This report summarizes preliminary and exploratory research conducted by the Council of the Great City Schools and the American Institutes for Research on urban school systems participating in the Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA) of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). The study is one of the first large-scale analyses…

The Nation's Report Card[TM], the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), is a nationally representative and continuing assessment of what America's students know and can do in various subject areas. NAEP is a sample-based survey assessment that provides periodic reports on student academic performance at the national and state levels.…

The Nation's Report Card [TM], the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), is a nationally representative and continuing assessment of what America's students know and can do in various subject areas. For over three decades, assessments have been conducted periodically in reading, mathematics, science, writing, history, geography, and…

This article presents an interview with Jeremy Koester, an eighth grade math teacher and football coach at Alamo Heights Junior School in San Antonio, Texas. In this interview, Koester describes his use of technology in his classes and describes his dream of advancing Second Life (SL) as a distance education environment. SL is a "3-D virtual…

THE AIM IS TO STIMULATE INTEREST IN CONVERSATION FOR STUDENTS WITH A PREVIOUS BACKGROUND IN THE LANGUAGE. THE COURSE OF STUDY IS DIVIDED INTO FOUR BROAD UNITS - REVIEW OF PREVIOUS WORK (GRADES 1-6), HISTORICAL AND CULTURAL BACKGROUND MATERIAL, A BRIEF HISTORY OF TEXAS IN SPANISH, AND FOLK TALES AND LEGENDS. ALTHOUGH GRAMMAR IS TAUGHT INCIDENTALLY,…

Between 1994 and 2003, employment in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields grew by a remarkable 23 percent, compared with 17 percent in non-STEM fields, according to federal data. The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts continued strong growth in STEM job openings through 2014, with emphasis on life sciences, environmental…

This report from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) presents results from the Trial Urban District Assessment (TUDA) in mathematics. Representative samples of between 1,800 and 4,300 fourth- and eighth-grade public school students from 18 urban districts participated in the 2009 assessment. Eleven of the districts also…

CURRICULUM GUIDES FOR GRADE 7 "LIFE SCIENCE" AND GRADE 8 "EARTH SCIENCE" WERE DEVELOPED BY 24 AREA TEACHERS AND THREE SAM HOUSTON STATE COLLEGE PROFESSORS. THE PROJECT WAS SUPPORTED BY THE TEXAS SMALL SCHOOL ASSOCIATION, THE LOCAL SCHOOLS, AND FUNDS FROM THE TITLE III PROGRAM. THE TEACHER GUIDES WERE PREPARED TO IMPROVE THE…

Five eighth grade science classes of students in at a middle school were assigned to three treatment groups: those who individually concept mapped, those who collaboratively concept mapped, and those who independently used their study time. The findings revealed that individually generating concept maps on computers during study time positively…

The first U.S. charter school opened in 1992, and the scale of the charter movement has since grown to 4,000 schools and more than a million students in 40 states plus the District of Columbia. With this growth has also come a contentious debate about the effects of the schools on their own students and on students in nearby traditional public…

According to a former junior high school teacher, eighth graders--inquisitive and opinionated--are not too young to grasp the impact of the Holocaust. This teacher went beyond "The Diary of Anne Frank" to push deeply into topics of genocide, racism, prejudice, and persecution. Students approached this discussion by considering examples…

SREB states were among the first in the nation to set comprehensive state academic standards for K-12 schools. Setting these initial standards was only part of the job. Getting these standards right and keeping them right may be the most important task facing public education today. If state standards are too low, many public school graduates will…

This article discusses a project that placed over 97% of Mars' topography made available from NASA into an interactive 3D multi-user online learning environment beginning in 2003. In 2005 curriculum materials that were created to support middle school math and science education were developed. Research conducted at the University of North Texas…

With the growing federal, state, and local policy emphasis on teacher quality and student achievement, the Southwest Educational Development Laboratory (SEDL) investigated teacher resources and their relationship to student achievement in Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas. The purpose of this study was to provide policymakers with information about…

Brains Rule! Neuroscience Expositions, funded through a National Institute on Drug Abuse Science Education Drug Abuse Partnership Award, has developed a successful model for informal neuroscience education. Each Exposition is a "reverse science fair" in which neuroscientists present short neuroscience teaching modules to students. This…