This study examined the potential of simulations to bolster interest in middle school social studies classrooms. Using a pre-post-design, we examined 305 middle school students (49% female) who participated in the web-based "GlobalEd" simulation. In contrast to the motivation declines middle school students usually experience, participants in this…

Bullying is a prelude to murder. Victims of bullying have resorted to extreme acts of violence in order to escape the torment that bullies have created in victims' lives. Research on empathy supports the idea that teacher empathy could ameliorate bullying in schools. This study investigated whether or not teacher empathy had an impact on…

This study explored the apprenticeship of students with high-incidence disabilities into the discipline of history through mediation of a web-based instructional environment, the Virtual History Museum (VHM). Thirteen students with high-incidence disabilities spread across two co-taught classrooms participated. They engaged in two units of…

A historical fact is like a fata morgana, "always less than what really happened." Even consensus does not establish truth; otherwise history is merely the version of the past that people agree to accept. The students who participated in the acclaimed 5th Street Cemetery Necrogeographical Study innocently found themselves clashing with…

Leadership continues to be a central focus for research in educational administration. Until recently, many studies about leadership have been based largely on the experiences of white males and interpreted based on the structural-functionalist perspective. In this paper the writer explores the phenomenon of leadership through the eyes and…

This author prided herself as being one who embraced change, and often became disgusted with her fellow teachers when they dragged their feet and resisted district initiatives. She also believed in setting goals and then managing the tasks that allows one to reach the goals. She thought it was merely a matter of purposeful planning, effort, and…

This article argues that school improvement requires the consultation of pupils to see learning from their perspective. It reports on a video-based research approach to the investigation of pupil-teacher reflections and identifies an apparent disjunction between teacher-pupil views on what constitutes learning. It describes how the use of…

Over the last four decades, research in environmental education (EE) has offered valuable theoretical insights spanning a number of pedagogical and philosophical arenas. EE literature offers expansive accounts of projects looking at a multiplicity of factors involved in bringing EE to the forefront of educational endeavour. Within all this…

The study reported here provides an example of the complex interface among historical study, current issues, and adolescents' complex social worlds. The authors investigated the ways in which a group of eighth grade students conceptualize the significance of gender in the context of a study of antebellum U.S. history. Fifty students participated…

The American School Counseling Association (ASCA) identifies scheduling students for classes as a non-counseling activity. Ideally, school counselors should limit non-counseling activities, but the reality is that counselors do in fact spend much time and energy scheduling classes, according to a recent survey of secondary counselors. We introduce…

The author offers an analysis of the failures and insights she experienced working with adolescents at a progressive school while discussing how the students understood and experienced race and identity -- their own and that of others. While she encountered students who were willing to take her into their worlds, her efforts fell flat when her…