Describes a writing assignment designed to educate students about an ethnic group different than their own. Students first wrote a factual account of how their family arrived at the local region. They then wrote an account from the perspective of a fictional student from a different ethnic group. (MJP)

Describes how teachers (of grades 4-12) can use computers to teach writing at a variety of levels, from the one-computer classroom to the most sophisticated, networked environments. Describes approaches for four electronic environments, how they might best be used, and what types of computer facility are needed. (SR)

Discussion of the development of advanced distributed learning environments focuses on a prototype graduate Web-supported course on emerging technologies developed by the National Computational Science Alliance partnership. Describes course materials; student assignments; student evaluations of the course; and future plans. (Contains 30…

A study of features of men's and women's English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) compositions (linguistic accuracy, readability, conformity to assignment guidelines) among a group of junior college students in Quebec found the two groups' writing of comparable linguistic quality. Superior marks received by women were found attributable to the way they…

This study gathered and analyzed feedback from graduate students regarding their use of the Internet to complete certain research course assignments. Findings indicate that the majority of students had a positive experience using the Internet, both as a means of accessing course materials and as an important resource for assistance in completing…

This study focused on my use of first grade literacy cases to scaffold a diverse constructivist perspective in my literacy methods course for preservice teachers. The cases depicted my concurrent work in a local school with three underachieving readers, two having diverse backgrounds with respect to home languages and socioeconomic status. I…

As a second article in a series devoted to an ongoing evaluation of our antiracism field project, a controversial assignment rooted in our Smith College School for Social Work's antiracism commitment, this paper focuses on the review of 128 assignments completed between September 1998-August 2000. A thematic analysis of these projects revealed…

Access to the textual world of academia requires that learners are familiar with the critical open-ended questioning stance demanded by textuality. Anecdotal evidence suggests that learners registered for the Bachelor of Education Honours degree are unable to generate appropriate questions to interrogate academic text, impacting on their ability…

Practical programming is one of the basic skills pursued in computer science education. On programming courses, the coursework consists of programming assignments that need to be assessed from different points of view. Since the submitted assignments are executable programs with a formal structure, some features can be assessed automatically. The…

The connection between high school chemistry pedagogical experiences and introductory college chemistry performance has been a topic researched in published science education literature since the 1920s. However, analysis techniques have limited the generalizability of these results. This review discusses the findings of a large-scale,…

Information assurance courses delivered in an online environment pose challenges to the development of meaningful hands-on exercises for students. This article presents techniques on furnishing laboratory exercises to online students and presents examples of assignments drawn from the author's experiences in teaching online courses for over three…

Research with ESL students studying at North American universities has indicated that Chinese students have difficulties in understanding academic lectures, taking notes, writing assignments, and giving presentations although they have obtained high TOEFL scores. The study investigates their English academic listening challenges as reported by…

Assessment data from both an FYE-infused general education course (N = 153) and a first-year seminar (N = 392) were analyzed to identify students' perceptions about projects that required significant participation in out-of-class activities as an integral part of the course. The results from this analysis revealed that in addition to increasing…

As advances in information communication technology have continued to affect business communication, the challenge for teachers over the past decade has been to stay abreast of new developments by integrating into the curriculum current theoretical and practice-based perspectives that can inform their students how to effectively create, manage,…

This study was designed to increase student empowerment through the use of formative assessment. The targeted population consisted of first and fifth grade students in the same school. Evidence for the existence of the problem included teacher observation, students' lack of knowledge and skills to complete classroom assignments, and low test…