Playing and learning mathematics do not have to be mutually exclusive activities, especially in kindergarten. Play and games can give young children opportunities to learn and develop foundational math skills that are aligned with Common Core standards for mathematics through age-appropriate, fun, and engaging activities.

What we're thinking about behaviorally challenging students and what we're doing to them requires a fresh look. When schools believe that parental discipline explains a child's misbehavior, educators are less likely to consider different explanations for the misbehavior and the full range of interventions that could be implemented at school. And…

Competency testing programs in Detroit, Illinois, and in the states of Maryland, Texas, and South Carolina have positively influenced student learning. In all four programs, measurement was perceived as a catalyst to improve instruction. (MLF)

Compares outcomes of the 1970 and 1977 weighted standardization samples for the subtests of the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills. On the whole, achievement appears to be consistent between tests for the fourth- and eighth-grade students and no one basic skill shows marked gains or losses. (Author/IRT)

The author uses samples of his and his father's college writing to suggest that spelling and punctuation were not taught quite so well in the past as people would have us believe. (IRT)

However feasible or easy it is to do minimum competency testing, the difficult task will be to defend doing it. (Author)

The Modesto plan includes basic skills competency standards in the K-8 grades and competency-based high school graduation. (IRT)

Discusses the uses of literacy as a process that enables people to perceive, discover, and communicate through the humanities and the arts. (RW)

Reason and evidence provide little, if any, justification for the belief that minimum competency testing will help poor students to learn or poor teachers to teach. (Author)

Through a comparison of an experimental and a control school, the author concludes that multiage groups make little difference in mean basic skills achievement (with the exception of vocabulary building). However, multiage grouping does seem to engender positive attitudes towards school. (Author/WD)

Named as Title I director for the Espanola (New Mexico) School District in the mid-1960s, Gilbert Martinez redirected the early grants from equipment purchases to development of kindergartens, centralized elementary school libraries, and free lunch programs. New Mexico's program improvement mandates stress curriculum integration and evaluation…

Promotes the use of basic skills testing in the certification of new teachers and the recertification of veteran teachers. Presents the belief that better teaching will result from mandated teacher testing. (MD)

Summarizes 10 basic exam questions relating to distance, direction, time, and world interest that have confounded college freshmen entering a professor's geography classes over the past 15 years. Students bewildered by the pretest usually did not pass or even finish his course. Also, foreign students performed better than American students. (MLH)

Presents a case for changing the emphasis in education from training for proficiency in basic skills to teaching students how to use computers. (MD)