Progressive education, open education, and whole language can be seen as part of a larger "progressive tradition" in American education. All three of these educational movements are "child centered," challenge the rigidity of traditional school organizations, view the nature of knowledge and the purpose of schools differently…

The open school concept used as an alternative to more traditional forms of schooling in selected elementary and secondary schools in Austin, Texas, includes seven major dimensions: individualized instruction, continuous progress of students, team teaching, multiage and multigrade grouping, differentiated staffing, open space classrooms and…

The Individualized Classroom Environment Questionnaire (ICEQ) is designed to measure student or teacher perceptions of actual and preferred classroom learning environment along dimensions which differentiate individualized classrooms from conventional ones. These dimensions are Personalization, Participation, Independence, Investigation, and…

This paper describes two modes of educational decision-making: Mode I, in which the instructor makes such decisions as what to teach, to whom, when, in what order, at what pace, and at what complexity level; and Mode II, in which the learner makes the decisions. While Mode I comprises most of what is regarded as formal education, the learner in…

A National Institute of Education-sponsoring project investigated how evaluations of nontraditional programs could be performed to maximize the utility of evaluation findings. This led to a conceptual model of the evaluation process which included the following elements: (1) identification of information needs; (2) design, collection, and analysis…

Described by the teacher is the removal of a 10-year-old hyperactive boy from drug therapy (Ritalin). The setting, open classroom, and the involvement of four regular classroom teachers and a progressive teacher employing behavior modification in a small group setting are thought to be related to the boy's academic and behavioral progress. The boy…

Four principles of language arts teaching in the open school are, first, "school" becomes "workshop," where emphasis is on giving students opportunities for self-discovery, self-discipline, and self-control. Second, "teachers" become "learning facilitators," so that instead of thinking about what he wants to teach, the teacher focuses on the…

The jagged study zone model helps designers to create educational environments which challenge the learner and make the learner to commit to the learning process. The characteristics of a jagged study zone can be explained by showing how its features are related to traditional closed and open learning environments. The requirements for a jagged…

The role of textbook publishing in educational reform is examined in this paper. The study evaluated a 4-year project in which three schools in the Netherlands implemented an open learning program (OLP) and created their own publishing company. Following the introduction, the second part provides a description of the OLP. The third part explains…

The concept of open or progressive education has come to mean that to learn one needs no discipline, no systematic organization, no planning. However, there is a middle, or at least another ground, between the ends of laissez faire and authoritarianism. It has to do with the structure of process. For example, the Key Vocabulary of Sylvia…

This paper is a discussion of The Churchill School, founded in 1972 as an alternative approach to serving the educational needs of children diagnosed as hyperactive, hyperkinetic, brain damaged, neurologically impaired, or suffering from minimal brain dysfunction. The school has a student body of 65, ranging between 6 and 13 years of age. The…

The dynamics of today's society are causing substantial changes in traditional education norms and forms. The total learning opportunities, regardless of where they occur, should be promoted by the accrediting institutions. We must make sure that our requirements for quality performance, and our accreditation and other standard measures, encompass…

Optional alternative public schools have been developed as an expression of the democratic ideal of individual choice. Alternative systems offer the opportunity for individuated instruction, contact with the "real world" community, and community control of educational decision-making. However, reforms in the last few decades have encouraged…

A study was made of the market need for cable television-based higher education from an off-campus and non-traditional point of view. State University of Nebraska (SUN) is such an endeavor. Reduced to its essence, SUN is three things: (1) an extensive investigation into non-traditional education; (2) a new exportable model for systematized design…

Parental reaction to open education in North Dakota was studied. The hypotheses predicted that there would be less parental acceptance of and support for the open classroom according to: the greater the classroom openness; the less the parents' cosmopoliteness, the smaller the town population, the older the parents, the lower the informational…