This article focuses on the problem of overage children populating some of South Africa's primary schools, particularly poor rural communities. The exploratory case study aimed to investigate the various barriers to learning and development that result in the enrolment of overage children in two primary schools in a rural district in…

Despite increasing interest in the effects of parenting stress on children and families, many questions remain regarding the nature of parenting stress and the mechanism through which stress exerts its influence across time. In this study, cumulative parenting stress was assessed across the preschool period in a sample of 125 typically developing…

We describe a four-level spectrum of pedagogical awareness (SPA) that emerged from the analysis of six undergraduate mathematics tutors' (1) conceptualizations of their first-year students' difficulties; (2) descriptive accounts of their strategies for facilitating the overcoming of these difficulties; and (3) self-reflective accounts regarding…

This study looks at how the environment in an infant child care setting can have an impact on young children's humourous experiences and therefore their learning and development. With the use of multiple qualitative methods, participant and non-participant observations, journal writing, videotaping, interviewing, and document review this study…

This paper reports on a study of nursery children's responses to number focused activities. Responses were analysed in terms of cognitive, physical, emotional and social aspects in order to gain insights into what engaged children in number learning opportunities. "Cognitive-emotional hooks" for number activities were identified, involving…

The purpose of this study was to identify what and how preservice teachers observe when peer coaching during an early field experience. Twenty-three male and 14 female preservice teachers trained in peer coaching participated in the study. Coaches observed a peer partner teach five 40-min lessons to small groups of elementary or junior high school…

Peer evaluation has been criticized as a threat to academic freedom and has been used, usually erroneously, as a justification for academic reappointment, tenure promotion, and merit pay. In recent years, scholars have recommended that peer consultation, which is primarily designed to improve teaching, be honored, but apart from evaluation. In…

Through research and classroom observation undertaken while conceptualizing and implementing the Intensive French program in Canada, many new insights were gained into the development of communication skills in a classroom situation. Five lessons learned about the development of spontaneous oral communication are presented in this article: the…

This article reports on an exploratory study of instructional issues encountered in the teaching of Mandarin as a foreign language at the university level. The research reveals the sometimes conflicting views held by teachers, researchers, students, and institutions with respect to instructional methods and types of classroom interaction,…

In this study, I examine the perspectives of preservice teachers enrolled in a multicultural education course at a large predominately White Midwestern university. Past research on the development of multicultural attitudes and knowledge of White preservice teachers is inconclusive. In an effort to examine the multicultural perspectives of…

This paper considers practitioners' beliefs about the literacy curriculum in four early years settings in England and the impact on the literacy experiences of the children in these settings. All four settings were working with the Curriculum Guidance for the Foundation Stage (QCA/DfEE, 2000) and represent the range of provision in England. One…

This paper describes how collaboration emerged in a school district-university partnership designed to foster teacher development in the context of elementary science education. The Teachers Researching Inquiry-Based Science project involved four elementary teachers, a school district science mentoring teacher, a school district science…

This standard lesson on identifying salt and sugar crystals expands into an opportunity for students to develop their observation, questioning, and modeling skills. Although sugar and salt may look similar, students discovered that they looked very different under a magnifying glass and behaved differently when dissolved in water. In addition,…

The purposes of this study were to ascertain which Texas public community colleges have been able to graduate the highest percentages of black males and to analyze the factors contributing to that achievement. An institutional questionnaire was developed, designed to elicit information regarding policies and/or practices directly related to the…

This study examines infant temperament (inhibited and uninhibited styles) as a predictor of behavior in the kindergarten classroom. Thirty-one kindergarten children were observed in their classrooms for approximately 1.5 hours on each of four occasions between September and January. Fourteen children (8 girls, 6 boys) had been classified as high…