The Elementary School Proficiency Assessment (ESPA) is the state test taken by students in the fourth and fifth grade. It is designed to give a school information about how well the students are achieving in the areas required by New Jersey's Core Curriculum Content Standards. For 2001, a new subject Social Studies has been added to the ESPA. The…

The purpose of this study was to determine whether or not periodicals would be useful in motivating low performing sixth grade readers. Two groups of remedial reading students from a New Jersey suburb were studied over a four month period. The control group was taught reading skills using conventional materials such as novels and short stories.…

A study determined if regular listening to oral reading by the teacher affected fourth-grade students' level of comprehension. Subjects were 47 students from an elementary school in central New Jersey. Twenty-five students were read to for 30 minutes daily for 8 weeks in addition to their regular classroom reading instruction. The remaining 22…

This guide to developing "Activity Days" for gifted children is a product of a New Jersey consortium of eight school districts in Burlington County, New Jersey. Briefly considered are the consortium's philosophy and program rationale. Goals and objectives of the gifted program are specified. The origins of the Activity Day program…

A study determined how exposure to learning writing as process through writing workshops would affect the attitudes of fifth grade students. Subjects had no experience with writing as process. At the outset of the school year, the participants, 23 fifth-grade students in a northeastern New Jersey school, were administered the "Emig-King…

The program description and curriculum for Art Partners, a Cranford, New Jersey, after-school program to meet the needs of artistically talented children in grades 3-6, are provided. The program description includes information on: a suggested sequence of activities for 38 sessions, program organization, the artist-in-residence component, area art…

A study determined if exposing middle school students to stories and poems that show what virtues look like, how they are practiced, how to recognize them, and how they work, would have a significant effect on the degree of assimilation of these virtues expressed by the students. Sixth-grade students (n=23) attending a suburban middle school in…