Uses the curing and caring aspects of medicine as an analogy for what education can be. Observes that the divinity expressed through medicine's ability to cure and care for people also can be expressed through teaching when it attempts to eliminate ignorance, prejudice, and misinformation. (DB)

Seventeen educational measurement textbooks were reviewed to analyze current perceptions regarding true-false achievement testing. A synthesis of the rules for item writing is presented, and the purported advantages and disadvantages of the true-false format derived from those texts are reviewed. (TJH)

The success of the Paired Reading (PR) technique is examined, and a study involving 43 pairs of Hong Kong students (ages 10-11) in a PR project is reported. It is concluded that the projects' success may not lie in the technique itself but in improving tutees' motivation, confidence, and self-esteem as readers. (JDD)

A technique is presented for teaching deaf students self-discipline along with useful idiomatic expressions. Idioms selected for study (such as "top dog,""in the doghouse,""sitting pretty," and "in hot water") are related to school rules, depicted on a bulletin board, and used to track classroom behavior.…

The staff of an apartment-based residential support program was taught to use behavior interruption strategies to elicit requesting functions from two women with deaf-blindness and developmental disabilities. Results found the strategies to be both quickly assimilated by the staff and effective in increasing request rates from the subjects.…

Effects of one-on-one versus small group arrangements were studied as were variations in instructional agents used to teach three elementary students with autism word recognition skills. Findings indicated the small group format allowed for more trials and reinforcing statements, as well as more closely approximating regular classroom activities.…

This paper discusses the history of U.S. reading instruction; instructional approaches and learning processes; the whole language view of literacy acquisition; promoting literate behavior through reading to or writing with children, shared reading, and guiding children's reading/writing; and use of the whole language approach with…

After an overview of several studies of cognitive instruction used with problem learners, the article describes two learning mechanisms that explain why such cognitive interventions work--prolepsis (communication that initially leaves implicit some information) and reflective abstraction (changing observables into meaningful internalized…

Analysis of transcripts of nine undergraduate lectures in the humanities and social sciences found that professors used asides and local breaks in topicality to increase global semantic and pragmatic unity, introduce various mutually reinforcing interpretive frames, resolve apparent contradictions, highlight contrast, and establish relevance and…

Offers a group approach method to learning new structures in German. Students practice one pattern by constructing sentences in a simple, mildly competitive board game that can easily be put together by the teacher. (GLR)

The advent of the European Community will cause important changes in European life and create more diversified language needs. The schools must be prepared to respond to this new dynamic, rethinking of foreign language education objectives, renewing curriculum content, and rejuvenating methodology. (Author/MSE)

Suggestions for organizing the objective structured clinical examination for medical students and physicians address selection of competencies to be evaluated, number, type, and duration of examination stations, use of examiners, clarity of instructions, test administration, resource requirements, interstation signals, and recordkeeping. (MSE)

The Helping Relationship Inventory was used to see whether objective improvement in medical student (n=109) communication skills occurred in a relatively brief (nine-hour) small-group course in interviewing. The study demonstrated that even brief small-group interviewing courses can effect a positive change in communication skills. (Author/MSE)

A teacher reflects on his experiences teaching American Indian literature and offers advice to other teachers: (1) clearly defining "Native American literature," noting diversity of Indian nations; (2) teaching works in their cultural context; (3) paying attention to continuance and Native time sense; and (4) being wary of translations. (SV)

Three related studies of the impact of variations in classroom and field experiences on preservice students' knowledge, skill, and reflectiveness are reported. Videotaped and live demonstrations of teaching strategies (the schema-theoretic approach and a conventional approach) and clinical seminars and microteaching were compared. (IAH)