(2000). Literacy for Youth: Programs, Problems and Perspectives. Proceedings of the Youth Literacy Forum (Melbourne, Australia, July 30, 1999). These proceedings document some of the work and the stories of literacy teachers who work with youth outside the school system and help to paint the educational and policy context of their work. "Professionalism and Passion: A Report on Teachers Working with the Literacy Needs of Unemployed Youth" (Beverley Campbell) introduces the report. The nine presentations are "Introductory Remarks: Unemployed Early School Leavers and the Knowledge Society" (John Wilson); "An Overview of the Situation of Early School Leavers" (Helen MacDonald); "Extending Learning Options for Early School Leavers" (Maureen Ryan); "Creating Links and Sharing Resources: An Overview of Programs at Morrison House" (Barb Lorey); "'Every Now and Then You Get One Over the Line…'" (Jules De Cinque); "Working with Unemployed Young People: The Teacher's Learning" (Lindee Conway); "The NMIT Youth Unit: Diverse Programs and Pedagogical… [PDF]
(1990). Previewing the Professoriate of the 21st Century: A Multi-Institutional Analysis of Faculty Supply and Demand. This study looked at future demand for faculty at institutions of higher education by developing a larger and more sophisticated model of faculty demand than previously used and by examining faculty separation and hiring patterns among independent colleges and universities. All members of the Higher Education Data Sharing Consortium (125 independent colleges and universities in the nation that collaborate on comparative research studies) were invited to contribute data to the study which consisted of two parts: an institutional survey of faculty separation and hiring practices and a faculty data base. Additional qualitative data from a survey of department chairs and an annual Senior Survey were obtained at Franklin and Marshall College only. The major findings indicated that the rate of faculty retirements is projected to increase significantly over the next 20 years with the largest wave of retirements projected to occur from 1999 through the first decade of the next century. In… [PDF]
(1993). This Will Fix You Up: Older Women and the Wise Use of Medication. Lifecycle Learning Sheet. The safe and effective use of medication is a concern for both older women patients and older women as caregivers. In 1989, twice as many antidepressants were prescribed for women as for men, and older women are more likely to have such drugs prescribed for them. According to studies, older women who live alone have the highest use of both prescription and over-the-counter drugs. A 1990 report on women's health stated that drug dosages are generally determined by studies of young men, whose bodies metabolize drugs differently than women's bodies do and who generally stay on medication for shorter periods than older women do. Although older people have been found to have high rates of drug dependence, the addiction problems of retired adults are often taken less seriously than are addictions in younger people. Older women must become better informed health care consumers by getting complete, easy-to-understand drug information; sharing their needs and concerns with doctors,…
(1983). Project SAVE: Skills, Attitudes, Values, Essential for Employment. Final Report, 1982-83. The Skills, Attitudes, and Values for Employment (SAVE) project was designed to explore the needs of women in the workplace. An exploratory design was selected for the study with a target population consisting of 200 women working in companies in Morris County, New Jersey. From a self-administered questionnaire used to elicit information, the study showed that more women in the 40 and under group are college graduates than in the group over 41. Also, more women who have attained a college degree or higher have had a mentor. The skills that seemed to be more important for the women studied were the self-management skills (self-assertion and public speaking) and functional skills (mathematics, statistics, English, computer-related skills, and career planning). The women also expressed the following needs: establishment of day care facilities, flexible work schedules, job sharing, financial planning, and exercise classes. Of the women in this study, 56 percent had a continuous…
(1986). Finding Speech Topics and Supporting Material. Many students in public speaking classes have trouble finding topics and material that will support their ideas effectively. Too often students have a conceptual emphasis, substituting lengthy explanations about their ideas, in place of images, metaphors, and specific details of carefully observed events that make ideas vivid and meaningful. A three part exercise can help students trust more in their own experiences when they search for topics and look for material to support their ideas. The first phase is a breathing and relaxation exercise. This is followed by a visualization phase, in which the students let their minds wander over recent events in their lives, while the third phase involves putting those visualizations into words and then sharing them with peers. At the end of the exercise, students give a general response to what happened. Some students want to tell their stories again before the whole group. They respond to each other, picking up the universal truths contained…
