Examines the relationship of student questions to teacher comments in college classrooms across the university. Finds 6 categories of student questions (with an average of 3.6 student questions asked per hour of instruction), 8 categories of antecedent teacher comments, and 7 categories of consequent teacher comment. Considers explanations and…

Discusses how four teachers with similar beliefs teaching at two different schools catering to radically different school populations altered their teaching practice to fit the specific culture of their school. Reviews existing research on theory practice relationship and calls for further research on the role of classroom context. (RS)

Twelve adults were asked to teach four pairs of preschool children in which one member of the pair exhibited problem behavior. Results indicated that the adults engaged in teaching activities with nonproblem children more often than with problem children. When an adult worked with a problem child, the breadth of instruction was more limited.…

Finds that choices instructors make about reading assignments and classroom activities can influence the way students use their composition handbooks, encouraging or discouraging certain behaviors. (SR)

Theories may fail to explain or predict outcomes of educational programs because outcomes are influenced by variations in educators' behavior and attitudes during program implementation. A theory-oriented evaluation approach includes reflection by educators on their personal and professional theoretical patterns that shape their educational…

Finds that each of six kindergarten teachers had a distinctive storybook reading style, varying in each of three major facets of style: focus of teacher talk during reading, type of information talked about during the reading, and instructional strategies used. (SR)

Examines the ways in which writing teachers present themselves in a virtual classroom--a computer networked first-year composition classroom. Discusses how the teachers' online presence relate to their off-line, "live" presence. Suggests that differences among teacher are more important than similarities. (RS)

Employs three approaches in a summative evaluation of ENFI (Electronic Networks for Interaction), a local area network used to teach writing through the use of software that supports real-time communication. Suggests that the ENFI setting allows a writing teacher to more easily model the creation of a writing persona. (RS)

Research on reading comprehension and its teaching is reviewed. A theoretical basis is presented for conceptualizing the reading comprehension curriculum as a set of five strategies. Research on teaching facilitates a new view of instruction, focusing on the negotiation of meaning among students and teachers through teachers' instructional…

The learning climate set by adult educators reflects assumptions about adults as learners and the teaching-learning transaction. Creating positive environments requires attending to initial contact with learners; answering the questions Who are we? Who am I the instructor? and Why are we here?; and using icebreakers. (SK)

Considers how the history of rhetoric is taught currently and has been taught in the past. Provides data from surveys of historians in rhetoric and composition concerning their methods. Describes how the history of rhetoric is taught at the University of Arizona. Shows how rhetoric can be taught as a social praxis. (HB)

Teachers of life skills courses must beware of ethnocentrism, understand their own culture, learn about other cultures, and ensure that a multicultural perspective informs the curriculum. Cultural differences may arise in such topics as child development, family relationship, food and nutrition, family responsibilities, and community resources.…

Concludes children benefit from teacher training in integrating environmental print into the curriculum; logos selected for classroom use should come from children's immediate environment; instruction should include experiences with manuscript forms of the logos; and children who are encouraged to bring to class examples of environmental print…

Suggests that the dangers and risks in whole language are real and irremedial, and educators' only recourse is to take responsibility for its shadow side and attempt to learn the lessons that even "monstrous examples" portend. (RS)

Each adult educator holds a unique set of beliefs about teaching and the elements of instruction and behaves in a teaching/learning setting in fundamentally individual ways. The key to a congruent teaching style is having the beliefs and behaviors consistent with each other. (Author/JOW)