The Trial of Activity for Adolescent Girls (TAAG) combines social ecological and social marketing approaches to promote girls' participation in physical activity programs implemented at 18 middle schools throughout the United States. Key to the TAAG approach is targeting materials to a variety of audience segments. TAAG segments are individuals…

Investigating variables associated with the school success and educational resilience of urban youth of color should be a high priority because of the persistent achievement gap in the United States. The current study examined individual and peer factors' relation to the school engagement of 132 seventh- and eighth-grade students from a diverse…

This research compared the effects over time of parents' control and autonomy support on children's functioning in the United States and China. American and Chinese (N = 806) seventh graders (mean age = 12.73 years) participated in a 6-month longitudinal study. Children reported on their parents' psychological control, psychological autonomy…

Examines seventh and eighth grade students in Australia, Japan, and the United States for attitudes related to mathematics, and the relationship these attitudes have to students' development of abstract mathematical thought and spatial relations. Study uses the Iowa Algebra Aptitude Test, Differential Aptitude Test-Spatial Relations, and the…

Comparison of 272 U.S. and 219 Korean seventh graders showed that those who had homework preferences often were not able to do their homework the preferred way. Students in the two countries had substantially different homework preferences and styles, many reflecting different cultural behavior norms. (SK)

To examine how conceptual knowledge about fraction magnitudes changes as students' learning progresses, 5th and 7th-grade students were asked to solve fraction magnitude problems that entailed finding a fraction between two given fractions and then to evaluate solutions for similar problems that were modeled for them. When the given fractions…

GRADES OR AGES: Grades 4-7. SUBJECT MATTER: Social studies; regions. ORGANIZATION AND PHYSICAL APPEARANCE: The guide is divided into 13 chapters, most of which are in list form. It is mimeographed and staple-bound with a paper cover. OBJECTIVES AND ACTIVITIES: No specific activities are mentioned. The guide is intended as an overview of the…

The use of instructional television (ITV) as part of an educational reform in grades 7, 8 and 9 El Salvador had a positive effect upon learning. This was achieved despite inequities in cognitive skills related to student background factors and inequities in resource distribution. In selected schools, 75% of the variance in cognitive skills in…

A study investigated students' reactions to the addition of nontraditional games (played in and traditional to another country) to the physical education curriculum. Seventh grade students in Australia were introduced to game development, skills, and present status of two sports, 'Midget' Hockey, a modified version of Canadian ice hockey, and…

In spring 2005, the Educational Policy Institute was contracted by an anonymous, non-profit, Missouri-based organization to conduct analysis of data from a series of focus groups of 7th, 9th, and 11th grade students. The purpose of the focus groups, conducted by the Change and Innovation Agency in Jefferson City, was to examine the postsecondary…

This study examined Chinese students' self-presentation bias and continuing motivation for difficult and easy tasks. Students read scenarios about characters who performed tasks, then answered questions about whether the characters and they themselves would do another similar task. Results revealed self-presentation bias among Chinese students…

This brief report compares the lessons on addition and subtraction of signed whole numbers in three seventh-grade Japanese mathematics texts and four U.S. mathematics texts. Japanese books contained many more worked-out examples and relevant illustrations, while U.S. books had more irrelevant illustrations and unsolved problems. (SLD)

To investigate factors influencing gifted early adolescent girls' career orientation and career aspirations in both the USA and Germany, the associations between giftedness, agentic characteristics, gender role attitudes, maternal characteristics, and the mother-daughter relationship were examined in 63 young adolescent girls. Additionally, two…

These guidelines and activities in economic education represent one part of a series developed through the combined efforts of hundreds of teachers from twenty-three school districts in the State of Washington and one in Montana over a period of three years. The paramount purpose of the guides is to help implement a program of integrating…

This article describes a protocol that was effective in collecting media-use pattern and sensitive health data from young adolescents. Students from three public school districts in the southeastern United States were recruited to participate in a study of the impact of the media on adolescents' sexual health. Using a 34-page mailed survey,…