To identify an easy and effective method by which the classroom teacher can expand student art preferences, this study examined three suggested approaches: habituation; art criticism (Feldman-Mittler Methodology); and art production (studio activities). Combinations of these approaches were studied in interaction with students' grade level. (SJL)

Examines the status of postoccupancy evaluation, which is the study of the effectiveness of designed environments for their human users. Issues addressed include generality, breadth of focus, applicability, sponsorship, methodology, and future directions. (WB)

Explains how to create slide shows via computer using common software programs such as ClarisWorks. Highlights include identifying the audience, organizing the information, becoming familiar with technical specifications of the equipment, the use of text, style consistency, the use of graphics, and the use of color. (LRW)

A review of college and university library home pages concluded that many higher education home pages are badly designed, difficult to navigate, and a poor reflection on the institution. The most common shortcoming was the tendency to create too many links or overly large graphics. An appendix lists points to consider when constructing a home…

Describes the efforts of School Works, a not-for-profit company in the United Kingdom which has developed a secondary school design process that enables communities to create unique school buildings that cater to their own particular needs. Discusses its work with Kingsdale Secondary School in south London. (EV)

Investigates the dominance of global versus local visual properties in four-month-old infants as a function of individual differences in fixation duration. Suggests that long-looking infants process visual information more slowly than short-looking infants, and there may be qualitative differences in the manner in which the two groups of infants…

Children's use of the middle concept was assessed in two developmental studies. Experiment 1, with kindergarten through fifth-grade students, showed marked improvement in the mastery of the middle concept across elementary grades. In Experiment 2, discrimination pretraining with two nonoverlapping stimulus sets transferred to the novel test…

Describes the four-step process of designing a library systems office at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC): (1) Collect Data: Why Create a Systems Office; (2) Organize and Present Preliminary Data: Educate and Involve Stakeholders; (3) Identify Actions: Write a Plan; and (4) Implement. Addresses the major problems encountered,…

Discusses the basic technical concepts of using graphics in World Wide Web pages, including: color depth and dithering, dots-per-inch, image size, file types, Graphics Interchange Formats (GIFs), Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG), format, and software recommendations. (AEF)

Investigated degree to which two shape dimensions were represented categorically by children and adults when learning object names. Found that adults accepted names more often to objects that fell within proposed shape boundaries than to objects that crossed boundaries. Children were just as likely to generalize names to novel objects that fell…

An interactive multimedia tutorial system that focuses on the "why" aspect of user interface design is described. The system contains a design exercise, three experts for guidance, and a user group that comments on the usability of the design. Testing results indicate that learners consider more possible solutions to design issues. (Author/AEF)

Describes the process of developing a web page for a history department and/or for the particular courses offered at the university. Asserts that the content should drive the design of the page, information should be chosen that is important to the students, and the content must be easily accessible to them. (CMK)

Discusses online resources that focus on what not to do in Web page design. "Don'ts" include: making any of the top 10 mistakes identified by Nielsen, qualifying for a "muddie" award for bad Web sites, forgetting to listen to users, and forgetting accessibility. A sidebar lists the Web site addresses for the nine resources…

Elder care can involve the elder's children, other relatives, friends, community, and services sponsored by the government. According to the compensatory view, an individual prefers to rely on only one mode of elder care (i.e., care of elders in society, not just one's parents). In contrast, the complementary view suggests that the individual…

Stimulus preference assessments for individuals with developmental disabilities typically involve offering choices among stimuli and providing immediate access to the chosen stimuli. Several researchers have explored the utility of presenting choices verbally, thereby obviating the need to present the choices in tangible form and deliver access to…