(1987). Dialogue Journals: Facilitating the Reading-Writing Connection with Native American Students. Focusing on the integration of early reading and writing skills, a study examined the instructional use of daily dialogue journals over a 5-month period in a class of 10 third-grade Native American students living on an Indian reservation in northern Michigan. Students were required to make an entry of at least three lines every day, all writing was confidential, and the journals were not graded. Punctuation skills, grammar, and sentence structure improved in most cases, the length of sentences and paragraphs improved in all cases. Ninety percent of the students indicated a positive feeling about writing, and a majority reported that they enjoyed sharing reading and writing with their classmates. Difficulties in using this teaching technique included the amount of teacher time spent in answering the journals on a daily basis, and the problem of motivating students to write. Overall, results indicated that the dialogue journals were successful in combining the need for a… [PDF]
(1969). Research Findings from a Language and Sensory-Perceptual Training Program. A program for approximately 100 2- to 5-year-old culturally deprived Nashville, Tennessee, children was conducted in two community day-care centers. The children received instruction in groups of six or seven on a half-day basis for 5 days a week. Both language input and output were the focus of instruction, which was carried out through face-to-face conversations between the child and teacher, with each child being required to use appropriate sentence structure, verb form, and word endings. Activities included information sharing and talking time, language and sensory-perceptual training units presented in small groups, eurhythmics, and a music and story hour. The sensory-perceptual training emphasized the development of concepts relative to size, color, number, form and position, figure-ground discrimination, and auditory and visual skills. A dramatic increase in IQ level over a 9-month period was noted for the experimental group, but this was not the case for the control… [PDF]
(1973). Kansas R2R (Right to Read) Abstracts. This report concerns the present status of the Kansas Right to Read plan of action. Two years of activities are discussed–the 1971 summer workshop, evaluation of the first year's program (1971-72), and the 1972 summer workshops. Thirty classroom teachers took part in the one week summer workshop in 1971. This workshop was designed by the State Reading Education Specialist and other educators to prepare teachers to return to their schools and establish inservice programs. A workshop content survey was given, and this data indicated a definite knowledge gain in selected workshop topics. The evaluation of the first year's program reports on the responses of the teachers in the 1971 summer workshop regarding their success in sharing their workshop experiences. The teachers indicated a statistically significant increase, at the .01 level, in their over-all rating of their school reading program's effectiveness. The final report, for the two 1972 summer workshops, includes an evaluation… [PDF]
(2002). Kick Starting the Inner Site: Reading To See and Feel. A number of adults were interviewed about memories of their favorite teachers. While many could remember specific instances of connections of learning had occurred, there were only 20 who could clearly remember and articulate this form of remembering. From this relatively small group, the dominant and most enduring memory was one of emotional introspection. This memory was enduring because it was an active constituent in their daily life. While these teachers used a variety of teaching approaches in their teaching of reading, one of the commonalities as recalled by this group of respondents was that they all used some form of a \literature based\ approach. This daily ritual of reading to the class was also accompanied by a sharing of responses. This process by which they discussed plots and characters and interacted with their teacher on a personal level became an over-arching reflective process of memory in action. This self-monitoring process was characterized by the following set… [PDF]
(1998). The Standards Teacher. Standards for Excellence in Education. This document was written to help teachers understand how to implement standards in a professionally rewarding way. The essay describes how to refine curricular, instructional, and assessment decisions, and it provides selective reviews of standards' content areas. It addresses some of the basic questions that teachers ask, such as \What am I trying to teach?\ and \Why am I teaching this?\ The guide discusses benchmarks in standards and the importance of collaboration and technology in instituting standards. It looks at how standards can enhance professional growth by providing a body of professional knowledge that unifies teachers and enhances the sharing with colleagues of ideas and concerns. It discusses what standards mean for students, the role of the individual teacher and the standards teams in preplanning, and how planning practices are developed over time and are influenced by school policies and by what happens in the classroom on a daily basis. The guide emphasizes that… [PDF]
