Since risk suffuses human life and trust helps breaks the paralysis of dealing with risk, a philosophy of education must account for the relationship between risk and trust. Keith Lehrer (in progress) has developed a philosophy that seeks to prepare students for knowing as human beings actually know things, suggesting that knowledge is a matter of…

This brief guide presents principles and suggestions to help individuals who are deaf-blind enjoy and benefit from participation in recreational activities. Principles consider the need to: (1) start with the individual and determine what he/she is interested in, focusing on the selection of safe, age-appropriate activities; (2) research the…

The contrasting assumptions of the didactic and critical theories and approaches to teaching and learning are set out in this paper. The assumptions have to do with: (1) whether students should be taught how, rather than what, to think; (2) the relationship between knowledge and thinking; (3) what constitutes an educated, literate person; (4) how…

This paper discusses the Modern School Movement (MSM), founded in 1924 by French educator Celestin Freinet (1896-1966) and widely-known throughout Europe yet largely unknown to English-speaking educators. The paper focuses on the MSM as the largest student writing network ever to have employed educational technologies as a central aspect of its…

This book presents a vision of leadership at work in the schools of tomorrow. School-based examples are used to provide guidelines for developing core values and using them to guide decision making. Chapter 1 proposes a framework that opens the organization to five areas: participation; diversity; conflict; reflection; and mistakes. The second…

Findings of a study that examined the application of strategic planning in American school districts are presented in this paper. Methodology involved content analysis of the strategic plans of 79 school districts throughout the United States, focussing on their mission statements, core beliefs and parameter statements, and objectives and…

This paper describes the highly gifted student population and provides principles for establishing inclusionary educational environments for them. Highly and profoundly gifted children are described as those who score above the third of fourth standard deviation on IQ tests or who are prodigies in a particular domain. Principles for placing highly…

This paper focuses on five basic concepts that exemplify the comparative study of higher education. It examines its contribution to the understanding of higher education: Comparative higher education is seen as the best means of examining one's own system, of understanding its cultural characteristics, of seeing alternatives, and of understanding…

The Foxfire approach to teaching and learning emerged from an experiential education program that used oral history methods to teach English to high school freshmen in Appalachian Georgia. In the 30 years since that program began, hundreds of teachers have helped develop and revise Foxfire's 11 core practices. This digest describes the Foxfire…

Exceptionally gifted children need special education because their needs are not fully met by standard educational programs. In standard programs, exceptionally gifted children waste time in acquiring basic knowledge that should be spent on more specialized knowledge, and can easily get bored and frustrated. Entry into primary school should take…

This volume is a record of discussions held at an invitational symposium that explored the major issues and challenges that face the catechetical ministry. The theme of this event was one of partnership and collaboration. The following presentations were made: (1) "Catechesis: An Ecclesial Ministry" (P. Laghi); (2) "Bishops Concerns…

This task force report is the Mathematical Association of America's response to the Association of American College's request to examine the issues that relate to the undergraduate program for mathematics majors. The first section of the report, concerning the present state of mathematics in liberal education, provides a historical perspective of…

This book reexamines dominant notions of what literacy is and challenges the problem-solution reflex approach to the issue. The book looks in detail at five principles advocated as central to the education of people who often can read, but wish they could read better, or who can write but wish they could write better. These principles focus on…

This paper describes the work of the Consortium for the Development of Thinking for Learning (CDTL), a committee under the auspices of the University of North Carolina that sought to introduce inservice programs in critical thinking and philosophy for children into the schools of North Carolina through a statewide network of inservice offerings.…

This paper discusses: (1) the link between the conservative education policies of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher and conservative educational thinking; (2) political, economic, and sociological conservative theories; and (3) characteristics of conservative thinking in education. The extent to which conservatives hold congruent or distinctive…