It has been widely proposed that student voices should play a crucial role in designing and implementing curriculum and instruction that promote students' engagement in science learning. In this study we examined the voices of two seventh grade boys from a low-income urban community as they worked together in an after-school program to create a…

The Trial of Activity for Adolescent Girls (TAAG) combines social ecological and social marketing approaches to promote girls' participation in physical activity programs implemented at 18 middle schools throughout the United States. Key to the TAAG approach is targeting materials to a variety of audience segments. TAAG segments are individuals…

As a part of the teacher licensure program at the graduate level at The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (UTC), the M.Ed. Licensure candidate is required to complete an action research project during a 3-semester-hour course that coincides with the 9-semester-hour student teaching experience or with school employment. This course, Education…

This study examined teachers' uses of virtual manipulatives across grades K-8 after participating in a professional development institute in which manipulatives and technology were the major resources used throughout all of the activities. Researchers analyzed 95 lesson summaries in which classroom teachers described their uses of virtual…

In this study, we examined the associations between organized activity participation during early adolescence and adjustment in a large and economically diverse sample of African American and European American youth. The sample included 1,047 youth (51% female and 49% male and 67% African American and 33% European American). We used analysis of…

Grounded in integrated and excerpt style (Emerson, et al., 1995), this article chronicles Mr. Lehrer, an English teacher who provides his students access to standard and nonstandard writing conventions. Student writing samples and discursive practices illustrate enhanced awareness of distinctions between nonstandard language (African American…

In this study we investigated the relation of rigorous instructional practices and teachers' efforts to create a respectful, collaborative learning environment to students' positive behavior toward one another and to the rate and quality of students' participation in classroom discussions. Full class period (i.e., 50-minute) observations of…

A cross validation study was conducted using data from white, rural seventh graders to investigate the stability of the construct validity of a model of eight conditions that are purported to support adolescent academic aspirations. A factor analytic study examined GEAR-UP survey data from 4,365 students across two consecutive years. In…

This textbook aims to set forth the elements of English grammar in their relation to thought and the expression of thought. This object has been the guiding principle in the selection and arrangement of material, in the treatment of forms and constructions, and in the fashioning of the very numerous illustrative exercises. The Introduction…

This author relates how she used to hate bugs but a museum visit changed her perception about them. She realized that in her panic of shooing insects away, she failed to recognize them as living models of the elements and principles of design. It made her realize that insects can provide an opportunity to teach this important lesson to her seventh…

Writers thrive when they are motivated to work hard, have regular opportunities to practice and reflect, and benefit from a knowledgeable teacher who knows writing. Student feedback to lessons during writing workshop helped guide Nancie Atwell in her quest to provide the richest and most efficient path to better writing.

In this article, the author relates her teaching experience with seventh and eighth graders using poetry activities, and she describes how she teaches poetry by using "published" poems and by engaging the students in classroom activities. Though students in seventh grade usually have knowledge of poetic conventions, the author takes time to review…

Using data from Grades 5, 6, and 7 of the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development (PYD), the role of intentional self-regulation in the positive development of young adolescents was examined through use of the Selection, Optimization, and Compensation (SOC) measure. Consistent with Gestsdóttir and Lerner (2007), results of confirmatory factor…

One of the most challenging daily experiences of teaching young adolescents is helping them transition from Piaget's concrete to the formal operational stage of cognitive development during the middle school years. Students who have reached formal operations can design and test hypotheses, engage in deductive reasoning, use flexible thinking,…

Students experience many forms of victimization at school, yet few studies address more than one form of victimization. In this study, we explored the incidence of multiple forms of peer victimization, including direct verbal and physical, relational, and sexual harassment victimization among urban middle school students. We examined the overlap…