No one teaches a toddler how to walk. No one moves his legs for him. We encourage him to stand, applaud his first step, and tell him it's OK when he falls. Yet when it comes to academic learning, writes Cathy Vatterott, we often fail to appreciate children's inborn desire for mastery or to trust their self-knowledge of how to get there.…

Schools in the United States are making curricular changes from kindergarten through college to meet the Common Core State Standards' demands for higher expectations in reading and writing. As they make these important changes, however, they need not overturn all that they learned about effective reading pedagogy during No Child Left Behind…

The way we define excellence dictates the way we achieve it. The author looks at four models of excellence that operate in schools today. The first looks only at the lowest-performing students, focusing all resources on getting these students to score above "proficient" on standardized tests so that the school will be in compliance with…

Researchers currently working in citizenship education are nearly unanimous in advocating student participation. (Author)

The Personal Responsibility Education Process (PREP) is a grass-roots approach to character education that seeks to strengthen student responsibility. Instead of promoting one set of values, it helps schools rediscover their own values and reinforce them. A sampling of several Missouri school districts illustrates the diversity of the process and…

In their search for alternatives to standardized assessment, a consortium of Pittsburgh administrators, teachers, and researchers discovered the value of portfolios gathered by artists, musicians, and writers. Now their students gather portfolios consisting of biographies of works, a range of works, and their own reflections. Includes five…

South Dakota's Rural Schools and Community Development Project was based on the belief that rural schools and communities are tightly linked and highly interdependent. School success is too often measured by how many graduates leave to pursue education or job opportunities elsewhere. (MLH)

After observing students learning to work out differences in conflict-resolution classes, a supervising administrator at a Connecticut high school began using his office wall as a backdrop for large posters representing model conflict-resolution practices. Posters define conflict; address ways to handle anger; discuss win-win strategies,…

Profiles Andre Allison and Florence Mondry, English teachers at Shoreham-Wading River High School (New York), who have placed composition at the center of their curricula, giving students more responsibility and fostering cooperative learning. Both use reading logs to help students interpret literature intelligently and extract meaning from their…

The Toughlove network, which currently includes over 500 parent support groups, is comprised of parents and teen offspring on the verge of suspension. Parents and children attend separate meetings; parents learn limit-setting and supportive behavior; and troubled teens learn to make some difficult changes and accept responsibility for their…

Empowering children to use the Internet safely and responsibly is essential. Students can also be taught to communicate positively with others. The CyberSmart! School Program offers a framework that teachers can use to discuss the Internet with students and raise awareness. Tips regarding etiquette, advertising, and privacy protection are also…

Key ingredients for achieving academic success include being prepared, taking responsibility for one's learning, making an effort, and completing homework every day. At Shaker Heights (Ohio) Middle School, after-school programs (academic sessions, a homework center, a homework hotline, and a university tutorial program) help students complete…

When a Connecticut school's assertive-discipline plan failed to generate a sense of ownership and community, faculty replaced rewards with schoolwide celebrations and consequences with problem solving. When students misbehave, teachers encourage them to reflect on their behavior, consider its effect on others, and devise appropriate restitution. A…

Based on recent research and the author's site visits, this article describes six attributes characterizing an Information Age school: interactivity, self-initiated learning, a changing teacher role, media and technology specialists as central participants, continuous evaluation, and a discussion-centered classroom environment. Contact information…

To shorten the line at his desk, a fourth-grade teacher tries to build thought and work habits that will inspire his students to strive for excellence and achieve it in every assignment. Each lesson incorporates an experience, criteria for excellence, student practice, a rubric, examples, self-evaluations, peer and teacher evaluations, revision,…