Notes that adapting the text to the audience is only possible when the physical task of writing becomes automatic and the writer is no longer absorbed by it. Describes a quasi-experimental study in which a procedural facilitation strategy is used to promote writing skills among Portuguese students, in particular, the skill of suiting the text to…

Describes how Michigan's English Language Arts Assessment (ELA) takes parts of the old fifth-grade writing assessment and fourth-grade reading tests, adds new elements, and wraps everything around a theme. Presents a seven-step activity to help prepare fourth graders for the ELA. Concludes that the overall impact on scores is not known. (SG)

Tested the effectiveness of a community-based intervention designed to promote physical activity among rural fifth graders. Data on students who participated in after-school and summer programs and home, school, and community interventions indicated that the after-school and summer interventions were implemented as planned, but the home, school,…

Describes an art lesson where fifth-grade students created Oaxaca style papier mache sculptures of either their favorite pet or animal. Discusses how to create the sculptures and includes a list of materials. States that the book, "Oaxacan Woodcarving: The Magic in the Trees," was used to introduce students to the project. (CMK)

Presents a lesson plan for fourth or fifth graders integrating art and social studies. Explains the lesson focuses on the 50 State Quarters Program and emphasizes the inquiry method. Explains that students create their own quarter design for a state. Lists other inquiry projects using the quarter program. (CMK)

Presents a personalized art activity that enables students, including those unenthusiastic students who think they lack artistic abilities, to participate in art. Explains that the students create a design or pattern within a pre-outlined silhouette. Discusses the process of creating the silhouette designs and includes an art materials list. (CMK)

Examined effects of differential teacher training in use of drug education curriculum on 12 grade 5 classrooms of students' knowledge levels, problem-solving and coping skills, attitudes toward planned decision making, behavioral intentions, and tobacco and alcohol use. Found significant differences in intentions to take a drink but not on other…

A study of 56 fifth graders found the traditional physical education approach (game techniques and fundamentals) was ineffective in improving scores on a health-related physical fitness test. Modification of the same sport (basketball) with conditioning exercises to improve cardiorespiratory and musculoskeletal function, produced improvement in…

Examined the relationship between the ability to think divergently and the knowledge of social strategies on the part of 157 fifth and sixth graders. Subjects who obtained high scores on a test designed to measure divergent thinking tended to select relatively indirect, subtle, and mature social strategies. (RJC)

Investigated 48 fifth- and eighth-grade boys' moral judgments of stories featuring good intentions with bad outcomes. Clear differences in moral judgments were found between groups recruited from the same general social setting that were comparable in intelligence but different in moral and social behavior. (RJC)

Uses extant musical examples as stimuli in order to assess the effect of melodic rhythm as a determinant of relative tempo as perceived by college undergraduates and elementary students. Results indicate that subjects responded to the melodic rhythm as well as the beat when making tempo judgments. (LS)

Relationships among the two new and the existing writing tests in the Woodcock-Johnson Psycho-Educational Battery (WJ) and other commonly-used writing tests were investigated with a sample of 44 fifth-graders. Results supported concurrent and construct validity of the WJ tests. The multiple samples writing approach is recommended as an alternative…

Tested three alcohol use prevention curricula, one focused on teaching social pressure resistance skills, one focused on solidifying conservative group norms, and one focused on increasing student understanding of consequences of using alcohol. Results from fifth- and seventh-grade students confirmed that each program had differential effect on…

Describes a project in a fifth-grade classroom that uses dialog to teach students expository writing and research reports. Describes how students worked together using all four language modes to explore a topic. (SR)

Two experiments examined fifth-grade students' reasoning about data modeling: one involved development of hypermedia documents, the other, use of a simple randomization distribution to test students' hypotheses. Found that data construction and analysis provide an opportunity to involve students in the important enterprise of mathematical…