Attempting to account for criticisms of earlier studies, a study investigated whether behavioral objectives improved student learning. Subjects, 43 undergraduate students enrolled in a business and professional communication course at a large mid-western university, were randomly divided into two groups. One group stayed in class and received…

This paper reports on research that examined longitudinal data on students entering Tennessee Board of Regents institutions of higher education after the implementation of a state-mandated developmental studies program. The program identifies and helps at-risk students to persist in college to graduation. Data analysis is presented from a 1986…

In the social learning perspective the anticipation of rewarding consequences serves as one source of motivation. A second results from the perception of a negative discrepancy between present capabilities and desired performance. To foster motlvation it is necessary that persons accurately appraise their capabilities. Techniques for fostering…

The Victorian school accountability framework is designed specifically for Victorian public schooling in the 1990s. These schools have three chief characteristics: (1) a high level of school autonomy in operational decisions about research allocation, human-resource management, and staff selection; (2) a common framework for curriculum and…

Reports on a longitudinal study of high school instrumentalists that examined the development of four distinct types of musical performance (playing by ear, playing from memory, sight reading, and improvising) over three years. Reveals a significant improvement in these skills while also demonstrating changes in aural and creative activities. (CMK)

Earlier practices in the teaching of literature offered one standard of success and one method of lesson delivery for everyone. This did not make it possible for students to reach their individual potentials. The resulting idea of attending to the individual formed the basis for ability grouping. However, placement into lower groups resulted in…

The West Virginia University Cooperative Extension Service developed a 4-H curriculum designed to provide targeted potential school dropouts with opportunities to develop specific skills. These included decisionmaking, parliamentary procedure, group processes, public speaking, leadership, and life skills. In addition, participants would have…

To provide a Louisiana State reading improvement program with information that could improve instructional efficiency, a study was conducted to determine the relationship between student time on task and eight broad categories of classroom activities used by teachers during reading and language arts instruction. The eight activities studied were…

A study examined whether student performance in some of the basic skills of editorial design would improve with practice. Subjects, 67 college juniors enrolled in an introductory course in graphic communication, were divided into four groups: male, female, students with ACT scores in mathematics of 14 or below, and students with ACT scores in…

In an effort to determine if achievement gains of low-achieving Chapter 1 students could be bettered, the Austin Independent School District implemented Chapter 1 Schoolwide Projects (SWP) in two schools to reduce class size to 15 pupils per teacher. SWP teachers functioned as regular classroom teachers with students of mixed achievement. Chapter…

This document describes women college students' perceptions of their experiences as student assistants (SAs) in a writing/reading/study skills center. To examine changes in the student assistants' perceptions of their growth, investigators compared two samples of their writing: reflective essays written before the SAs attended orientation or…

The "value-added" conception of excellence in education, unlike any traditional view, focuses on the ability of a school or college to affect its students favorably and equitably. It focuses on changes in the student from the beginning to the end of the educational program. The "value-added" approach would involve the testing…

Teachers in all disciplines must demand good writing from students if they want their writing to improve. When good writing is demanded only in English classes, students develop a double standard for their writing. To make teachers in other departments aware of their responsibility for the quality of student writing, English teachers can take the…

After research between 1960 and 1977 relating to college reading program effectiveness was identified, a statistical procedure called Meta-Analysis was used to integrate findings and determine any composite benefit of instruction. Of 676 references on the initial list, 66 studies were identified as having quantifiable data within the limits of the…

The case study described in this paper supports the premise that sentence combining exercises do more to improve student writing than simply producing longer sentences. Following a brief description of a longitudinal study that involved college freshmen in 15 weeks of sentence combining exercises, the paper focuses on the changing characteristics…