A rural New Mexico project identifies gifted Hispanic and Native American children in the visual arts. Committees of parents, teachers, artists, and administrators use identification procedures sensitive to cultural, linguistic, and ethnic differences and community ethnic identity. Program elements include culturally relevant differentiated…

Reviews the literature on psychological and educational assessment of American Indian and Alaska Native children, including the background psychological factors of biological deprivation, motivation, attitudes toward self, and traditional nonformal education. Discusses brain hemispheres, visuospatial skills, otitis media, fetal alcohol syndrome,…

Describes how a bilingual teacher and a professor collaborated in a bilingual classroom to create culturally relevant opportunities for learning. Examines the work of four fourth-grade students of different backgrounds to show what this culturally relevant learning looked like. Discusses sources of knowledge generation: families, multicultural…

Provides teacher trainers with a variety of instructional materials, resources, and articles that can be employed to diversify the special-education training curriculum to address the needs of migrant students and families. Online information, videocassettes, and field trips and field work addressing the migrant experience are also discussed.…

Studied the relative weight of personal, social, and cultural variables that explain gender differences in mathematics learning in different sectors of Israeli society. Results from 106 Jewish and 105 Arab high school students show the higher perceived achievement and mathematics self-confidence of the Arab girls. Explores reasons for the…

Both content and event analyses were applied to cultural and social knowledge underlying narrative production in three African-American preschoolers. Results suggest that the use of alternative approaches broadens understanding of the repertoire of narrative structures among African Americans. Suggestions are offered for building collaborative…

Teacher educators addressed negative student responses to a multicultural foundations course by designing an action research study to investigate students' identities, experiences, and beliefs. Analysis of written assignments and focus group discussions uncovered three categories of beliefs about the purposes of schools in relation to cultural…

Examines the failure of colleges of education to address racial diversity and teacher preparation issues. Research supports that teacher immediacy, or communication that facilitates physical and psychological closeness, positively influences teacher effectiveness, credibility, and the teacher/student relationship. Teacher trainers must become bold…

Summarizes the status of preservice special-education teachers' preparation for diversity based on a review of the special-education literature. Issues regarding the special-education literature base, special-education professional standards, and special-education organizational structures are addressed. Identified challenges include retooling…

Assessed Oakland University's elementary-teacher-preparation program to determine aspects of the program that most affected students' preparation to teach in diverse classrooms. Pre- and post-semester surveys of student teachers placed in urban/suburban schools indicated that students learned adequate skills for teaching diverse students, but…

A study of 26 Asian-American students with learning disabilities in grades K-5 found that although the district policies reflected desired professional practices, there were no guidelines for documenting how variables such as second-language acquisition, culture, socioeconomic status, and other differences were accommodated. Policy recommendations…

Examined cross-cultural mentoring of ethnic minority doctoral students (proteges) in special education programs, noting the role of mentoring in preparing proteges for higher education faculty positions. Protege and mentor interviews indicated that cross-cultural mentoring was crucial in preparing ethnic minorities for faculty positions. All…

Discusses the inappropriate referral of culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students for speech-language therapy. Preassessment considerations that should be considered and the interrelatedness of culture, language, and communication as they impact on an individual learner's behavior are explained. Culturally appropriate assessment…

Explores the conflicting cultural perspectives associated with studying English, drawing on two studies of Mexican students. P. Ryan (1994) studied the perceptions of culture related to language learning for six college teachers and their urban students. N. Francis (1994) studied the perceptions of rural bilingual (Spanish/Nahuatl) elementary…

Discussion of library education in New Zealand focuses on the cultural clash between government control of education and university autonomy, as well as the clash between an indigenous people and a culture introduced from outside. Topics include nationwide higher education reform; distance education; quality assurance, including strategic…