This report offers a number of specific teaching techniques that research suggests will help 4th- to 12th-grade students in this nation's schools. The report focuses on all students, not just those who display writing difficulties, although this latter group is deservedly the focus of much attention. The premise of this report is that all students…

Postsecondary and work success is central to the economic and social wellbeing of a country. Fundamentally, college success is measured by persistence to degree attainment. Analogously, work success refers to effective performance of a job's required tasks. To succeed in college, one must be ready for college. A student who is ready for college is…

This booklet provides a variety of checklists to assist parents with their children's learning process and needs from the time they are in preschool to high school, as they begin to consider options for college. Examples of checklists include: Know What Your Preschooler Needs; Watch for School Resources; Partner with Teachers and Counselors; and…

A growing research base on adolescent literacy supports an emphasis on direct instruction in the reading and writing skills needed to perform these more complex literacy tasks. However, many middle and high school teachers have little or no preparation for teaching these skills within their content-area disciplines and have few resources upon…

Research indicates that lower levels of school commitment may be one potential outcome of policy initiatives such as high-stakes testing and exit exams. Such outcomes may lead these policy initiatives to have unintended consequences for students, particularly racial or ethnic minority students. This study examines whether race or ethnicity…

This article presents findings from research in a school district using handhelds to support writing across the curriculum. The authors report that handheld devices can be useful to foster classroom note-taking activities, assist students who have handwriting difficulties, and provide inspiration to teachers who want to create collaborative and…

To monitor priority health-risk behaviors among youth and young adults, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) developed the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (YRBSS). The YRBSS includes national, state, territorial, and local school-based surveys of high school students in grades 9-12. In addition, some states, territories,…

The Educational Training Academy (EdTrAc) is an NSF-funded project of Normandale Community College to increase the number, diversity, and skills of students preparing to be elementary and middle school teachers with a specialty in math and science. Overall, this evaluation indicates that the EdTrAc implementation is on track after its first year…

This study examines school and work barrier beliefs about the limitations of education for future career rewards and perceived supports for attaining the educational and career aspirations of low-income, inner-city, African American, Hispanic/Latino(a), and Caribbean immigrant youth. The authors find that higher levels of school and work barrier…

One of the most important and difficult challenges facing social studies educators, particularly world history teachers, concerns the role of Islam--one of the world's fastest growing and most dynamic religions--in historical and contemporary domestic and international affairs. What teachers choose to teach about Islam and how they present it are…

Over the years, educational research has provided important insights into how children learn to read. In the last decade, it also has been influential in helping to create new programs, teaching practices, and policies that support the goal of all children reading well by the end of third grade. Yet, while most researchers would agree that early…

Behind Act of 2001 and its many facets, an area of major concern for most schools is how to make Adequate Yearly Progress. The definition for AYP has been written about in numerous articles. What very early research is indicating is that more elementary schools and middle schools are making AYP in both reading and math, than seems to be happening…

This report summarizes Austin Independent School District's (AISD's) Account for Learning evaluation report and action plan for 1999-2002.

For several decades, science teachers have used bottles for classroom projects designed to teach students about biology. Bottle projects do not have to just focus on biology, however. These projects can also be used to engage students in Earth science topics. This article describes the Earth System Science Project, which was adapted and developed…

This article describes a lesson in which students construct Bohr's planetary model of the atom. Niels Bohr's atomic model provides a framework for discussing with middle and high school students the historical development of our understanding of the structure of the atom. The model constructed in this activity will enable students to visualize the…