A decade ago, M.C. Wang, G.D. Haertel, and H.J. Walberg asked the question, "What helps children learn?" To find the answer to that question, they analyzed the contents of 170 books, compiled 91 research syntheses, and surveyed 61 educational researchers. In order to summarize their findings in a way that would be helpful to educators, they developed a 28-category framework of variables that might have an influence on learning and grouped them into six general "types of influence" on learning. What they found highlights the importance of good teaching. Of these types of influence, classroom instruction and climate had almost as much impact on learning as students' aptitude. In fact, one of the teacher-related factors-classroom management-had the most impact of all of the 28 variables. With the massive amount of research conducted in education, a meta-analysis like this, which analyzes and summarizes existing research, can be especially valuable to busy educators. While the definition of "scientifically based" research which was provided in the "No Child Left Behind" Act would exclude much of the present research, it would be shortsighted to ignore what this research says about effective teaching. In this article, work from three major research projects are briefly summarized.