Using a language effectively involves both expressing oneself and acting upon one's surroundings. Linguistic theory has focused on the study of speech acts, but speech activity is basically pragmatic, that is, the conversational context determines the individual speech acts and not the other way around. Theorizing about the speech act independent…

Intended to help teachers present Indian legends for the maximum benefit and enjoyment of students, this guide provides background information and learning activities for seven legends derived from the Dakota, Ojibwe, and Winnebago tribes. Introductory material discusses the history and purposes of tribal legends and outlines student objectives…

The Computers in Bilingual Education program at South Bronx High School (New York) completed its first year of operation in June, 1985. The program offered limited English speaking students computer-assisted instruction in English as a Second Language (ESL), native language arts, social studies, math, and science, and also provided instruction in…

During 1983-84, the second of three program cycles of the Title VII English as a Second Language, Special Education Development Approach Curriculum Project (ESL-SEDAC) was fully implemented in the New York City Public Schools. The project provided direct instruction to 260 handicapped limited English proficient students, resource assistance,…

The teaching activities presented in this document focus on teaching students the language of science through reading and writing. The first activity engages students in writing everything they know about a particular science topic, devising questions for further study, reading and gathering information to answer the questions, developing specific…

This paper describes how electronic spreadsheet simulators, originally designed to simulate and replace large paper worksheets used in accounting and financial planning, can be used to study and explore functional relationships among a number of parameters. As a way of providing a context for understanding this application of a spreadsheet…

In its final year of a 2-year funding cycle, the Cooperative Work-Study Program for Bilingual Students offered bilingual instruction, career exploration programs, and supportive services to approximately 220 students in grades 9 through 12 at a high school in Bronx, New York. Almost all students were Hispanic and most were non-native born and of…

A study explored whether teaching the comprehension skills of inference, drawing conclusions, sequencing, and cause and effect would increase student achievement in reading and language while at the same time imparting social science content. Subjects, 197 eighth grade students in the experimental group and 192 eighth grade students in the control…

One of seven studies in the "Education and Polity" series, this document looks at alternative futures and the interface of education with four areas: communication; employment and leisure; state policy; and technology. The studies were commissioned during 1984 and were conducted by interdisciplinary teams: two in Australia, two in India,…

The writing of five first grade children was studied to determine whether findings of a previous study regarding children's concept of story structure would be demonstrated in the children's original compositions. The weekly sessions during the study included individual or group prewriting discussions, drawing and active writing, modeling by the…

A guide to behavioral objectives for elementary school mathematics published in the Assyrian language contains the complete sequence of objectives for the first four levels, covering kindergarten and grade 1. The levels include the average number of objectives the student should cover in a specific time period. The program gives the child the…

This report summarizes some of the literature focusing on specific aspects of the cultures of American Indians and the concommitant testing and assessment problems. The issues of non-competitiveness, language barriers, and a high incidence of middle ear disease among American Indian children are examined as they affect the assessment process. The…

A study explored the notion of writing as a sociocultural act in order to discover whether and how native cultural literacy and literary influences manifest themselves rhetorically and stylistically. Data were collected from 223 students in Australian grades 6 through 11, and representing three linguistic and cultural groups: Vietnamese,…

Preliminary results of a comparison of the language modifications made by teachers when telling stories to native English speakers and non-native speakers of English at various proficiency levels suggest that teachers need to do more than make the routine modifications in linguistic input to lower-level learners. Teachers need to: (1) act on the…

This study presents a review of selection factors for the seven major general-purpose programming languages: Ada, BASIC, C, COBOL, FORTRAN, PASCAL, and PL/I. The factors covered include not only the logical operations within each language, but also the advantages and disadvantages stemming from the current computing environment, e.g., software…