The educational objective of this user's guide is to provide parents, teachers, and administrators with a resource to catalyze a wide range of partnerships and projects. Schools work best when everyone is actively involved so as to demonstrate democracy first hand. This program is designed to promote the democratic process of active citizenship in…

Discusses the history of U.S. community service programs and asserts that the potential benefits for students include increased self-esteem, enhanced motivation and interest in school, improved academic achievement, and increased social responsibility. Includes a list of six curriculum resources and a bibliography. (CFR)

This booklet, designed to accompany a videotape, gives teachers and students advice on how to participate in their community and productively build upon it. Teachers who are affiliated with the REACH (Rural Education Alliance for Collaborative Humanities) advise other teachers to design their own program based on the specific community's needs.…

Reports on an experimental program in which preservice education students worked as Junior Achievement consultants in elementary schools. Discusses successful results and aspects of the project that could be improved. Concludes that the program could be replicated successfully in teacher education programs throughout the country. (CFR)

Since 1979, a coalition of lawyers and educators in Sacramento, California has put on a one-day law-related education (LRE) conference in the local courthouse that draws hundreds of students from area high schools. The conference includes mock trial and moot court competitions, panels, debates, and simulations. This handbook was developed by the…

The efforts to reform the U.S. educational system should focus on the goal of creating a Learning Society. A Learning Society is based upon the commitment to a set of values and to a system of education that affords all members of the community the opportunity to stretch their minds to full capacity from early childhood through adulthood. This…

Offers information useful to educators interested in implementing community-service programs. Provides estimates of students' participation in community service in U. S. high schools; describes the nature of the programs and students' experiences; and reports data which illustrate that the potential for influencing civic responsibility may not yet…

This document is an assessment of the effectiveness of the Policy/School Liaison Program (PSLP), which began in 1982. PSLP offered 11th and 12th graders a one-semester, law-related education course. The 1985-86 PSLP was designed to expand the program and to develop materials necessary to expedite program institutionalization. A curriculum manual…

Contends that barriers to effective education can be overcome by using the community as a living laboratory for social studies learning. Discusses out-of-school learning opportunities that meet four criteria: (1) goal relevance; (2) appropriate level of difficulty; (3) feasibility; and (4) cost effectiveness. (CFR)

Results of the Black Metropolis Model (BMM) of service learning are analyzed and illustrated in this article to explain how to "put the learning in service learning." There are many soup kitchens or nontransforming models of service learning where students are asked to serve needy populations but internalize and learn little about the…

Describes the community participation facet of the eleventh-grade social studies curriculum for British Columbia. Proposes a four-stage model to identify, study, and propose recommendations about a community issue or problem. Suggests that social action based on empirical research improves social studies instruction. (CFR)

Realizing that the society in which today's young people are taking their place is complex and characterized by both continuity and change, this paper voices the need for improving social studies education. Social studies programs should focus on the learning which young people need for participation in society and which public welfare requires.…

This document presents a case study of the reinstatement of Advanced Placement European History at Brookline High School (Massachusetts). The paper explores the parents' role in reviving the course and indicates that proponents of the course were rebuffed despite a petition campaign in support of the course. Course backers formed the…

Social studies educators can use this long form of the Curriculum Materials Analysis System to analyze curriculum ideas and materials in breadth and depth. The form was revised using feedback from educators in workshops and conferences. Eight major sections deal with product characteristics; rationale and objectives; content; theory and…

This shortened version of the Curriculum Materials Analysis System (CMAS) was designed to serve as a helpful tool for social studies educators involved in the selection of materials for classroom use. It can be used by participants in short workshops of a few hours to a day in length and by the busy administrator or teacher who does not have time…