Describes using a loose framework of response journal writing and small and large group sharing with two classes of ninth-grade English students. Describes students' deep involvement as they constructed important meanings from a story that went beyond their own experiences. (SR)

Finds that with teacher scaffolding (modeling, explicit instruction, feedback, and the creation of contexts for sharing), first graders can write thoughtful, personal, and extended responses to books in their literature-response journals. Discusses teacher and peer scaffolding, and literacy development. Describes in detail the children's…

Presents material from two first-year teachers' case writings and discussions about teaching writing which resulted in a "linguistic event," an opportunity to construct new knowledge about teaching. Claims the teachers were able to reflect on concerns in depth, validate each other's practice, and explore the value of talking and writing…

Describes how keeping a journal of four areas of concern helped a high school writing teacher implement changes in his teaching and discover what worked. Discusses how he used the journal to help him focus on implementing peer editing, teaching essay structure, improving student essay detail, and correcting essays more skillfully. (SR)

Uses a control class to compare student attitudes about writing and performance as writers. Finds that students in the Internet-based classes contributed to their journals more frequently, reported a greater increase in their enjoyment of writing, and demonstrated greater improvement on initial and final timed writing samples as compared with the…

Describes three active learning strategies for use in a teaching assistant (TA) training program that can enhance graduate students' teaching skills: (1) in-class activities; (2) written assignments (journals, written exercises, and teaching portfolios); and (3) modeling and observation (watching versus performing teaching behaviors). (CMK)

Explores prospective social studies teachers' use of online reflective journals. Discusses the content of the journals in terms of four categories: social science, technical, pedagogical, and procedural. Includes typical and unique journal entries. Considers the classroom implications of technology as a reflective tool. (CMK)

One university's use of peer evaluation to develop fair and reliable distribution of grades for group projects is described, and its adaptation to the specific requirements of civil engineering is examined. Results suggest the evaluation model is transferable to this discipline. In particular, use of student journals for grade allocation was found…

Describes the results of a project in which students adopt a three-meter-by-three-meter plot and make periodic observations of changes in the plot. Students keep a journal, involve their families in plot observations, and visit one another's plots. (DDR)

Notes that teaching literature in a Technical and Further Education setting presents its own special set of problems and paradoxes not usually encountered by teachers in more conventional classrooms. Discusses students and their literature experiences; impact of the canon on teaching; and influence of modern literary theory on the reader-text…

Explains cultural and spiritual traditions within African American women's experience that form the foundation for group counseling strategies. Reviews literature regarding African American women's experience in groups. Explains group interventions such as art, music, dance, imagery, journaling, and rituals that can help transcend, empower, and…

Compares the effectiveness of incorporating two different types of reading comprehension strategies with journal writing to improve learning in social studies at the seventh-grade level. Finds the group that structured their responses according to the K-W-L comprehension model learned more than the group that summarized what they had read. (NH)

This narrative recounts the disruption of my graduate research project by persistent, self-reflexive questioning of the process of doing independent research for the first time, and draws its texts from the resulting master's thesis. In this story, the ethnographic method I chose initially to study the experience of women returning to school to…

The understandings of properties that children develop in the context of rock and mineral identification point to the challenges of observing in a manner authentic to the discipline of geology. The notebook entries of 34 third graders written during the enactment of a commercial unit on earth materials were investigated for their descriptions of…

Classroom communication figures prominently in current math reform efforts. In this study, we analyze how one teacher used writing to support communication in a seventh-grade, low-track mathematics class. For one school year, we studied four low-achieving students in the class. Students wrote in journals on a weekly basis. Using classroom…