Initiatives for outdoor education have gained popularity because of their capacity to boost teacher well-being, foster better mental health in instructors, and enrich the learning environment for students. We demonstrate the influence that outside education programs have on the achievement of students and how they create a vivid tapestry of…

Sixth graders and undergraduates were tested in two experiments to investigate the salience imbalance hypothesis, one aspect of the similarity theory of metaphorical processing data indicate that salience imbalance generally enhances metaphorical interpretation but is not a necessity. (Author/BS)

Reports on a study which interviewed children (fourth, fifth, and sixth graders) on the following issues: who should play child protagonists in children's theatre (adults or children); which actor in a particular production was most believable and realistic; and casting advice for directors of children's theatre. (SR)

In two experiments, fourth, fifth, and sixth-graders and an adult set chose titles and wrote summary sentences for expository paragraphs. All groups were better at detecting sentences that conformed neither to the paragraphs general nor specific topic than sentences conforming only to the general. (CE)

Outlines the essential conditions of cooperative learning. Describes six cooperative learning structures modeled in a reading methods class that can be used to create literacy activities appropriate in fourth through sixth grade. (SR)

The Test of Understanding of College Economics, the Test of Economic Literacy for senior high students, and the Basic Economics Test for students in grades 4-6 provide reasonably good measures of economic understanding. The tests' technical features--reliability, validity, norms, and item statistics--are critiqued. (RM)

Shares a memory enhancer that has stood the test of time and has supported students in their pursuit of meaningful textbook reading, from upper elementary grades through college classrooms: THIEVES (Title, Headings, Introduction, Every first sentence in a paragraph, Visuals and vocabulary, End of chapter questions, and Summary). Notes the…

Proposes a formula for helping students learn to write paragraphs by requiring highly disciplined and limited material and sentences until students have acquired skills that permit more variety. (TJ)

Examines the accuracy and changes that writers make when rereading their self-generated texts in a clozed condition. Finds that by sixth grade, learners are able to perform cloze tasks with accuracy similar to that of college undergraduates. Suggests that students have difficulty with revising their written work because they remember their writing…

Reports findings of one study that reanalyzed research data allegedly demonstrating a substantial relationship between social cognitive ability and narrative writing skill, and another that collected original data. Reveals no relationship between social cognitive ability and rated quality of narrative essays. Discusses finding in terms of a…

A perceptual-recognition task was used to assess whether utilization of orthographic structure in letter recognition varies with reading ability. Good and poor college readers showed equally large effects of orthographic structure on task accuracy, whereas poor sixth-grade readers did not. (Author/GK)

Suggests that claims of sex differences in interruption behavior should not be uncritically accepted. Examines frequency of interruption in fourth-grade, ninth-grade, and college students. Finds that males did not interrupt females any more than females interrupted males. (RS)

Describes a project in which preservice teachers and sixth grade students exchanged correspondence. Notes that the preservice teachers learned important things about the writing of sixth graders. Finds that the students' abilities in letter writing developed without direct instruction. (RS)

Examines "Theater-in-Education," (TIE) a unique British-inspired teaching-and-learning methodology which combines young people's theater with creative drama, currently taught at a handful of universities in the United States. Finds that, as a result of the program's tour to 10 fifth-grade classrooms in five schools, area teachers were unanimous in…

The responsibility for helping students attain competence in music-reading skills must fall on choral directors and choral music teachers from middle schools on up. Teachers must teach rhythmic and tonal vocabularies and pitch accuracies. Methods are described. (RM)