Summarizes a large-scale, systematic study that described and analyzed instructional practices in about 140 classrooms located in 15 poverty-area elementary schools. Teaching for meaning, or instruction promoting comprehension and conceptual understanding, was compared to more conventional methods. Students exposed to meaning-oriented instruction…

Whether organized around subject matter, teaching methods, school improvement, or restructuring efforts, successful networks share common features, such as focus, variety, and opportunities for discourse and leadership. Networks can also present nagging problems concerned with quality, application, stability, overextension, ownership, expanding…

New York City schools who have adopted the Central Park East model share a commitment to kindergarten principles that promote self-reliance and democracy. The central function of schooling should be to cultivate the mental and moral habits that a democratic society requires. These include openness to other views, the capacity to sustain…

At her principal's request, a sixth grade teacher/composer formed a high-quality chorus of fifth and sixth graders. The chorus was a great success despite lack of strong administrative support. Unfortunately, the chorus disbanded after the author's resignation, resulting from lack of leadership, interest, and attendance. Meanwhile, the central…

Describes a comprehensive environmental education program and facilities at Gullett Elementary School, in Austin, Texas. The program helps children learn responsibility and respect for animals and each other. Attendance improves, as children are responsible for feeding an animal entrusted to their care. Students score in the upper 90 percentiles…

Provides background information on the Hudson Institute's "Charter Schools in Action" project that studied 50 charter schools in 10 states. Examines innovative ways charter schools organize and support themselves, and presents five lessons from the charter-school movement. Public schools would benefit by becoming more consumer-oriented,…

Characterizes the University of Massachusetts School of Education Program as dynamic and creative and as offering a quality program based on change and innovation. (Author/DW)

The Motilal Nehru School of Sports in India has a three-fold mission: (a) students will be dedicated to improving Indian society and societies throughout the world; (b) students will be prepared for Indian and foreign universities; and (c) students will develop their bodies and represent India in international athletic competitions. (MD)

The emphasis on control and standards in current educational reform reports is a reaction to past permissiveness, but new business community studies suggest an emphasis on human resources development. Thus, the educational community should concentrate on stimulating unusual effort from ordinary students and teachers, rather than selecting those…

Describes the process by which a small elementary system (Windsor, Connecticut) combined Individually Guided Instruction and open education. (Author)

The authors suggest that, in the future, career educators should attempt to discover to what extent career education enhances the principle of maximum possibilities in occupations; how it can obliterate the distinction between work and leisure; and how it can be more concerned with human services. (Author/JN)

Failures in the university-public school partnership to raise student academic achievement in disadvantaged areas is attributed to faculties that hold diametrically opposed views regarding both the dimensions of the problem and the basic aims and objectives of education. (MF)

An appraisal of performance contracting in an upper income school district. (JF)

Discusses the development since 1971 of an alternative school-within-a-school at the Wheatley School in East Williston (New York), emphasizing shared decision making, nontraditional teaching, and student self-evaluation. Describes recent changes in the program to improve both student evaluation and the program's communication with the traditional…