Standardized vocational education course titles and core contents for two courses in Mississippi are provided: general drafting I and II. The first course contains the following units: (1) orientation; (2) introduction to mechanical drawing; (3) lettering; (4) geometric construction; (5) basic computer-assisted design (CAD); (6) orthographic…

Progress is reported on research conducted in school settings to investigate methods to help students--especially at-risk students--to acquire and use knowledge to solve problems. The methods incorporate principles of learning and instruction derived from basic research on cognition. Specifically, the research involves using microcomputer and…

Although the emphasis on adult literacy/basic education is increasing, the high dropout rate from programs in these areas is a concern. Why learners choose to participate or not to participate in such programs can be understood in terms of three sets of factors. Learner-inherent factors include self-evaluation, goals, and capabilities. Life…

An in-progress staff development program in a small, rural school district in South Carolina strives to make teaching and supervising more rewarding to the staff member while at the same time improving instruction for students in the schools. The program is the result of attempts by the school district to survive through staff development. With…

The first in a 10-volume report, this volume provides an overview of the NETWORK school improvement study as a whole, placing it within the context of federal dissemination-related school improvement policies and programs. Existing research on these programs is examined and synthesized, and the evolution of the federal role in dissemination is…

While continuing education is vital to all practicing social workers, human service workers in rural areas that are undergoing rapid change due to energy development may face particular problems in obtaining additional training and education. When rural areas become boom towns and social disturbances increase, human services personnel generally…

A progress report on "Building Work Skills through Volunteering," a demonstration project designed to use the volunteer experience to develop and practice work skills, is presented. The initial section describes the participants, methods, and materials at each of four sites: a private corporation, a suburban school district, a voluntary…

Nonformal education is any organized, systematic learning activity carried on outside the formal educational system and usually focused on improving participants' social and personal living, occupational capability, or vocational competency. Because it offers opportunity and participation to all in a non-threatening atmosphere and promotes rapid…

Generalizations arising from effective teaching studies are vulnerable because they are not based on a theoretical perspective of how learning occurs or can be improved, but have resulted from observations of what teachers appear to be doing when students are learning. Critics of teacher effectiveness studies contend that good instruction requires…

Since 1976, the Atlantic Institute of Education in Nova Scotia has conducted a series of workshops to help school administrators and school board members to develop their practical leadership skills. The services provided by the workshop program include needs assessment, inservice workshops, information services, dissemination of materials, and…

A comparison of the end-of-study versus months-to-years later levels of language proficiency of 49 students of Japanese at Cornell University, from both intensive and nonintensive programs, is reported. In addition to academic records and performance on the Japanese Proficiency Test, data obtained from a comprehensive background questionnaire…

This handbook for kindergarten through grade eight provides instructional objectives for student mastery in the basic skills of reading, mathematics, written communication, and oral communication. The section on reading is divided into the following strands: word identification skills; vocabulary skills; comprehension (literal, inferential, and…

This report describes activities of the PLATO Education Group (PEG), the educational research and development arm of the Computer-based Education Research Laboratory (CERL) at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Staff, funding sources, and an overview are presented for the four projects summarized, along with additional,…

This article focuses on the empirical effects of cognitive differentiation and persuasive skills on transformational, transaction, and laissez-faire leadership. Subjects (N = 294) completed measures of independent and dependent variables. Findings confirmed prior findings, however some findings reflected differences. Cognitive differentiation was…

Keyboarding as writing apparatus is an essential skill in the technological era and more self-regulated learners perform better in keyboarding than less self-regulated learners. In order to indicate this, students registered at the Faculty of Arts for a compulsory keyboarding and word-processing course completed a questionnaire to identify both…