This research is concerned with preservice teacher understanding of six earth and space science concepts that are often taught in elementary school: the reason for seasons, phases of the moon, why the wind blows, the rock cycle, soil formation, and earthquakes. Specifically, this study examines the effect of readings, hands-on learning stations,…

The context for this teacher narrative is a multicultural South Australian secondary school with over 50 nationalities represented, where many of the older students are disengaged from English. A transformative moment for the writer occurred following research for here doctoral thesis, which unexpectedly challenged her thinking about the English…

"School for Surgeons" is a web-based distance learning program which provides online clinical-based tutorials to surgical trainees. Our aim was to determine surrogates of active participation and to assess the efficacy of methods to improve usage. Server logs of the 82 participants in the "School for Surgeons" were assessed for…

When given opportunities to explore mathematics, make conjectures, and write about what they have discovered, students gain a deeper understanding of this fascinating subject. In this article, the author describes her successful Geometry Portfolio class. In addition to traditional student work, the author frequently added short essay questions or…

"Melioration" is borrowing and using an idea from another field not closely associated with your field of expertise. Using the borrowed concept to address a challenge in your field potentially provides new avenues of action and insight. I borrow the concept of boundary objects from science fields and use it to examine assignments in the college…

Rooted in graffiti culture and its attitude toward the world, street art is regarded as a postgraffiti movement. Street art encompasses a wide array of media and techniques, such as traditional spray-painted tags, stickers, stencils, posters, photocopies, murals, paper cutouts, mosaics, street installations, performances, and video projections…

Curriculum is at the core of any educational endeavor, and the course outline of record plays a central role both internal and external to the California Community College System. This update to the original Academic Senate paper "Components of a Model Course Outline of Record" also incorporates material from the previously published…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of reading a model written assignment, generating a list of criteria for the assignment, and self-assessing according to a rubric, as well as gender, time spent writing, prior rubric use, and previous achievement on elementary school students' scores for a written assignment (N = 116).…

Many college courses have historically been associated with large amounts of reading. For example, many biology courses required students to read trade books such as Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring" (Carson, 1962), or James Watson's "The Double Helix" (Watson, 1980), but now most instructors elect to focus students' reading on course textbooks and…

The purpose of this study was to test the validity of scores on the Homework Management Scale (HMS) using 699 rural and 482 urban eighth graders. The study revealed that the HMS comprised 5 separate yet related factors: arranging the environment, managing time, handling distraction, monitoring motivation, and controlling emotion. Given an adequate…

The attempt of writing center consultants to discourage faculty from requiring classes to visit the writing center led to research that calls this longstanding practice into question. In the early days of the proliferation of writing centers, faculty were advised not to require either individual students or entire classes to go to the writing…

The aim of the study was to find out how dance students experienced learning in an international distance education program delivered in an e-learning format using a virtual learning environment platform. In order to organize the students' experiences with the various learning assignments, we focused on three broad categories of learning tasks:…

This article describes an effective strategy to encourage students to accurately self-evaluate their understanding of different mathematical concepts both before and after assessments. It contains examples of pre- and post-assessments as well as an activity sheet. (Contains 4 figures.)

Whole-class inquiry (WCI) assessments range from challenging, paper-and-pencil puzzles to lab-based problems that require students to apply their own gathered data to a new scenario; the latter might also require students to perform a lab with new parameters, or to answer a question using data from a previous lab. In this article, the authors…

For educators striving to create an egalitarian classroom based on open, reflexive, and honest dialogue, silence can be the ultimate obstacle. Not only does silence stifle individual expression; more importantly, silence also prevents the collective production of knowledge, understanding, compassion, and empathy. When learners and teachers feel…