A linguistic analysis of a prose text from Somerset Maugham's "On a Chinese Screen" is made under the following four heads: (1) Content and Organization; (2) Lexis; (3) Grammatical Structure; and (4) Typographical Features. (CFM)

Calls for new freshman English texts that emphasize communicative competency. (DD)

Description of the method and results of a study that evaluated introductory psychology textbooks according to their human interest and readability. It updates a previous study. (ND)

More than five hundred chemistry/science text books from a variety of countries and written at all levels of education have been looked at to see how they dealt with the topic of physical and chemical change. Textbooks have continued to cover this chemical topic for over one hundred years. What evidence do school textbooks contain about the…

The purpose of the original study was to investigate practicum student teachers' reflectivity. This paper describes the use of a revised version of the Reflective Pedagogical Thinking Scale (Sparks-Langer, et al., 1990) to measure reflectivity. The original scale was used by the developers to assess reflectivity through a structured interview. The…

This study examined the quantity and quality of narratives and graphics concerned with disability in children's magazines prior to and after Public Law 94-142, the Education of All Handicapped Children Act, enacted in 1975. Content analysis was conducted on "Highlights for Children," selected for its longevity and wide circulation and…

As the shock of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks was drawing down, the author decided to peruse the International Relations (IR) textbooks on his home and office shelves to determine what students would find to help them make sense out of the events that so stunned the nation. Consulting ten different textbooks, he found "sloppy…

This book presents a method for the qualitative assessment of text difficulty, a method that relies on a total impression rather than on an analysis of text features. The method is based on matching samples of text to exemplars that have been scaled for comprehension difficulty. These exemplars range in difficulty from those suitable for the…

The purpose of this project was to perform an analysis of the Rockford Public Library (Illinois) circulation services department and provide recommendations leading to customer service improvement, better space utilization, and improved departmental work flow. Based on an analysis of input from individual interviews with staff, review of…

Whereas in a traditional university classroom, important features of interpersonal relationships are most readily communicated by body language or tone of voice, in electronically-mediated teaching environments, absent such real time cues, even subtle metacommunications may take on added importance and power. Although a growing number of studies…

Media portrayals involving sexuality can contribute to the sexual socialization of young people. If television is an important source of information and potential influence about sex for young people, then obviously it is important to understand the nature and extent of sexual information that is being conveyed by television. This report contains…

Over the past five years, many forensics programs and students have been undertaking competition in parliamentary debate. During the same period, policy debate has seen a decline in the number of schools participating. A survey of students participating in debate tournaments asked their reasons for choosing one type of debate over another: Why do…

The Magazine section of the proceedings contains the following 4 selected papers: "Racial Cover-Up, 1996-2000: Who Is the Face on Today's Fashion Magazine?" (Lindsey Kressin); "Reporter at Large: Morris Markey's Literary Journalism in 'The New Yorker'" (Les Sillars); "Art, Ideology and Americanisation in Post-War Dutch…