(1999). The Dialogic Instructor: Co-Teaching across the Disciplines. This paper explains that an interdepartmental writing across the curriculum course at Syracuse University was developed and proposed by a writing teacher and a professor of experimental psychology and psychopharmacology. The paper states that the course, Perspectives on Drug Experience, was to be offered in both writing and psychology and sought to involve students in discussion, argument, and discovery, incorporating writing as a vehicle for exploration, intellectual development, and the sharing of knowledge. It lays out the course in four units: (1) Reading, Discussing, Responding; (2) The Science of Drug Action; (3) Drug Users; and (4) Policy Debates. The paper relates that the course featured as its centerpiece dialogue over texts, problems, and issues and that an open discussion format took the participants through territory that a content course using writing-to-learn is unlikely to tread. It presents a discussion of some of the factors built into this environment, which seem… [PDF]
(2005). The CTY Summer School Model: Evolvement, Adaptation and Extrapolation at the National Academy for Gifted and Talented Youth (England). High Ability Studies, v16 n1 p137-153 Jun. This article compares the summer schools run by the National Academy for Gifted and Talented Youth (NAGTY) in England with those in the USA, run by the Centre for Talented Youth (CTY). When the NAGTY summer schools started they were based on the CTY model, but the programme has evolved over the last 3 years of operation. The article looks at basic design, the courses, students, summer school sites and issues of pedagogy. There is also an extensive section sharing evaluation data about the NAGTY programme in 2004. The overwhelming view expressed in the article is of two highly successful programmes, highly thought of by students and evaluators. As students who attended both have commented, the summer schools have similarities and differences, but are of high quality. Their experiences at the summer schools are life changing for the students. They emerge from the experience much more self-directed and with greater aspirations and expectations. NAGTY and CTY have some interesting plans… [Direct]
(1993). The Impact of a Parent Involvement Program Designed To Support a First Grade Reading Intervention Program. A study examined the impact of a parent involvement program for parents of children involved in a first-grade reading intervention program in Bakersville, a middle-class suburb north of Chicago, Illinois. Parents attended three workshops designed to complement their children's one-on-one tutorial program. Analysis focused on case studies of three families and the issues addressed concerned: how well parents learned the strategies presented at the workshops, and did they use these in a responsive manner; how parents' beliefs about their children's progress and their own ability to support their children's reading changed over time; and how home literacy resources and literacy-related events changed over time. Data were coded and displayed in graphs and tables. Findings showed that while all parents learned the strategies presented at the workshops, some had more success with the techniques than others. Parents whose initial theories more closely matched those presented at the… [PDF]
(1997). Community Texts: Bakhtin in the Writing Center. In "Discourse in the Novel," M. Bakhtin notes that writing and speaking are both fundamentally social acts–every utterance "exists in other people's mouths, in other people's contexts, serving other people's intentions" until the writer/speaker is able to appropriate it as her own. As an institution, the writing center enacts the Bakhtinian notion of dialogue through its individualized approach to writing instruction. Yet it simultaneously resists a social view of writing in its constant concern over upholding a student's absolute ownership of his/her text. Even more so than writing instructors, writing tutors have been faced with the ethical problem of negotiating the boundaries between "legitimate collaboration" with a student and "unfair influence" over that student's text. Erring on the side of caution, tutors have typically adopted a "hands off" approach to tutoring by refusing to provide content information that did not…
(1995). You Make Me Alive! Developing Understanding through Play. AECA Resource Book Series, Volume 2, Number 3. AECA Resource Book Series, v2 n3 Sep. This issue of the ACEA resource series focuses on the role of sociodramatic play in early childhood development, giving recommendations and examples for developing children's social understanding through play. Sections include the following: (1) "Developing Understanding through Play," which introduces the concepts; (2) "Complex Sociodramatic Play," discussing how sociodramatic play can involve both pretending and sharing pretense; (3) "Why Is Complex Play Important?"; (4) "Different Perspectives," focusing on how children realize that others have different views and interpretations; (5) "Negotiation," showing how children negotiate different perspectives within sociodramatic play; (6) "Shared Focus," asserting that children draw upon a shared focus and communication during complex play; (7) "Some Strategies for Supporting Complex Play"; (8) "Providing Shared Experiences"; (9) "Adult Involvement in…