Situates the experience of Porto Alegre in the larger political and educational context of Brazil; presents normative goals of the Citizen School and examines the mechanisms that helped forge these goals; describes and explains some elements of the institutional design of the Citizen School; evaluates potential problems of the project; offers some…

Revision of the Bachelor of Education program at the University of Alberta (Canada) and results of an initial formative evaluation of one program component--students' first school placement--are described. Program revisions based on continual student and teacher feedback obtained from ongoing formative evaluation enabled positive program…

Discusses the development of effective interactive learning environments based on a case study of a staff development program for university personnel that combined a Web-based database with CD technology. Topics include aspects of educational design; software design, including feasibility studies; project management, including team issues and…

This research study evaluated the efficacy of the "Bracken Basic Concept Scale-Revised" (BBCS-R; Bracken, 1998) and the "Bracken Concept Development Program" (BCDP; Bracken, 1986a) in a test-teach-test paradigm with students from a Head Start program. Prior to the intervention, 54 children were administered the BBCS-R and were…

During the last decade, the focus of innovation and research in the field of computers and education has shifted from stand-alone to networked computers. The rapidly growing educational use of networked computers raises questions about which approaches to research can tell us most about improving educational impact. A key aim of this paper is to…

In this paper, the authors first give a brief account of their work with teachers to develop formative assessment practices, including a brief outline of the quantitative results and the impact of formative assessment project. They give a full account of the changes in classroom practice that the project schools developed, together with some…

Formative and summative evaluations were used to evaluate students' perceptions of online courses. Inquiry focused on three primary areas including a) interaction with course content and instructors, b) accessibility of resources in an on-line environment, and c) perceptions of online course engagement. Findings indicated that students both…

The Animation Tutor[TM] is a curriculum project that uses software to supplement instruction in courses such as intermediate algebra. Its purpose is to ground mathematical reasoning in concrete experiences through the use of interactive animation and the virtual manipulation of objects. This article summarizes how the project has progressed from…

Cohorts are increasingly popular management tools for recruiting students into professional education programs, for organizing their learning experiences, for promoting performance-based outcomes, and for developing and using innovative teaching-learning practices. This article explores the role of a cohort leader in ensuring that the curriculum…

Although the ultimate goal of teacher education is to provide an adequate supply of highly qualified teachers for the nation's schools, many factors hinder its success. In special education, too few people enter the field, and a policy context that promotes easy entry via unconventional preparation threatens to dilute teacher quality. In this…

This article analyses the increasingly diverse and sophisticated critique of "outcomes approaches" in vocational qualifications; critique which has now moved well beyond the early claims of reductivism and behaviourism. Avoiding a naive position on extraction of points of consensus, this article attempts to extract key issues which have…

Purpose: The paper aims to explore the challenges of problem-based learning (PBL) as an unconventional teaching methodology experienced by a higher learning institute in Singapore. Design/methodology/approach: The exploratory study was conducted using focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews. Four groups of people were invited to…

As part of its ongoing process of formative evaluation, the Stanford Teacher Education Program (STEP) conducted a survey of four cohorts of recent graduates. The data from this survey are being used in concert with findings from other lines of inquiry to assess and improve the program. The discussion in this paper is centered on several research…

The measure of performance improvement potential (Gilbert, 1978) in human performance technology uses an exemplary performance as a criterion against which to measure the potential improvement in the performance of a workforce. The measure is calculated based on the performance efficiency which compares expended resources to productivity. The same…

This study outlines a formative assessment system using a consistent set of cut scores on Curriculum-Based Measurement-Reading (CBM-R) probes and investigates four statistical methods for establishing cut scores. Cut scores were established using the Minnesota statewide achievement test in reading at grade 3 as the criterion for a successful…