Background/Context: A review of the literature demonstrates that grade retention often fails to improve the academic and socioemotional outcomes of retained students. Although little empirical work on peer tutoring has focused specifically on retained students, the literature suggests that those students who act as peer tutors often experience…

Background/Context: Metacognition has been a subject of study for cognitive theorists, behaviorists, educators, and others. The term metacognition has traditionally and simply been defined as "thinking about thinking," yet it describes a complex process that can result in a nuanced understanding of oneself as a thinker and a learner. Metacognition…

Action research is a process that classroom teachers undertake to reflect upon and improve their own teaching. This study followed an elementary teacher's two-year experience with an action research project in which her middle school students played mathematical-related games. Through the teacher's involvement in this project, her core beliefs…

The purpose of the study was to examine if there was a significant difference between first-grade English Learners (EL) who constitute a majority (greater than 50%) of the English language mainstream classroom (homogeneous grouping) and first-grade EL who constitute a minority (less than 50%) of the English language mainstream classrooms…

In recent years teachers within the classroom have experienced an increase in the off-task behaviors of students. The purpose of this action research project was to increase on-task behavior through development of classroom social skills. The causes may be a lack of social skills, outside influences, presentation of materials, students not…

This paper examines how a game-like 3D Multi-User Virtual Environment (MUVE), Quest Atlantis (QA), is used in an after-school programme to engage a group of 14 academically at-risk primary students in their learning. It adopts an activity theoretical perspective to identify the disturbances and contradictions during the implementation of the…

During the past decade, researchers in special education have begun to investigate the unique and complex challenges encountered by novice special educators. These investigations have documented numerous factors in special education settings that contribute to the stresses of the first year of teaching for them, including: role ambiguity, students…

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether and how elementary teachers' thinking and instruction changed as a result of a teacher research experience. Each teacher worked with a scientist conducting research for a period of six weeks. Data in the form of classroom observations and interviews was collected before and after the research…

In this article, the author compares the potential academic and attitudinal gains of a gifted and talented population using different instructional methods. It has been found that instruction for identified high-achieving students must be different than that of general education students. Gifted and talented students cannot maximize learning…

In Eleanor Duckworth's class "T-440: Teaching and Learning" at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, students sometimes wonder how Duckworth's model of teaching and learning works in elementary classroom settings. In this article the author, a graduate of "T-440" and a 6th grade teacher at the Smith College Laboratory School, chronicles her…

The use of manipulatives in the classroom has been advocated for decades. However, the theoretical and empirical support for this practice is mixed. Some researchers suggest that manipulatives facilitate learning by (a) providing an additional channel for conveying information, (b) activating real-world knowledge, and/or (c) improving memory…

SEDL is providing analytic and technical support to three large-scale randomized controlled trials assessing the efficacy of promising literacy curriculum in afterschool settings on student academic achievement. In the field of educational research, competition among research organizations and researchers can often impede collaborative efforts in…

This article focuses on a collaborative project between two fifth-grade dual language teachers (English-Spanish) and a university researcher as they engaged children in a study of memoir. The bilingual children in these classes cultivated their genre knowledge by participating in the ways of writers of memoir through the careful adaptations the…

In this article an educational action research study, based on a phenomenographic approach, is reported in which unexpected results have been possible to gather thanks to the inductive design of the study. The aim is to describe the ways in which contrasts of critical aspects of a learning object affect the students' generative learning found by…

Numerous scholars have promoted "practitioner research" or "teacher-research" as a way of facilitating professional development for pre-service and in-service teachers, promoting change and reform in K-12 settings, and giving voice to teachers" personal and professional knowledge. In this article, the authors consider what…