Provides background on ThinkQuest, the world's largest Internet learning competition. Describes the experience of H.D. Perry Middle School in Miramar, Florida, where students designed a Web site about one of their hobbies--juggling. Includes the 1997 ThinkQuest Category of First-Place Winners. (AEF)

Addresses the effects of an after-school computer club network, the Fifth Dimension, on children's computer knowledge development. Compares Fifth Dimension novices and "experts" who had attended several times previously. Concludes that despite the absence of formal instruction, children's knowledge about computers is enhanced. (AEF)

Describes the use of George P. Landow's hypertext, "The Dickens Web," in an advanced undergraduate literature class and analyzes its practical and theoretical implications. Debates some of Landow's claims about the ease with which learning from hypertext occurs and examines difficulties encountered in using hypertext in the classroom. (DSK)

Illustrates techniques to foster transformative learning in computer-assisted literature classes: (1) a lesson plan on John Donne's "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning"; (2) a plan to analyze "Oedipus Rex" using the "Daedalus" Interactive Writing Environment; and (3) a demonstration of how students engage in "meta-reflection" as they explore…

Offers guidelines for enhancing science instruction for students with disabilities by adapting, implementing, and assessing an activities-based approach. This approach features a structured learning cycle, emphasis on the relationship of science to students' lives, experiential learning, interdisciplinary themes, cooperative learning groups,…

Recommends using focus group interviews and other discussion techniques, generally used in business, to examine social studies issues. Outlines and discusses how these techniques (systems thinking, mental models, shared vision, team learning) can greatly enhance social studies instruction of current events and controversial issues. (MJP)

Examines the extent to which student groups working with the Chelsea Bank computer simulation were able to use school-to-work transition skills. Results show that students demonstrated substantial involvement with workplace skills and were considerably more actively engaged with learning than studies of traditional classrooms. (Author/AEF)

Details the middle school implementation of an Academies of Inquiry and Talent Development enrichment program involving authentic-learning and real-life problem solving objectives. Considers start-up issues of orientation for students and parents, as well as teacher planning. Also considers issues of maintaining high standards, finding time for…

Four 8th graders with learning disabilities were taught to recruit assistance from peers during cooperative learning activities in two general classrooms. Training consisted of modeling, role playing, corrective feedback, and praise. Recruitment training increased the productivity and accuracy with which the students completed their language arts…

Examines the effects and implications of embedding the element of competition in computer-assisted cooperative learning situations on student cognitive, affective, and social outcomes. Results of statistical analyses of Taiwanese fifth graders show that cooperation without inter-group competition engendered better attitudes and promoted more…

Explores how two high-achieving adolescent girls reacted to a teaching intervention designed to foster collaborative group work focusing on aspects of their cultural practices in interpersonal relationships. They were primarily influenced by a competitive individualized ideology, not appropriate for the project, but not deviant from the school's…

Suggests that special education students do well in writing process classrooms that use a variety of approaches, such as cooperative learning, reciprocal learning, and multisensory teaching. Views the writing process classroom as a place where teachers and students respect different learning styles. (TB)

Describes the geographic information systems (GIS) curriculum at Roosevelt Middle School (Florida); the program includes an interactive matrix of communicative hardware and geographic software. Discusses problem-solving assignments, program flexibility for individual needs, cooperative learning via online communication, and the need for students…

This article describes an innovation that embraces elements of both technical and professional models of school improvement within the elementary division of a large school system. Emphasis is on development of the reciprocal learning instructional strategy for teaching academic content in regular classrooms and enhancing teachers' adoption and…

Study examined the content and form of elementary students' discussions in cooperative groups. Researchers recorded group discussions during whole language literacy instruction. Across classrooms, much verbal interaction was oriented toward academic and procedural talk, although the cognitive level of the discussions was low. Some grade level and…