The first part of this document presents the results of a survey of early entrance testing procedures in 25 Florida districts and details teacher ratings of 486 first-grade and 154 kindergarten students whose entrance test results had permitted them to enter kindergarten a year earlier than other students with birthdays between October and…

The document contains eight activity sets suitable for grades 6 and 7. Topics focus on governmental, social, and educational systems in foreign countries. Each activity set contains background reading materials, resources, concepts, general objectives, and instructional objectives. Grade 6 sets are "Soviet Youth Organizations,""How…

The questions to be answered regarding the relative success of the project were: 1) Do students perceive a difference between the new curriculum and the traditional; 2) Has the program changed the attitudes of students toward the school in general, and social studies in particular; 3) Have teacher attitudes been changed regarding student…

GRADES OR AGES: K-12. SUBJECT MATTER: English. ORGANIZATION AND PHYSICAL APPEARANCE: The first half of the guide consists of several chapters which give a general outline of the program. The second half is broken down into two sections--"Language in Action" and "Literature in Action"--which outline the program in greater detail. These two sections…

Project Oz is a not-for-profit special services agency providing drug education and crisis intervention services. Project Oz curricula provide compact and well-researched information for teachers, supplemented by student learning activities that reinforce the lecture portions of the topic. These activities are grade-appropriate and incorporate…

Two studies involving 84 fifth and sixth graders and 77 sixth and seventh graders explored the component orientations of spirituality, affect, and communalism of an Afrocultural social ethos and their connections with psychological functioning among inner-city African American youth. Positive endorsement and moderate correlations among the…

Examined relationship between the cognitive demands of instruction and student motivation in fifth-, sixth-, and seventh-grade mathematics classrooms. Found through observation and survey data that sixth- and seventh-grade math lessons were characterized by significantly fewer elements of higher-order thinking than fifth-grade math lessons, and…

Reported is an approach to teaching the use of Macintosh computers to sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students within the context of a simplified model of scientific research including proposal, data collection and analyses, and presentation of findings. Word processing, graphing, statistical, painting, and poster software were sequentially…

Surveys of Native-American students in grades six through eight examined their attitudes toward and knowledge of fetal-alcohol-syndrome risk factors and prevention strategies. Results revealed that there were limited prevention programs in middle schools, though students considered it an important topic. Families and peers were the most important…

The intention of this study is to explore mathematical discourse and teaching methods in Grades 6 and 7 of primary school in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. The school's student population changed from predominately white English/Afrikaans-speaking learners before the 1994 election to predominately black Xhosa-speaking students in…

The effectiveness of the online card catalog at Sailorway Middle School in Vermilion (Ohio) was studied. The library became fully automated in 1991. The participants were 76 sixth, 90 seventh, and 70 eighth graders (102 males and 134 females), ranging in age from 12 to 14 years. A survey determined the degree of effectiveness of the online card…

This document is a unit that introduces students to the American Revolution by relying on primary sources. The lessons divide the conflict into 3 periods: (1) the friction leading to the War; (2) the struggle for independence; and (3) the expectations that shaped people's participation. The feature that distinguishes this treatment of the…

Studies suggest that the transition to middle school is associated with a decline in motivation and performance for a number of children. This longitudinal study examined changes in motivation in English and mathematics across and after the transition from elementary to middle school. Of particular interest were changes in personal goal…

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.…

To address middle school students' lack of motivation for recreational reading, the practicum reported here integrated activities designed to improve student attitudes toward reading into a middle school reading program. A target group of 75 students in sixth and seventh grades grouped homogeneously in remedial, average, or enrichment classes…