The right of parents to home educate is sometimes described as a "human right." Underlying this "rights claim" is the perception that attempts to restrict home education are both unnecessary and dangerous. "Unnecessary," because home education does not harm children or deprive them of the right to education and…

A study is reported of the use of a personal journal as a tool for transferring learning from the training room to the workplace. The targeted learning event was an English for Communication training programme. This programme was an intensive four-day course that grouped together participants from the non-UK sites of the aircraft manufacturer…

Amartya Sen's writings have articulated the importance of human agency, and identified the need for information on agency freedom to inform our evaluation of social arrangements. Many approaches to poverty reduction stress the need for empowerment. This paper reviews "subjective quantitative measures of human agency at the individual level." It…

One goal of most courses is to prepare students with basic knowledge and skills associated with the course content. Mastery learning can be a rewarding way to encourage greater student achievement by allowing students multiple attempts to demonstrate an understanding of course concepts. This may involve repeated submissions of individual…

This study assesses the impact of parent practices and knowledge of school on school success for a sample of 240 immigrant and nonimmigrant high school students and their parents. Immigrant parents from the former Soviet Union were less knowledgeable about and had less contact with the school, and allowed less autonomy than U.S.-born parents. Some…

On the premise that there are certain practices that influence students' intrinsic motivation for academic engagement, this study examined the congruence between a teacher's goals and practice with regard to autonomy. Self-report data were collected on seven sixth-grade elementary school teachers concerning their goals for their math classes.…

This paper reports the results of an initial exploration into the attitudes and practices of some selected Canadian distance educators regarding a learner-centered view of education. Twenty-nine Canadian distance education teachers and administrators responded to questionnaires concerning attitudes toward distance education, student autonomy in…

The necessity of balancing the need for togetherness and the need for separateness in intimate relationships has been well documented in family research. To investigate cross national differences in the value placed on autonomy versus togetherness in close relationships, 2,079 college students from Hungary, Ireland, Mexico, the Netherlands, the…

This survey investigates how the students of social philosophy modify their criteria on basic questions of social justice. A questionnaire of 30 questions, with 5 options, was developed. The five answer/options correspond to the following five schools of social philosophy (five ways of thinking): (1) liberal individualism; (2) humanitarianism; (3)…

The study developed a definition of "independent living" for handicapped individuals and evaluated the definition's seven domains using data provided by 3,758 handicapped members of the 1980 sophomore cohort of the High School and Beyond National Longitudinal Survey (N=14,553). The seven domains are: (1) self-care and advocacy skills;…

How successfully a student responds to the stresses of college life depends on several factors, including the time of onset, the degree of perceived threat, and the student's repertoire of coping skills. This study was conducted to determine if personal adaptability or ego-strength in college students could be predicted from knowledge of…

A passive participant observation method was used in three classrooms to determine the decision-making opportunities provided by special education teachers to moderately and severely intellectually limited students, ages 16-21 years (N=105). Teachers provided such opportunities through verbal directions, nonverbal communications, and in the…

Learned helplessness often precedes depression. The elderly are more likely than the general population to be faced with uncontrollable events which may bring on learned helplessness. Intervention by gerontological counselors has been useful in reducing effects of helplessness. With pseudohelplessness, persons act helpless in order to control…

Among the conditions necessary for learning to occur within the educational process are those of intentionality and guidance. A learner must necessarily be allowed choice in entering into educational transactions. Autonomy on the part of the learner in the educational process is not an option, but a necessary condition for the proper functioning…

Success in transaction and interaction in the foreign language classroom depends on teachers and students knowing the parts they have to play and how they relate to those that others have in learning encounters. Various roles of teachers and learners are defined. (CB)