This case study illustrates and expands upon the principle that innovation efforts involve both role change and change in role interrelationships, changes that (ideally) will be supportive of the innovation effort, but which may--if duplication, gaps among roles, or tension arise--weaken or destroy the effort. A planning effort in the Cleveland…

Responding to the mandates of the Educational Reform Bill in Texas, new emphasis has been placed on the role and responsibilities of substitute teachers. This paper describes a 5-hour substitute teacher seminar that all substitute teachers and aide applicants are required to attend. The 2-day seminar focuses on the contents of the "Substitute…

The need to provide inservice training to substitute teachers was examined. The study surveyed a random sample of 278 teachers and 123 substitute teachers in Allen County, Ohio. The first part of the survey asked both groups about demographics. The second and third parts asked both groups whether teachers left complete lesson plans for…

This study examined the extent to which Ohio school districts had implemented several policy and procedure recommendations in order to address the problem of perennial substitute teacher shortage. Surveys of district superintendents, who had completed a questionnaire on substitute teacher policy and procedures 3 years before, examined: district…

This paper reports on one Massachusetts teacher educator's work as a substitute teacher in local urban and suburban public schools. His goals were to assess diversity within today's classrooms, be better informed as a teacher educator, gain new clarity about teacher roles, understand the changing role of school administrators, and re-establish his…

The lives of students with special needs are often chaotic, and they have difficulty with organization. The unfamiliar experience of a new substitute teacher can spring chaos into their lives. It is important to teach students, particularly those with special learning needs, techniques for coping with the unavoidable changes that occur when a…

A description is given of a cooperative teacher education program formed between a university and the public schools to provide substitute teaching service to the schools while the teacher-training programs at the university would be re-modeled to include substitute teaching as a training component. Graduate students who have completed a…

All individuals desiring employment as substitute teachers for the Oklahoma City Public Schools are required to attend a professional substitute teacher institute. Certified and noncertified applicants are eligible; retired teachers who have been employed within the previous 3 years are exempt. Curriculum and instruction for the institute,…

This paper reports the result of a three-year research project that implemented the idea of university professors as volunteers to provide released time for public school inservice teachers. It reviews the conception of the idea and gives a detailed account of an actual experiment involving a group of professors and a local high school. The…

Free time is the natural medium through which youngsters express themselves and develop motor, cognitive, and social skills. Nevertheless, free play on the playground is rarely used in the school as a means of enhancing students' motivation to learn. This study uses play as an application of Premack's principle (D. Premack, 1965) to the classroom.…

The Houston Independent School District (HISD) has worked with the University of Houston, Texas Southern University, the Houston Community College to develop a program to prevent rapid staff turnover in urban schools. Part of the program is aimed at recruiting high school students who live in urban areas and training them as potential teachers.…