"Alabama Education News" is published monthly except for June, July, and December by the Alabama Department of Education. This publication, authorized by Section 16-2-4 of the "Code of Alabama", as recompiled in 1975, is a public service of the Alabama Department of Education designed to inform citizens and educators about…

A case study on the teaching of writing, this paper discusses what motivates students in a freshman writing course to complete increasingly difficult writing assignments. The study provides a glimpse into how one class of freshman students developed positive expectations for writing a paper about a difficult poem by helping each other map…

The case for small schools has been made in educational research since the 1960s, when scholars such as Barker and Gump argued that smaller schools provided students with greater opportunities for participation in various extracurricular activities. The value of small schools was further supported in the 1980s by research on public and private…

Ability to retrieve information is so important that Chastain (1976) and Brown (2000) do not consider learners to have learned something if they cannot remember it. This ability can also have practical significance too, since it can lead to successes at the exam time. Due to both theoretical and practical reasons, any method that can help the…

Literature suggests a variety of opinions regarding what constitutes capable instructors. Rapport with students and methods of delivering content material are critical elements in learning. For these elements to be achieved successfully, effective instructors must demonstrate good communication skills. Furthermore, keeping students involved in the…

The discussion in this paper is based on the assumption that international education is equated to recruiting and educating international students, even though its true concept goes far beyond this narrow understanding. The purpose of this research is to look at the key factors that influence recruiting young Chinese students, and make sure all…

This paper illustrates the positivistic nature of person-centered planning (PCP) that is evident in the planning methods employed, the way that individuals with disabilities are described, and in portrayal of the outcomes of PCP. However, a confluence of factors can lead to manifestation of excessive positivism that does not serve PCP…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relations between divorced mothers' (N= 196) coparental role identity and their perceptions of how cooperatively they coparent. Data were gathered by questionnaires mailed to mothers who had participated in a court-mandated divorce education program. Using structural equation modeling, it was…

The present study examined whether maladaptive perfectionism (i.e., discrepancy between expectations and performance) and length of time in the United States moderated the association between acculturative stress and depression. Data were collected through online surveys from 189 Chinese international students from China and Taiwan attending a…

In 3 experiments, 9-month-old infants' expectations for what distinct count noun labels refer to were investigated. In Experiment 1, a box was opened to reveal 2 objects inside during familiarization: either 2 identical objects or 2 different objects. Test trials followed the same procedure, except before the box was opened, the contents were…

This study offers insight into the perceptions of a group of Chinese American parents, many of whom have children who excel at school. The results indicate that the Chinese American parents had high expectations of their children's educational success, placed high value on education and effort, tended to sacrifice for their children's education,…

This article explores the nature of self-study of teacher education practices by examining what self-study is and how it might be conducted and reported. In working through these ideas, the article makes an argument for the need for learning through self-study to be documented in ways that might not only be accessible to others but also meaningful…

Becoming a parent is a major developmental transition of adulthood. Individuals often have optimistic expectations about parenthood, yet this transition also presents a number of challenges. The authors investigated whether new parents have overly optimistic expectations about parenthood and, if they do, how this influences their adjustment to…

The International Handbook of Teacher and School Development brings together a collection of research and evidence-based authoritative writings which focus on international teacher and school development. Drawing on research from 18 countries across 7 continents, the 40 chapters are grouped into 10 themes which represent key aspects of teacher and…

The purpose of the study is to examine, through interviews and observations, the extent to which 8-10 year old children in a London primary school replicate gendered musical practices and experience gendered musical meanings, and how these may affect their expectations and the specific practices and products of their composition. I also consider…