuals from the first to the sixth grade as used in the Mexican school system. They include suggestions for exercises from folding, cutting out, pasting, coloring and similar operations designed for the first grade up to simple electrical and electronic…

This response to Gersten and Dimino (EC 606 357) sees whole language as a perspective on language instruction rather than as an instructional procedure. Three other perspectives on language instruction are suggested--cognitive, sociocultural, and developmental--and are illustrated with sample cases, to demonstrate their contributions to a…

This paper reports on a survey of public and Catholic elementary schools in southwest Pennsylvania. The purpose of the study was to find out the extent to which various educational practices, association with those two types of schools, have been adopted in the schools and whether Catholic and public schools differ along a continuum of…

This article examines the conflict between literature-based or whole-language approaches to reading/literacy instruction and the direct instruction approach, as used with students having or at risk for learning disabilities. It concludes that each approach is often depicted in an idealized fashion but that, in practice, the approaches overlap and…

This response to Gersten and Dimino (EC 606 357) claims a lack of clarity in their understanding of whole-language instruction and confusion of the approach with its implementation. The response stresses the need to empower special education teachers so that they are able to make decisions about teaching and not merely follow directions in…

This response to Gersten and Dimino (EC 606 357) claims that their paper: (1) does not emphasize the considerable research literature associated with both the whole language and direct instructional approaches; (2) does not help teachers make balanced instructional decisions; (3) focuses on extreme positions; and (4) considers motivation only in…

Chapter I programs are based on locally identified needs, and projects are developed and operated at the local level to meet each district's needs. A majority of Chapter I programs stress language and math skills, however, there are a wide variety of instructional approaches. This source book relates educational practice to research in school…

A teacher at the Hawaii School for the Deaf and Blind recounts his experience implementing a whole-language approach with an elementary class of students with hearing impairments. The effort, focusing on insects, utilized dialog journals, word banks, shared reading, guided reading and writing, independent reading, and theme activities. A…

This document summarizes the results of a study which evaluated whether school instruction with Musical Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI) keyboards improves memory skill and whether school instruction with MIDI keyboards improves sentiments toward school and instructional media. Pupils in early elementary grades at five schools were evaluated…

This document reports on the Radio Mathematics Project (RMP) over a five-year period. In 1973, the United States Agency for International Development (AID) asked the Institute for Mathematical Studies in the Social Sciences (IMSSS) at Stanford University to develop an instructional program with radio as the medium of delivery. IMSSS was to devise…

Summarizes the two-year Developmental Teacher Education (DTE) program of the Graduate School of Education, University of California at Berkeley. Describes a pilot study of the ways in which three DTE program graduates and three traditional teachers used the program's methods in their classrooms. (MDM)