This study explored first-year distance education students' experiences in an innovative early childhood "Teachers as Researchers" class that required a collaborative student research project. Distance education students comprised about 25 percent of the total class, and requirements for on-site and distance students were kept as similar as…

This activity plan for fifth graders posits that the student is an agent for the King and Queen and are authorized to make a journey to the New World on behalf of the kingdom. The mission is to claim all land for the monarchy, locate a new trading route across the ocean, look for the Northwest Passage, and bring back gold, silver, spices, new…

Freshmen often approach research papers by selecting a "giant topic" and going to the library to confront swamps and mountains of resources. A different approach to teaching research is designed to help students begin to shift the often counter-productive paradigm under which they operate. The classroom strategy proposed is 3-fold.…

Prominent school-to-work observers see a close connection between service-learning and school-to-work programs. Major components of service-learning are as follows: active student participation, thoughtfully organized experiences, focus on community needs and school/community coordination, academic curriculum integration, structured time for…

Standards documents produced by professional educational organizations on the best ways to teach reading and writing have been synthesized by Zemelman, Daniels, and Hyde (1998). They recommend that teachers provide: more active learning in the classroom; more diverse roles for teachers; more emphasis on higher order thinking; more deep study of a…

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) is a computer application for urban planning, weather reporting, and geological and demographic studies. This book takes teachers and students to the cutting edge of teaching social studies and environmental education using GIS. Students can use GIS as a tool to explore, question, integrate, analyze, interpret,…

Team-based student projects have become an intrinsic part of coursework in information technology courses. The rationale is that once students enter the work environment they will be required to work in teams. Challenges of teamwork are reviewed and factors influencing student team performance are identified. An approach is described which deals…

Teams working in distributed projects go through the same stages and encounter the same problems as typical face-to-face teams. The main difference when the environment is moved to a distributed setting is that some problems become more complex, other problems become less noticeable, and some new obstacles occur. One of the main problems with…

This book explores the art heritage of Sub-Saharan Africa with projects (n=40) and activities (n=15) featuring African animals. Artifacts from museums and private collections have inspired the activity choices in the book, and an effort has been made to present fresh and new ideas, not always found in most activity books on diversity. As with all…

This document reviews the Pacific Region Junior Science and Humanities Symposium (PJSHS) program for 2003-2004 which is a 10-month, precollege student research program held in Japan. The theme is AtmosphereThe Other Ocean. The program includes a one-week symposium of student delegates who have completed research projects in the sciences or have…

This paper intersperses events and experiences from the poet Nikki Giovanni's life--she emerged from the Black Rights Movement in the late 1960s--with student assignments in prereading, reading, discussion, and writing about Giovanni's poetry, specifically the poem "Nikki-Rosa." In addition, the paper describes an oral history project…

A class of 3- to 6-year-old children in a Midwestern child care center chose to study hair and hairstyling salons as a group project. This article discusses how the project evolved, describes the three phases of the project, and provides the teacher's reflections on the project. Photos taken during the project are included. (Author)

This book describes ways to help teachers teach using technology and project-based instruction. It opens with a theoretical 3-year school-improvement plan that outlines a framework for developing curricula that address real-world applications. The second chapter describes how schools can write a sound technology plan of action, which includes…

A preschool class of 4- and 5-year-old children in a Midwestern Christian school chose to study school buses as a class project. This article discusses the goals of the project; describes the three phases of the project, including the children's representation of parts of the bus; provides the teacher's reflections on the project; and presents…