This study highlights two groups of students enrolled in a college mathematics of finance course using same textbook and instructor. Experimental group used menu-driven symbolic calculators, whereas control group used standard scientific calculators. Significant increases in favor of experimental group were found both with respect to students'…

Presents a discussion of the documentation of and access to interviews for historical research purposes. Examines problems of documentation, transcription, permission, and storage. Presents questions of property, professional ethics, and witnesses. Argues for interview guidelines, training of researchers for interviewing, and taping of interviews.…

Fourteen female teachers participating in Montgomery County (Maryland) Public Schools' Students Achieving Independent Learning Program, which promotes strategies-based instruction to enhance reading comprehension of elementary school students, were interviewed about program effects. Teachers identified both strong points and shortcomings of the…

Rod Ellis discusses contribution, past, present, and future, of second-language acquisition (SLA) studies to English language teaching. Considers two primary issues: conditions that facilitate and promote SLA in classroom; and how teachers can create those conditions. Role of grammar in English classroom is discussed, recent research is described,…

Researcher Howard Gardner discusses the extent of students' application of learned concepts to real life; Project Zero research on alternative educational assessments; evaluation of children's multiple intelligences and aptitudes in the Spectrum classroom (combining free play and structured activities); teacher's role in providing each child an…

Analyzes data from the 1989 National Health Interview Survey for 40,979 adults to see how successful human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) testing and counseling efforts have been in testing the U.S. population, particularly those at high risk. Twenty percent reported having been tested, with the percentage higher among high-risk groups. (SLD)

Describes an eighth grade teacher's efforts to integrate talk and writing, questioning and discussion, and learning as a shared responsibility between students and teacher. Outlines several projects related to the theme of work that achieved these goals, including interviews with parents and community members, journal entries projecting into the…

R. Carlos Nakai discusses his personal development as a musician, his interest in keeping the Native flute tradition alive in a modern way, his ethic of service, the purpose of higher education for Indian students, the relation of education to life, and the role of Indian people in the sciences. (SV)

Reports two studies of adolescent perceptions of playful and aggressive fighting. Results suggest that some bouts of playful fighting are used during adolescence to settle disputes about dominance and that aggression may be introduced into playful fighting to settle dominance disputes. (LB)

Forty-eight adults with mental retardation assessed their daily living competency using the revised Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales. Compared to subject and counselor interviews and demonstrated competency, the self-evaluation yielded highly consistent results on domains measuring adaptive skills, though subjects underreported problematic…

Discussion of information literacy focuses on a study at Rutgers University that was conducted to determine how undergraduates evaluate the results of their CD-ROM database searches. A proposed instructional model is explained that is designed to give students the skills they need to use information sources successfully. (three references) (LRW)

Defines images that teachers have of themselves within their teaching context. Employs a grounded theory approach and interviews to study how these images contribute to curricular decision making in six secondary school teachers. Analyzes the effectiveness of teacher images as tools for connecting teachers' past experiences to current curriculum…

The knowledge that 35 fifth graders and 37 sixth graders had about a historical period was characterized by focusing on the fifth graders before they studied the Revolutionary War, and sixth graders 1 year after they studied the topic. Students' knowledge before and after instruction included simple associations and lacked connected structures.…

Identifies the unsophisticated assumptions and conjectures, both intuitive and empirical in character, underlying secondary school science students' (n=25) portrayal of scientific knowledge and its production. Structured interview protocols explored not only the students' substantive knowledge base but, perhaps more important, their ability to…

Discusses results of interviews with reference librarians that were conducted to investigate the effects of electronic reference options such as CD-ROM and OPACs (Online Public Access Catalogs). The work environment is described; changes in library instruction are considered; and the changing nature of reference work is discussed, including users'…