Oral language skills in the preschool years are predictive of children's later reading success and literacy acquisition, and among these language skills, vocabulary and narrative ability play important roles. Children from low socioeconomic families face risks to their language development and because of threats to these skills it is important to…

Research Findings: Using data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods, this article relates neighborhood characteristics to the type of child care used in families with toddlers and preschoolers (N = 1,121; representative of children in Chicago in 1996-1998). Neighborhood structural disadvantage was assessed via U.S. Census…

This study examined the global quality of early care and education settings and individual children's experiences in those settings. Sixty 4- to 5-year-old children (30 with disabilities and 30 without disabilities) were observed using the "Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale-Revised" (ECERS-R) and items from the ECERS-R adapted to focus on…

This study utilized early reading assessment data from a randomized trial of 210 urban and rural schools in Texas to examine contextual effects on risk prediction in first and second grade. The primary objective was to examine the roles of (a) individual differences, (b) the grade 1 classroom, and (c) the pairing of first and second grade teachers…

There is a direct correlation between (teacher) morale and (learner) discipline at school. Since the scrapping of corporal punishment, a sense of despair seems to have taken over amongst teachers in South Africa. The findings of this study indicated that more than 65% of teachers, out of a sample population of 80 respondents from schools located…

As one of the important stakeholders in the academic process, students and their preferences should be considered when the instructor selects the various course design features. Although students are not the only stakeholders in the academic process, their receptiveness to classroom instruction is clearly a central focus of that process. This…

This study identified issues in school--and in life outside school--that caused significant worry for 120 Chinese adolescents (72 males, 48 females) attending a secondary school in Hong Kong. The study explored relationships existing among 3 variables comprising degree of worry, students' general self-efficacy, and their academic achievement.…

This research examined the level of equity of the public school funding system in Texas that in September of 2004 was held to be unconstitutional by a state district judge. The study also introduces a mechanism, referred to as the Revenue-to-Population Index or RTP Index, which compares funding equity within the unconstitutional system among 1031…

Teacher instructional efficacy is an essential part of the mathematics learning process. When a mathematics teacher possesses a high level of instructional efficacy they can effectively influence a mathematics student's skill acquisition. This researcher examined what extent 5th-grade mathematics students perceive teacher instructional efficacy to…

The Longitudinal Emergency Medical Technician Attributes and Demographics Study (LEADS) provides a representative sampling of EMTs throughout the United States. This study examines the relationship between instructor quality and National Registry of Emergency Medical Technicians certification examination outcomes. Results show significant…

Recent research has found that maternal employment is associated with worse child performance on tests of cognitive ability. This paper explores mechanisms for that correlation. We estimate models of instrumental variables using a unique dataset, the American Time Use Survey, that measure the effect of maternal employment on the mother's…

This study analyses teachers' and students' perception of task-based language learning in order to find out the similarities and differences that exist between the understanding of tasks by the two parties. The overriding purpose of this study is to find out the pupils' interpretations of tasks used in the foreign language classroom and,…

This report contains the best national data available to provide a reliable and comprehensive overview of American reading today. While it incorporates some statistics from the National Endowment for the Arts' 2004 report, "Reading at Risk," this new study contains vastly more data from numerous sources. Although most of this information is…

This paper investigates the relationship between quality of support services in online education and the level of satisfaction of e-learners with these services. Case study was employed to measure University of Surrey's virtual MBA students' satisfaction with course facilitator, personal tutor and help desk functions designed for online education.…

The present study examined fathers' daily parenting hassles and coping strategies to (a) determine their association with fathers' emotional expressiveness and (b) predict their sons' development of socioemotional competence. Fathers of 148 preschool-aged boys reported on their parenting hassles, coping strategies, and emotional expressiveness;…