A study compared (1) data on rejections of advice by native and non-native speakers collected from natural conversation with (2) data collected from a discourse completion task (DCT). Subjects were students in an academic advising session (13 native speakers, 11 non-native speakers of English) who responded to a DCT and students (18 native…

An analysis of the use of language in a social service context using microethnographic research techniques is described. The study examined a single interaction between a welfare caseworker and a client as they address the client's employment and educational options. The interaction was videotaped and a segment of just over a minute was analyzed…

The use of tests of statistical significance was explored, first by reviewing some criticisms of contemporary practice in the use of statistical tests as reflected in a series of articles in the "American Psychologist" and in the appointment of a "Task Force on Statistical Inference" by the American Psychological Association…

In France the creation of Instituts Universitaires de Formation des Maitres (IUFMs), university institutes of teacher education, has revived the question of the role of research in teacher education. The IUFM is not part of a university and does not have the same status. It has to negotiate a contract with a university. The importance of research…

This paper describes the methodology used by The College of St. Rose (New York) to identify peer institutions (similar small private liberal arts colleges) as part of a comparative compensation survey. To identify peer institutions, researchers used a hybrid approach involving both objective identification of institutions and administrator…

The application of computer technology in qualitative research and evaluation ranges from simple word processing to doing sophisticated data sorting and retrieval. How computer software can be used for qualitative research is discussed. Researchers should consider the use of computers in data analysis in light of their own familiarity and comfort…

The Annual Performance Report submitted by each state to the Office of Vocational and Adult Education was used to monitor what states have developed and how and to what extent states have implemented their accountability system. The following findings of this analysis are synthesized in this report: (1) 32 states require evaluation of all programs…

In Pioneer Institute's November 1995 "Dialogue," nine school-choice advocates critiqued a draft manuscript of "Who Chooses, Who Loses? Culture, Institutions, and the Unequal Effects of School Choice," edited by Harvard professors Richard Elmore, Gary Orfield, and Bruce Fuller. This publication contains the response of Professor Fuller to the…

A curriculum activity was initiated to provide preservice teachers with a personal knowledge base of active research procedures through the use of class-related activities. A research component was included in a required preservice class in assessment. Following the principles of scaffolding theory, students who had studied the elements of…

Advances in computer technology are making it possible for educational researchers to use simpler statistical methods to address a wide range of questions with smaller data sets and fewer, and less restrictive, assumptions. This digest introduces computationally intensive statistics, collectively called resampling techniques. Resampling is a…

Researchers in vocational education (VE) often are not viewed as having made substantial contributions to VE practice. The VE literature and the poor attendance at American Vocational Education Research Association sessions by vocational educators are evidence of the gaps that have developed between VE research and practice, basic and applied…

This study was conducted to investigate eight teacher education faculty members' perspectives of concordance with existing and emerging knowledge during the actual development of a knowledge base. An instrument was developed by content analysis to measure faculty understanding and realization of 82 theoretical constructs in six domains: (1)…

This paper discusses the building of a hypermedia-based reference station at the Wright Laboratory Technical Library, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio. Following this, the paper focuses on an electronic user survey from which data is collected and analysis is made. The survey data is used in a rapid prototyping approach, which is defined as…

This paper reports on a qualitative ethnographic research study on the inclusion of children with severe disabilities into a Montessori preschool program in Lawrence, Kansas. The program has served 20 children with disabilities since its inception in 1986. The program's emergent model involves a split program (utilizing a special education…

A majority of the empirical studies on questioning has focused on the effects of prior knowledge on the number and type of questions asked. Research has not been able to find support for the frequency hypothesis and the specificity hypothesis in questioning. The focus of these studies is briefly criticized, and a detailed critical assessment is…