Research about social studies textbooks overwhelmingly supports the conclusion that these books are unpopular and often the subject of intense criticisms. These criticisms concern anything ranging from the language they employ, to the way they are utilized by teachers, to the undue influence they exert on shaping and defining curriculum. This…

Building upon past studies of curriculum textbooks in the US, this paper presents an analytical framework that classifies curriculum texts according to their representation of reconceptualized curriculum scholarship. It uses four indicators of the representation of curriculum scholarship in the analyses of eight curriculum texts published in the…

Schoolbooks in use prior to the twentieth century constituted the very heart of school curriculum. The purpose of this publication is to commemorate the nation's bicentennial and to broaden people's educational perspective. This publication examines the evolution of school curriculum by researching and studying old textbooks. Books examined in…

An analysis and critique of two elementary textbook series: "Discover Art" by Davis Publications and "World of Music" published by Silver Burdett & Ginn are presented. "Whose content, context, and culture?" is an ideological question that assumes that equitable social relations and diverse ways of knowing ought to…

Reports research intended to determine whether the multitude of instructional materials prepared as a result of the recent interest in Afro-American history were in agreement with recent historical scholarship. (Author/JM)

The task of choosing the right text(s) for an undergraduate music theory program is difficult, at best. Sixty-seven U.S. institutions of higher learning offering graduate degrees in music theory were surveyed to determine what undergraduate textbooks were used, how long they have been used, and how satisfied the schools were with the texts. The…

Although a history and systems course in psychology should provide a valuable forum for organizing the discipline, no current texts consistently provide enough coverage of the context in which the discipline emerged to anchor developments throughout the history of psychology. To test the validity of this observation, 10 undergraduate history and…

Author asks: Who is properly responsible for the direction of education, the makers of instructional materials or those who work with the materials in the classroom? (SP)

Describes the "cloze" procedure for judging the readability of textbook prose and in particular how this procedure may be applied to written mathematical materials. (JP)

Reviews research related to textbook development and provision in developing nations. Stresses the importance of increased access to textbooks as a cost-effective means for improving educational quality. Examines four policy options for textbook development in developing countries: adoption, adaptation, government publication, and international…

This study was designed to find out how far suggested textbooks have been adopted in teaching a new chemistry syllabus in Kenya and if the chemistry books now being used in schools to teach the new syllabus involve activity and encourage the process of scientific inquiry. The new syllabus is a merger between the traditional separate chemistry…

Examines the thinking of social scientists, politicians, and others who write on the subject of intervention. Summarizes the past and present treatment of intervention in social studies textbooks, stating that teachers must go beyond their texts in identifying intervention as a problem with which society should be concerned. (GEA)

China's opening to the world and economic reform in the late 1970s led to tremendous progress in Chinese education. Social science education, has traditionally assumed the most important task of cultivating responsible citizens. It has undergone remarkable changes in quantity and quality as a result of the change of the social and economic…

A new awareness of the importance of understanding Canada has made its way to U.S. public school classrooms. Canada and the Canadian-U.S. relationship have joined the spectrum of countries featured in the U.S. curriculum. As a response to this development, an investigation of leading textbooks used in U.S. classrooms was undertaken to examine the…

Because textbooks are essential instructional tools, they should play a major role in educational reform for excellence. Despite improvements in response to ethnic and women's movements, deterioration in textbook quality has occurred through competition for markets. Former Secretary of Education Terrel Bell observed in 1984 that educators should…