The California Association of School Psychologists (CASP) responds to a critique of the Association's Position Paper: "Specific Learning Disabilities and Patterns of Strengths and Weaknesses" (2014, March. Available: http://casponline.org/about-casp/publications/) by McGill and Busse. The CASP offers corrections to McGill and Busse's…

Disciplinary literacy encompasses not only the ability to read the texts of a discipline, but also to engage in the practices and discourse of that discipline. At the center of the discipline of history is inquiry. For these students to move from their ninth grade expectations about history toward the authentic discipline of history, they would…

The authors believe teaching for understanding begins with the development of a few essential orientations. Teachers must have an appreciation for student centered mathematics teaching, valuing an approach that builds on student thinking. In addition, teachers must appreciate the complexity of students' mathematical thinking and ideas. Once these…

We describe some of Merl's more subtle contributions that extended beyond his own prodigious scholarly record, his high-quality teaching, and his mentoring of students. The context of our remarks on Programmatic R&D focuses on his contribution to the University of California, Los Angeles, Department of Education. Merl was the first director of…

Quynh (pseudonym), a Vietnamese-American female, was an honor student in her K-12 education in Vietnam four decades ago. April 30, 1975, abruptly signaled the fall of Saigon and the end of the Vietnam War. Many military personnel from the former regime found themselves and their loved ones in danger of being persecuted by the victorious new…

Using a student's native language, either as a medium of instruction or as a scaffolding technique, has been used effectively in many classrooms throughout the U.S. In the past, many schools provided native language instruction to meet the needs of English Language Learners (ELLs). However, with the advent of antibilingual education proposals such…

Members of a site of the California Writing Project conducted the study in this article in partnership with a large, urban, low-SES school district where 93% of the students speak English as a second language and 69% are designated Limited English Proficient. Over an eight-year period, a relatively stable group of 55 secondary teachers engaged in…

This article intends to inform physical education teachers about the current research describing the relationship between physical education performance outcomes as identified by the national physical education standards (i.e., regular participation in physical activity, physical fitness, motor competence; National Association of Physical…

Discusses the recent rise in interest in the teaching of thinking skills. Presents brief outlines of eight school districts' successful thinking skills programs. All these programs were developed through careful attention to time and training and with an understanding that success is based on a long-term plan of action. (MD)