Describes a project in England that used interactive drama with student nurses to promote healthy behavior with secondary school pupils concerning sexual relations. Highlights include pretests and posttests, secondary pupil attitudes and student nurse attitudes, and gender differences in responses by pupils. (Author/LRW)

This pretest/posttest study used two samples of injecting drug users (184 from street outreach and 103 from a methadone program) to assess drug use and human immunodeficiency virus risk practices. The improvement in risk behaviors at posttest suggests that intervention programs were agents of change. (SLD)

Pretest and posttest experimental (n=18) and control group (n=7) study assessing the effectiveness of a commercially available social skills training program for improving social skills and reducing family conflict in parent-adolescent dyads. Training group manifested improved social skills. Results partially confirm effectiveness of social skills…

Report provides new data concerning children's accuracy as measured by previous studies and clarifies progress of first graders during entire year on difficult single-digit addition and subtraction problems. Discussion focuses on advantages of an adding on interpretation of subtraction and the importance of emphasizing conceptual understanding…

Pretests measuring critical thinking ability and mental alertness were administered to 72 first-year college students at the beginning of an introductory computer programing course. Posttests administered at the end of the semester showed significant improvement in both areas, indicating that instruction in programing improves students' critical…

Describes a longitudinal evaluation of the five-week Computerphobia Reduction Program designed to reduce anxiety in the use of computers. Discusses methodology, evaluation measures, selection of clients, therapies offered, and results, which showed the intervention strategies to be successful in reducing computer anxiety over the long term. (28…

Describes attempts to instruct 12 children, aged between 10 and 11, during a 12-hour course in LOGO that proper attention should be paid to the external angles through which the turtle rotated. Results suggest that using LOGO to draw closed figures may lead to confusions about angle that are not amenable to conventional intervention techniques…

Quantitative outcomes from the Attitudes toward Science Inventory, as well as interview results, indicate that nonscience college majors have high anxiety levels in combination with low levels of motivation when confronted with science material. Further, these attitudes toward science change with exposure to introductory, science instruction with…

Discusses the use of multimedia techniques in computer-assisted learning (CAL) to help dyslexic children with spelling. An evaluation study that tested rule-based versus mastery-based approaches to spelling remediation is reported; problems that dyslexic children have with traditional CAL are discussed; and software that uses synthesized speech is…

Describes a study that assessed the impact of four half-hour science programs for fourth graders aired on commercial radio in a causal-comparative between-groups study with prebroadcast and postbroadcast questionnaires. Formative and summative evaluation of the programs is described, and results are reviewed. (21 references) (LRW)

Computer managed instruction (CMI) based on the principle of mastery learning has been cost effective for job training in the tax division of Arthur Andersen & Company. The CMI software system, which uses computerized pretests and posttests to monitor training, has been upgraded from microcomputer use to local area networks. Success factors at…

Describes the development of a history assessment test by Northeast Missouri State University (Kirksville) faculty. Discusses content, problems with design and cooperation, and theories of assessment testing. Includes sample questions demonstrating the cube plan, a technique that involves using a single question to measure three learning…

Discussion of learner control in computer-assisted instructional simulations focuses on an experiment conducted with undergraduate students that compared three different treatments for instructional control in an aircraft simulator. Topics addressed include performance on immediate and delayed posttests; practice; student attitudes; effects of…

The effects of a French tutorial with spoken feedback, written feedback, written/spoken feedback, and no feedback were examined with 56 undergraduates using a Macintosh computer. Results supported the hypothesis that students receiving written/spoken feedback perform better than those in the other three feedback categories. (eight references)…

A pretest-posttest control group design was used to assess the leadership and problem-solving skills of 281 participants and 110 controls in a statewide community leadership development program. Quantitative and qualitative data demonstrate that the program has been a catalyst to influence leadership and problem-solving skills for community…