This 8-week interdisciplinary unit for fourth- and fifth-grade students helps children address the U.S. westward expansion in the 1840's using the interactive software program, The Oregon Trail. The unit provides connections to literature, geography, computer/mathematics skills, language arts, and research skills. The work is done in cooperative…

This guide provides background information on the development and implementation of thematic units that focus on a hands-on approach, process orientation, integrated curriculum, cooperative learning, and critical thinking. Topics of the thematic units and mini-units include wild animals, dinosaurs, rainforests, the human body, earth science,…

Indigenous peoples throughout the world have sustained their unique world views and associated knowledge systems for millennia. Many core values, beliefs, and practices associated with those world views have an adaptive integrity that is as valid today as in the past. However, traditional educational processes to transmit indigenous beliefs and…

The environmental education curriculum called Environment ACTION is designed to empower students with the knowledge and skills necessary to make meaningful environmental changes. This module provides step-by-step instructions on how to explore the sources, production, uses, and environmental effects of energy in their schools and home. There are…

Issues pertinent to the coordination of educational policies with those in other fields for innovative policy formation are presented in this synthesis. The first section details objectives of the interdisciplinary approach, of which the development of common frameworks and methodological tools that are adaptable to specific countries or regions…

Developed with contributions from administrators, faculty, and students in four model college sites, as well as faculty from community colleges across the nation, employers of associate degree graduates, and a task force of two-year college educational specialists, this report emphasizes the role of the humanities in improving community college…

It is important to give medical personnel being trained in second languages and cultures access to information necessary to their specific immediate needs. The University of California, San Diego, is used as an example of a communicative approach to helping health care providers establish an appropriate relationship with their Latino patients and…

This special theme issue of "Educational Foundations" contains five articles on the theme of "The Politics of Education." In Marie E. Wirsing's "Academic Freedom and Teaching Foundations of Education: A Personal Memoir," the history of academic freedom, including the constant struggles to preserve it and examples of significant infringement, are…

In response to curricular changes at Muhlenberg College (Pennsylvania), emphasizing interdisciplinary exploration and a focus on writing, students in an introductory psychology course were assigned a paper examining a "hero" of their own choosing from a psychological perspective, from an ethical perspective, and from a viewpoint…

This collection of essays on Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) defines terms, presents helpful suggestions, and provides models for useful documents (everything from workshop evaluation forms to contracts for visiting consultants). After a preface by Elaine P. Maimon, the collection's 12 essays are: (1) "Writing Across the Curriculum: An…

The 107 citations in this annotated bibliography reflect diverse perspectives on curriculum integration and the arts. Annotations of periodicals, journal articles, books, school curriculum guides, and program guides are included. Section 1 provides 34 citations on general interdisciplinary concepts from curriculum design to implementation. Section…

Heritage education is an approach to teaching, rather than an academic discipline or subject area. It draws on history, geography, literature, the arts, architecture, and the social and natural sciences to study the evidence of the past remaining in the natural and built environment, the material culture, written documents, and in community…

The curriculum and resource guide is designed to help elementary school teachers organize their classroom and instructional activities to increase achievement of pupils whose first language is Spanish. The guide offers a curriculum plan, instructional strategies and activities, suggested teacher and student materials, and assessment procedures…

This document is intended to help schools deal with the increasing ethnic diversity of school populations. The arts can provide a context, a means of expression, and a way of learning about cultural values and beliefs that will help to dispel cultural misperceptions among the nation's youth, and to foster cross cultural acceptance and…

A discussion of the role of sociolinguistics in the treatment of communication disorders focuses on issues related to dialect and language variation. It begins with an examination of linguistic diversity and dynamic description of language, reporting on a study of speech and language pathologists' judgments of sentences in African American…