The articles in this publication consider the way in which freshman English students can gain insights into both the reading of literature and the workings of the mind by discussing and writing about their dreams; the function of names in Washington Irving's "Rip Van Winkle" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow"; folklore and…

Draws parallel between 18th century British scientists unwillingness to recognize a non-scientist's discovery of how to determine longitude at sea with New York education leaders current unwillingness to consider alternatives to high-stakes testing. (PKP)

Critique focuses on the discourse of leadership as a vehicle for representing organizational practice. Identifies a series of conceptual inadequacies, such as difficulties in distinguishing leadership from management. Embedded in each criticism is a claim that, if leadership is to retain its conceptual and practical utility, then it has to be…

Rejoinder to Rose and Gallup's defense of 2001 Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup poll's results concerning the public attitude toward educational vouchers. (PKP)

Criticizes claims by proponents of effectiveness of Success for All, New American Schools, and other schoolwide reform policies and programs. Argues that evidence from a substantial body of research indicates that these reform efforts have not raised the reading scores of low-performing students. (Contains 33 references.) (PKP)

Critical analysis of recent National Reading Panel report on teaching children to read based on meta-analysis of research on reading instruction. Asserts that because of problems with meta-analysis and interpretation, report's findings should not form sole basis for reading-instruction policy and legislation. Proposes four reading propositions.…

Background: National curriculum assessment (NCA) in England has been in place for nearly 20 years. It has its origins in a political desire to regulate education, holding schools accountable. However, its form and nature also reflect educational and curriculum concerns and technical assessment issues. Purpose: The aim of the article is to provide…

This annotated bibliography of children's books about Africa cites more than 800 entries written in English and published in the United States, Africa, and Europe. The books (designed for children in early elementary school through young adulthood) are evaluated in terms of the validity of the perspective of Africa which they present. Both…

In this essay, Alexander Sidorkin offers a conceptual critique of the human capital theory that makes erroneous assumptions about the nature of student work and the private cost of schooling. Specifically, human capital theorists underestimate the private cost of schooling by taking low-level manual labor as the basis for estimating students'…

Recently, transactional reader response theory has been criticized for providing an inadequate theoretical guide for the study of multicultural literature. Some scholars argue that Rosenblatt assumes the reader and her response to literature are ideologically innocent and the continuum of aesthetic and efferent stance does not encompass critical…

Almost since its inception, the word "dehumanization" has caused apprehension, especially as the words relate to educational technology. This paper is a brief analysis of educational technology's critics from the late 1950s through present time; it also serves as a study of how their rhetoric has affected the structure of elementary and…

This study was designed to analyze and apply the dramatistic criticism methods of rhetorical theorist Kenneth Burke to the evaluation of both specialized and general curricula. The study consisted of four phases: interpretation and summation of Burke's work, translation of Burke's vocabulary into an appropriate form, application and refinement of…

Critical analysis of an article by Doyle Watts that was a criticism of an earlier article by Arthur W. Combs. (MLF)

Discusses four "bad boys" in adolescent literature and how their characterization reflects the attitude of their time period or of the author. (SRT)

An immediate best seller when it was published in 1987, E. D. Hirsch, Jr.'s "Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs To Know" galvanized legions on both sides of the sociopolitical aisle that divides education. The book has become a revered text regularly referenced by those scholars who take up a position that may be loosely…