This study examines the year-long process in which a teacher and her fourth- and fifth-grade students with diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds implemented Book Club, a literature-based instructional program. Data analysis reveals a gradual release of responsibility from the teacher to students in carrying out book conversations. Five…

Picture books are useful tools for teaching many abstract and complex concepts of the social studies at the elementary level. They allow students to develop visual literacy through sustained viewing time necessary for exploration, critique, and reflection on the images portrayed. Numerous examples of picture books are presented to support such…

Based on the premise that the fairy tale genre can be effectively used as the content base for teaching reading, writing, and thinking skills and processes, this book offers educators ideas and techniques that promote multiple intelligences, critical thinking, creative problem solving, and problem- and product-based learning. Drawing on Bloom's…

The Interdisciplinary Assessment Model was created out of the need for improved assessment of learning, especially the assessment of critical thinking and problem solving. Development of the model required establishing a common language for library media specialists to cover various curriculum areas, a comparison of current state standards for…

This paper discusses some of the promises and pitfalls confronting education in the Information Age. It explores the business motivation that drives the education agenda, examines what some futurists call "the end of the job," and identifies four themes that could help transform education as the millennium approaches. Critical literacy,…

This study examined the critical thinking skills of resident and commuter students during the freshmen year, controlled for precollege background and ability. Differences in commuter and resident students' experience, particularly aspects of academic and social integration were also considered. The study sample was a subset taken from a national…

This paper explores how multicultural education via the curriculum can enable schools to educate rather than school the student. Multicultural education assumes that: (1) ethnicity and culture are salient parts of U.S. life; (2) ethnic diversity is a positive element in a society because it enriches a nation and increases the ways in which its…

In fall 1993, Coffeyville Community College (CCC) in Kansas announced the implementation of a new program known as Quantifying Learning Outcomes (QLO), one component of the college's Student Outcomes Assessment Plan. QLO calls for a clear articulation of CCC's goals regarding instructional support materials within the next 6 to 12 months; the…

This paper presents the cases of four preservice teachers enrolled in a critical multicultural education course during Spring 2000, showing how the readings, cross-racial dialogues, and journal reflections that were part of the course helped students, for the first time and irrespective of race and gender, discuss their experiences and question…

This book offers high school and college teachers both a philosophy of composition instruction and an immediately useful set of classroom-tested teaching ideas distilled from the author's 28 years of teaching writing. Throughout the book, two aims underlie all others: (1) to tap every student's inborn ability to think extensively and well; and (2)…

This paper surveys issues that draw together instructional technology (IT) with the goals of the traditional classroom curriculum. Ways that IT serves to further the traditional educational goals of developing lifelong learners who function with skills, knowledge, and wisdom are examined, as well as the potentials and challenges of IT. The first…

International interest in the use of the Internet and the World Wide Web in learning environments has become the major area of focus for many educators and instructional designers. While few dispute the value of hypermedia in instruction and training, the design, development, and implementation of Web-based learning has not been researched in any…

The 52 units that comprise this book were devised with the goal of "freeing up" the creative abilities of students while helping them look at a number of important social issues. The book is in a sequential form and presents many of the fundamental issues of the social studies curriculum. The units in the book follow a pattern that is…

This report examines a study on the extent to which California's teacher preparation programs were preparing candidates for teaching critical thinking and problem-solving skills in elementary and secondary schools. Researchers conducted interviews with education and subject matter faculty in private and public colleges and universities. Results…

This book provides directions and sample activities to help parents teach their children to follow an easy system for study reading: set clear purposes for study; ask targeted questions; read quickly for specific information; summarize effectively; and gather information from charts and tables. The first section, Flexibility and Reading Speed,…