Reviews criticism of elementary social studies textbooks, focusing on how the written text, the pictures, and graphics often seem unrelated. Asserts that the inclusion and use of literature selections in K-3 social studies textbooks is a newly emerging strategy. (CFR)

Evaluates the first stage of "Lernpunkt Deutsch," a new three-stage German course designed for upper elementary and early secondary school. Describes the publisher's package of materials and the appropriateness of the course, utility of the different package elements, format of the materials, and assesses whether the course provides pedagogically…

Summarizes the five reasons why the National History Standards will have a minimal effect on history instruction in U.S. schools: (1) the controversy behind the standards; (2) the unrealistic and impractical nature of the standards; (3) competition with local policies; (4) the formulation of widely adopted textbooks; and (5) the nature of history.…

Only with the beginnings of a structural system of social classes in America--a system based on both wealth and education--did an ethic of gentility and "correctness" arise in American attitudes toward speaking and writing. Rhetorical instruction was forced to move away from the abstract educational ideal of "mental discipline" and toward the…

The European history textbooks of four authors, Phillip Van Ness Meyers, Willis Mason West, Hutton Webster, and James Harvey Robinson, are described to show how they responded to and reflected the changing nature and function of the high school from 1880 to 1930. Data for the study came from educational histories, committee reports, journals,…

Textbook authors have the responsibility to present a complete and accurate account of a specific discipline. In the field of interpersonal communication, intrapersonal communication is of great importance. Textbooks tend to take two approaches to intrapersonal communication. One approach treats intrapersonal communication as essentially the same…

Learner Verification and Revision (LVR) has been part of Florida's instructional materials adoption process since 1974, when state statutes required textbook publishers to provide written proof that their materials were revised based on student feedback before publication. Publishers were also required to collect student data and make revisions…

This document introduces a new German business language textbook for American college students and describes the preparation, structure, and potential classroom uses of the materials. The text has five units and a total of 15 sections, each of which can be covered in about three contact hours. Each section begins with a text on the subject matter…

Many feel that textbooks dominate what students learn. They set the curriculum and often the facts learned in most subjects. For many students, textbooks are their first and sometimes only early exposure to books and to reading. The public regards textbooks as authoritative, accurate and necessary and many teachers rely on them to organize lessons…

Described in these four contributions to a discussion group are options open to publishers and purchasers to improve textbooks and textbook selection. The first contribution (by Robert L. Brunelle) briefly introduces the discussion and stresses the urgency of creating higher standards for textbooks as part of overall educational reforms. The…

In this paper on the school textbook system in Japan, information is provided on the school textbook system during the post-war period. Topics discussed in this area include: (1) the establishment of the school textbook authorization system; (2) improvements to the school textbook system; (3) putting the free school (public school) textbook system…

Written from the perspective of a textbook editor, this paper reviews the limitations on curricular reform in mathematics. In the first section, an argument is presented that the style and manner of the presentation of educational materials are more important than the content presented. This section also raises objections to the current push to…

Since the questions included in literature anthologies play a key role in the high school English class questioning process, a study examined the questions in four eleventh-grade American literature anthologies. The anthologies met the following criteria: textbooks (1) contained selections organized chronologically, (2) were major compilations in…

A VARIETY OF READING MATERIALS AND METHODS WERE DEVELOPED TO DETERMINE THEIR EFFECT ON THE READING ACHIEVEMENT OF FIRST GRADERS. MATERIALS DEVELOPED INCLUDED READING READINESS MANUALS, PRIMER TEXTS AND MANUALS, AND LISTENING TAPES. THE FIRST-GRADE PUPILS IN 10 LOS ANGELES SCHOOLS SERVED AS SUBJECTS. THEY WERE MATCHED WITH A CONTROL GROUP ON…

Seeking to discover how comprehensively and systematically one significant category of semantic elements is taught in current reading instructional material, a study surveyed the teaching and use of prefixes in the teachers' guides, readers, and workbooks (grades two to six) of six major reading series. Findings indicated that many of the most…