The main purpose of this study was to identify educational research that had been undertaken in Kenya between 1963 and 1980 and to categorize it under major educational issues. To collect data, questionnaires were sent to libraries and data gathering institutions, organizations, and agencies. Personal interviews were also conducted with staff and…

A content analysis was conducted of 17 technical writing textbooks published between 1911 and 1938 and of 3 texts published recently to determine if the early texts differ from the more recent ones in the way they define the purposes of technical writing and in their treatment of style and audience. Results showed that both sets of texts define…

A study of changes in children's programing on network television in the United States from 1948 through 1978 is detailed in this report. The first chapter discusses the concepts of "diversity" and "shape" as they apply to television programing, and provides details about the research methodology used in the study. The second, third, and fourth…

Twenty-two short stories and seven novels, each with a woman journalist as a major character, were used in an analysis of the image of the woman journalist in four time periods (1890-1920, 1920-1940, 1940-1945, and 1945 to the present). The themes of the stories changed over time, often reflecting the prevailing cultural attitudes about working…

The opportunity to discover the flaws in newspaper letters to the editor and to evaluate the ensuing consequences can help beginning persuasive writing students, who have had little practice at forming arguments, begin to conceptualize for themselves the ways that principles of persuasive discourse apply in particular writing situations. The study…

Noting that rhetorical critics have ignored the study of nonwestern movements and have failed to construct theories that help to explain and interpret the rhetorical form of such movements, this paper synthesizes concepts from rhetorical theory and anthropology to explain the linguistic process that made up the 1978 Israeli peace movement. The…

This paper, presented at the 1979 meeting of the American Educational Research Association (AERA), investigates student errors in high school mathematics. A conceptual framework of hypothetical information-handling processes such as procedures, frames, retrieval from memory, visually-moderated sequences (VMS sequences), the integrated sequence,…

Three levels of the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills were studied to disclose the possible existence of sex bias in mathematics test items. Two mathematics tests (mathematical concepts and mathematics problem solving) and two comparison verbal tests (vocabulary and reading) were selected for analysis at three levels--grades 3, 6, and 8. Samples of 480…

A review of the first 23 volumes of "AV Communication Review" identified 68 theoretical and experimental articles on the effects of media on student learning attitudes. Examination of these articles revealed that (1) researchers do not routinely evaluate the impact of mediated instruction on learner affect toward either the medium or the…

The Fry Readability Formula was used to determine the readability levels of 12 first and second grade basal texts. These texts were part of the Ginn 360, Ginn 720, and Macmillan Series "r" basal reader series. The results showed that 4 of the 12 books tested did not correspond closely to the publisher's readability levels. The Ginn 720 text for…

To analyze the patterns of newspaper news sources in a developing nation and the geographic focus of news and news subject matter categories, an analysis was conducted of the English-language "Egyptian Gazette," the official organ of the Arab Socialist Union. Primary data for the study were the front pages selected at random from the…

A structural analysis according to narrative rules and common content elements was made of stories on an identical theme in three different foreign language texts. The purpose of the analysis was to highlight some of the elements by which an educational institution influences its students through the world view it espouses. The three texts chosen…

A study was conducted to determine the precise content of elementary school spelling instruction. Spelling textbooks for grades one through six from seven major commercial publishers were selected on the basis of their use in elementary classrooms and were subjected to a critical, computer-assisted analysis in order to identify and classify the…

A new, computerized readability assessment program was developed to verify the reading levels of stories, as designated by publishers in current sixth grade reading texts. The Spache, Harris-Jacobson, Dale-Chall, Flesch, and Fry readability formulas were incorporated into one computer-based program designed for rapid calculation and comparative…

A study of news refraction was conducted to determine how well the press has functioned in popularizing scientific views and findings on a subject with direct implications for a controversial social issue. In reporting the marijuana question, the press produced a certain amount of refraction or news-slanting. For example, science articles…