Teachers at a laboratory middle school in Evanston, Illinois, reconceptualized and revitalized an ailing student council according to some meaningful goals: empowering and involving all students, creating an atmosphere for cooperative action, and offering opportunities for service. There are three main arms to this action council (service,…

Describes an eighth-grade teacher's decision to heed innervoices and make time for poetry in her classroom. The class began by reading fun-filled, picture-book poetry; enlisted the help of school and town librarians in finding compelling single-author works and anthologies; and finally wrote "recipe poems" together. (Contains 27…

Discusses collaboration between a teacher and an education professor in developing and implementing a new reading/language-arts program in a fifth-grade classroom. The move from a traditional basal reading and language-arts textbook approach to one using novels and process writing meant many changes for both teacher and students. An Author's…

This is a case study of two sixth-grade teachers from Illinois who participated in a semester-long inservice to learn about Chickscope, a supercomputing application that allows students and teachers remote access to magnetic resonance images of chicken embryos. Shows how they produced an inquiry-based unit on chicken weight and measurement.…

A survey of representative schools in Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, and Illinois showed that most small and rural schools house middle-level students in buildings primarily designed for elementary or high school students. Middle level students often receive an inappropriate educational program that is not taught by teachers trained to understand and…

Eureka (Illinois) Middle School has found some user-friendly ways to clarify communication and keep learning personal and accessible. Despite resource deficits, options and output have increased by actively using the school's philosophy: shared ownership for student success. Various community-building programs for students, faculty, and parents…

Explores sources of drugs and weapons for a group of pre-adolescents living in disadvantaged neighborhoods in Chicago using a focus group and a self-administered survey. At least one-third of the sample of fifth-grade students responded that it was easy for people their age to obtain each of the products. Neighborhood sources were the most likely…

Suburban Chicago middle school teachers designed a month-long unit to foster global education, guided by research on integrated, self-selected, and collaborative learning strategies. Teachers initiated brainstorming activities, grouped students by interest, and demonstrated how to be investigative researchers, informative writers, effective…

This paper examines levels of participation in and correlates of AIDS-related risk behavior for adolescents in high risk communities. Seventh through ninth graders completed surveys regarding attitudes, behaviors, and resistance skills related to sexual intercourse and substance use. Grade, race, and sexual activity correlated with drug use.…

Asserts that, although middle school students have rudimentary map skills, they typically dismiss old maps as worthless. Describes the use of outdated and inaccurate maps as instructional resources in social studies courses. Concludes that the approach was valuable and helped students learn about the concept of change over time. (CFR)