Reports on a study of two secondary teachers who used the practical reasoning or practical argument approach to classroom management. Finds that practical argument techniques can benefit teachers by providing opportunities to question and revise their theories of learning and teaching. Recommends that teacher education programs employ the…

A study investigated the relationship between what teachers reported they do in their elementary (n=91) and middle school (n=64) classrooms and students' perceptions of classroom activities. Magnet school gifted students reported significantly more challenge than their gifted and other peers at the middle school level, whereas no such differences…

This study explored why students attempt to please their teachers, the link between the self-reported desire to please teachers and academic performance, and the various ways students go about the task of pleasing teachers. The research focused specifically on the range of reasons students have for wanting to please teachers, what students do to…

A list of suggestions for the content-area teacher dealing with limited-English-proficient students is designed to help increase the comprehensible input provided to the students. A brief introductory section reviews theory underlying the approach. Subsequently, nine lists outline specific classroom activities (speaking/listening), teacher…

This book offers a variety of forms to help the college instructor obtain feedback concerning instructional quality and improve instructional effectiveness. Two preliminary charts match specific forms to specific instructor concerns and compare the forms for sources of input, value, and limitations. Each form is introduced by a discussion of the…

The traditional role for teachers in children's play was to structure it, setting rules and interrupting if things got "out of hand." However, for children ages 3 to 5, sociodramatic play is a way to invent and make familiar the rhythms and actions of everyday life. This book describes why play is a fundamentally important part of…

The Associate Program for Adjunct Faculty (APAF) at the College of the Canyons (CC) in Valencia, California, includes efforts to increase instructional quality by increasing the incidence of good teaching practices among part-time instructors. As part of a project to evaluate the APAF and to determine the involvement of adjunct faculty in the…

The Thinking Mathematics project, a joint effort of the American Federation of Teachers and the Learning Research and Development Center, had the primary objective of developing more efficient means of disseminating new knowledge about mathematics learning and instruction. The resulting practitioner-researcher collaboration developed an…

A critical challenge facing educators today is meeting the needs of culturally diverse school populations. Since 1989, Mississippi State University has provided a summer institute, Strategies for Instructing Culturally Diverse Students, in which selected Mississippi elementary and secondary teachers have identified strategies for addressing the…

This literature review examines the effect of teacher expectations on minority students, and especially on Mexican-American students. The review focuses on four areas: (1) teachers' attitudes and expectations toward Mexican-American children; (2) teachers' attitudes and expectations toward minority children; (3) teachers' performance expectations…

This document describes the development and content of five videocassettes used to depict diverse approaches to kindergarten education to preservice and current teachers and teacher educators. Developed under a faculty development grant from the University of South Dakota, the tapes range between 15 and 25 minutes in duration. The first tape,…

Teacher enthusiasm has been linked to increased student achievement and attentiveness. Although enthusiasm is often mentioned to teachers and preservice teachers as being important, they are rarely trained in the particulars of enthusiastic teaching. This investigation was designed to explicate relationships among enthusiasm behaviors in a natural…

Although schools should be places which boost children's self-esteem, they usually play an important part in damaging the self-esteem of their female students through various forms of gender bias. This study explored how public coeducational schools can strengthen the self-esteem of girls in grades 7-12. Twenty subjects, all of them female,…

Teachers describe their professional development experiences regarding science, science teaching, and science learning as they occurred over a 2.5 year period in the Literacy in Science and Social Studies Project in a professional development school setting. They contrast their experiences in this collaborative setting with more traditional models…

Previous research on the difficulties faced by community college students transferring to four-year institutions has suggested that community colleges inadequately prepare students for the academic environment of their new institution. To examine transfer students' perceptions of their academic experiences and the causes of difficulties,…