Project work represents a significant component of most Bioscience degrees. Conscious that students are not necessarily given adequate preparation for their final year project, we have investigated two core elements in the 3rd year of a 4-year Honours programme. One element, an investigative project on aspects of insect biology, has run for…

Results from this study suggest teachers believe technology may provide English language learners (ELLs) an advantage in developing writing skills. Using a theoretical framework by Hadaway, Vardell, and Young (2002) citing seven teacher practices that support the writing of ELL students when writing processes are embedded in real-world activities,…

This paper describes a campus survey designed to enhance student learning while generating high-quality data for research and evaluation. Students enrolled in a research methods course pretest a draft interview schedule and interview randomly selected students; then, drawing on their interview experience, they write a paper that addresses…

Students from the University of Montevallo, Alabama's public liberal arts university, re-created the Battle of Shiloh (April 6-7, 1862) approximately twenty miles north of Corinth, Mississippi. For ten weeks in a classroom environment, nineteen students studied strategy, operations, and tactics that affected events nearly 143 years prior. Then,…

This paper focuses on the difficulties of assessing multi-year team projects, in which a team of students drawn from all three years of a full-time degree course works on a problem with and for a real-life organization. Although potential solutions to the problem of assessing team projects may be context-dependent, we believe that discussing these…

The objective of this research was to explore how authentic technology use and teacher inquiry may coalesce during curriculum-based, technology-enhanced field experiences for prospective teachers. Thirteen inquiries were analyzed using qualitative analytic procedures (Rossman, 1998). Results suggest that teacher inquiry may serve a variety of…

This article describes data from the Community Mapping Project, a set of statistical activities and inquiry projects within a summer seminar for high school students. In designing the Community Mapping Project, we attempted to create conditions under which urban students themselves would come to recognize how mathematics is relevant to their lives…

In May 2008, the Center for Evaluation & Education Policy (CEEP) issued the Education Policy Brief, "Calculating High School Graduation Rates," which discussed the importance of accurate and reliable high school graduation data, various graduation rate calculation methods, the history behind the use of particular methodologies, and…

Late in 2007 New Visions for Public Schools, a New York City reform organization, received a grant from the C.S. Mott Foundation to organize select high schools and community partners into delivery systems that could improve student achievement. New Visions asked Policy Studies Associates, Inc. to provide research support for this effort in the…

In this chapter, a Canadian high school teacher describes a senior English independent study program requiring that each student become involved in a topic through experience. From previous teaching experiences, the teacher realized that the curriculum was secondary to the method of delivery, that learning happened when a teacher instilled in…

One of the most interesting challenges facing educators today is how to engage students in meaningful study of the environment in which they live. This paper presents the benefits of studying scientific data from an aesthetic point of view. The visual display of the earth's surface through aerial photographs and satellite map images was used as…

Electronic Performance Support Systems (EPSS) use computers to capture, store, and distribute knowledge in both an interactive and non-linear delivery. Using technology sources such as the Internet, Microsoft's Net Meeting, Connectix's color camera, and business software, it is possible to provide multiple site delivery and bring business…

This paper describes an innovative course in educational administration and presents students' reactions to the experience. The class was based on the constructivist perspective, which emphasizes the individual's construction of reality through dialogue, observation, writing, and reflection. The class was organized to focus students on the purpose…

This report describes educators' collaborative self-directed experiences in learning about and producing alternative forms of assessment for use in elementary-level classrooms. The report analyzes the Virginia Standards of Learning and local curricula in English/Language Arts, Mathematics, Social Studies, and Science/Health in grades 2-4, to…

This book is a guide to incorporating multiculturalism in college curricula and offers practical pointers and strategies as well as a collection of useful references. Part 1 contains specific, practical ideas designed to be useful to instructors in all disciplines. Chapter 1 examines objectives and priorities, the structuring of syllabi, and the…