In 1985-1987, seven faculty members at Sacramento City College (SCC), California, conducted classroom-based research studies as part of an effort by the college to involve faculty directly in research as a means to improve teaching and learning. In 1987-88, three follow-up studies were conducted to validate and/or expand upon the original…

This book is the result of the accumulated research of five researchers from the United States and Australia on a school in Coastal Australia. The research team shared a constructivist epistemology and interpreted the qualitative and quantitative data collected over a 10-week period in two classrooms from that perspective. Each chapter discusses…

Modifying the classroom behavior of passive college students is central to the task of improving education. At Ursinus College in Pennsylvania, an Academic Orientation Workshop for freshmen was designed to communicate the college's expectations of high student involvement in classes from the outset of the student's college experience, in order to…

Undergraduate students in sociology (N=59) and psychology (N=50) participated in a study at a large midwestern university to determine if the pattern of attributional assignment, expectancy, performance, and perceived success was different in these two groups of undergraduates. Prior to taking the first of three exams each student was asked how…

The best way to teach writing is to make it the way to learn something else. Instructors need to look at written communication as it is used in real life. When students take pains with their writing, it is because what they have to say is important to them. The students' need to communicate a particular meaning for a particular purpose guides them…

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of two modes of computer-assisted instruction, simulation and tutorial, upon the ability of preservice elementary teachers to understand relationships between a number of concepts dealing with home energy. A number of instruments measuring various dimensions of learning style differences were…

The reports describe the institutional context, design, and administration of language awareness courses and course components in seven British secondary schools: the Oratory School in Reading, North Westminster Community School in London, the Priory School in Barnsley, Hambrough Middle School in Southall, the Henry Box School in Witney,…

Interpreting is an example of context-bound performance in which the interpreter has a prescribed role in infinitely varied contexts. The use of interpreting to train language students in confident and competent language use in less demanding contexts contributes to the development of both interpersonal skills and the ability to switch language…

Papers presented at a conference on the use of simultaneous, consecutive, and other forms of interpreting as features of foreign language teaching and learning in British higher education include the following: "Liaison Interpreting as a Communicative Language-Learning Exercise" (H. A. Keith); "Interpreting and Communicating:…

If a student is to develop reading comprehension, he must possess and activate a number of linguistic and cognitive skills. He comes to the text with certain expectations and uses a cyclical process of sampling, predicting, testing, and confirming to understand it. The overall goal of reading instruction is to produce motivated, independent,…

Drawing from a review of the literature, this paper explores the role of university and community college faculty in teaching the growing number of adult students and potential adult students. First, section I offers background on the growth in adult enrollments at Fullerton College (California). Next, section II profiles the adult college…

Foundational Approaches in Science Teaching (FAST) is a program which is intended to facilitate student transition from the general science process programs of elementary schools to the discipline-oriented programs of high school. This guide has been developed to provide an overview of the total program as well as a description of the…

Children's literature, when used appropriately in conjunction with textbooks, can become a powerful teaching tool that builds relevant prior knowledge, capitalizes on the student's skill in reading narrative, engenders interest and motivation, and consequently promotes a deeper understanding and appreciation of the content in both trade books and…

Research in this project studied cognitive processes involved in understanding and solving problems used in instruction in the domain of mathematics, and explored implications of these cognitive analyses for the design of instruction. Three general issues were addressed: knowledge required for understanding problems, knowledge of the conditions…

A two-year ethnographic study of kindergarteners' experiences in a French immersion classroom focused on the processes by which children find and construct meaning through classroom interaction and communication processes. Data were gathered through classroom observation and videotapes. The initially unilingual English-speaking students were…