Investigates the role of cognitive style in the ability of first-, third-, and fifth-graders to represent the horizontal coordinate. Students were observed on a portable rod-and-frame test of field dependence/independence and on water bottle and crossbar measures of horizontality representation. (Author/RH)

Two New Rochelle, New York, teachers who developed a unit on ancient Egypt for gifted fifth and sixth grade students give tips on preparing interdisciplinary units which involve independent student research. Their unit incorporated social studies, science, language art, and mathematics activities. (PP)

Nine years after the National Science Education Standards' release, just how well do science teachers in grades 5 to 8 actually use them to plan content, define improved teaching, and assess real learning? Find out the answers to these key questions in this groundbreaking collection of 15 essays by teachers, researchers, and professors whose…

This book follows students' natural progression from measuring with informal or nonstandard units to using standard units to measure such attributes as length, weight, angle, and temperature. Activities extend students' learning to the measurement of two- and three-dimensional objects. Students work in a variety of lively real-world contexts,…

This study discusses the successes and failures that resulted when fifth grade students used email to compose response journals. Every student was required to send at least one email a week to the teacher describing and reacting to the novel they were reading independently. The teacher would respond each evening. The study was conducted in an…

This report describes a program to improve student achievement through the use of music strategies. The targeted population was fifth-grade students in a small Iowa community. The absence of music integration into the social studies area was observed through data that displayed the lack of motivation and in-depth learning by the students. Analysis…

The Age of Exploration, beginning in the late 1400s, was an important era in the discovery and development of land unknown to Europeans. Students initially participate in geographic literacy activities by comparing and contrasting the European geographic view of the world in the 1400s with present-day information. Focusing on pre-Columbian…

Little research exists that examines how children experience listening to stories, and few studies have been done that ask students to discuss their own experience with storytelling. A qualitative grounded study designed to focus upon children's responses and experiences to storytelling in the classroom was conducted in a public middle school in a…

California State Standard 5.7 is delineated in the following manner: "Students describe the people and events associated with the development of the U.S. Constitution and analyze the Constitution's significance as the foundation of the American republic." Students answer six questions about the Constitution and present suggestions for…

How do students who are learning English as an additional language (EAL) participate in classroom mathematics? To investigate this question, I collected recordings of primary school EAL students as they worked with peers on a mathematics classroom task. Drawing on theoretical and methodological work in discursive psychology (Edwards, 1997), I…

The study reported in this paper is an attempt to develop a comprehensive model of measuring problem solving and posing (PSP) skills based on Marshall's schema theory (ST). A battery of tests on PSP skills was administered to 5th and 6th grade Cypriot students (n=2519). The Rasch model was used and a scale was created for the battery of tests and…

Japanese lesson study, in various adapted forms, is becoming increasingly significant in professional development of mathematics teachers in the USA. Our goal in the research reported in this paper was to investigate, in a three-tiered teaching experiment, the cycles of learning of two researchers, six teachers, and the students in three grade 4…

An ethnographic study described a successful educational environment for students from low-income families and examined what it is about those environments that makes them successful. The subject class was a combined fourth and fifth grade class at Taft Elementary School in a predominantly African American working class community two miles from…

A study examined how a teacher, researcher, and students moved beyond literal, lower-level thinking and response activities and engaged in literature study that promoted meaningful discussions and deeper-level responses and understandings. The study combined two research paradigms, action and interpretative research. The classroom teacher and…

This study examines a 3-month software design activity in which mixed teams of girls and boys designed and implemented multimedia resources. Mixed-gender teams of fifth and sixth graders used Logo MicroWorlds in their classroom to design multimedia encyclopedias about their astronomy unit for use by younger children. In this context, students'…