This paper presents 10 units in an introductory oral communication course which utilize instructional techniques necessary for student success in attaining 15 course objectives. Each unit consists of a goal statement and sections on objectives, content description, enabling activities, and instructional resources. The time frame for instruction…

A study of college students was conducted to identify academic skill areas in which students were deficient. Dormitory residents were surveyed by questionnaire in the fall post-midterm (N=300), fall pre-final (N=210), winter (N=261), and spring (N=128). The questionnaire measured factors of distractability, concentration, self-concept, difficulty…

A study was conducted to determine if changes in a student's writing and speaking skills over the period of a semester could be measured reliably and to measure what changes, if any, occur in these skills over this period. A pretest-posttest design employing the speech and writing portions of ACT's College Outcome Measures Project was used to…

Contending that previous investigations into the efficacy of underlining as a study technique have yielded mixed results due to the specific experimental methodologies employed, a study addressed the issue by manipulating both the reading comprehension skills of students and the kind of information given to them about underlining. Specifically,…

In this study, two experiments indicate that modification of the method of scoring in the EQUATIONS game enhances achievement in learning specific mathematical ideas. The experimental scoring method (4+ scoring) which allows learners to obtain bonus points for constructing more complex solutions was introduced into year-long instructional gaming…

This paper presents a study conducted with two goals in mind: (1) to employ an operational definition of school choice that is more faithful to orthodox choice theory than are extant definitions; and (2) with this definition, to assess possible effects of school choice on students' academic commitment and achievement. Claims for the positive…

Described in this report is a plan to improve public education in Houston, Texas. Specifically discussed are program components relevant to students; parents, business, and the community; and educational staff. Student components of the plan focus on achievement objectives, minimum competency testing, standards, proficiencies, extended educational…

The development of processes for considering student achievement data in the evaluation of teaching is discussed. As an alternative to the inappropriate and indefensible use of standardized test scores, the project on Expected Student Achievement (ESA) of the Kentucky Career Ladder Commission considered a management by objectives, or goal setting…

Recent reports have shown that black high school and college students do not fare well on standardized tests, possibly because they have not been successful when dealing with materials requiring analytical thinking in the past. Several psychologists have found that mental imagery can be used to increase motivation to achieve idealized goals.…

The purpose of this report was to examine the progress of 60 local school districts toward attaining the goals of Missouri's Career Ladder Program. The goals were identified as teacher retention, teacher responsibility, professional growth, teacher sharing, teacher collaboration, and student enhancement. The assessment documents of 58 ladder…

Controlled composition--a method closely related to sentence combining--can be beneficial for college students whose writing is characterized by frequent errors and lack of fluency. Controlled composition consists of copying short, competently written compositions exactly except for certain stipulated changes. The assignments, which progress in…

In an effort to combine instruction in study and reading strategies with the study of an academic course, an adjunct course was created by the learning skills center at a major university. The five objectives of the program were: to improve students' studying strategies, to encourage application of strategies to similar courses, to increase…

As part of the development of a university-wide writing program at the University of Michigan, a study was undertaken to judge the effectiveness of various composition courses. A pretest consisting of a writing sample was given to 3,913 entering students and evaluated. Students were then assigned to a regular composition class, to a tutorial…

Researchers examined the first in-class essays and the final exam essays of 24 freshman writing students to determine the syntactic maturity these students gained during an eight-month period. Counting the words, T-units, clauses, and sentences for each of the 48 essays created data about mean words per T-unit, clauses per T-unit, words per…

Unless questions about student performance and student retention can be answered and unless educators are proactive in finding and publicizing such information, basic writing programs cannot determine if what they are doing is working. Hard data, especially from underrepresented groups, is needed to support these programs. At Arizona State…