Describes a middle school career-oriented teaching unit with emphasis on teaching for divergent thinking. The unit provides hands-on opportunities for eighth-grade students to explore careers using the knowledge and skills developed in their home economics class. The careers are restaurant management, hospitality service, and interior design. (CT)

Offers strategies for teaching eighth grade Georgia geography in accordance with the Georgia Quality Core Curriculum mandate of 1988. Describes the value of combining teachers from the earth sciences, mathematics, and language arts. Gives an example of team teaching at work, including student activities and answer key. (RW)

Effective teaching behaviors that have cognitive and affective learning effects on students' were identified in this study. Subjects were 50 grade-8 Dutch mathematics teachers. Findings indicate more teaching behaviors have a positive effect on mathematical knowledge than have a positive effect on students' attitudes toward mathematics. (IAH)

Examined the effects of science curricula organized around topical and causal styles of discourse on 46 eighth graders. Found that students taught with the causal style of discourse had significantly higher retention rates and could better apply their knowledge to problem-solving exercises than students taught with the topical style. (MDM)

As part of the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), videotapes of classroom instruction were collected from 231 eighth-grade mathematics classrooms in Germany, the United States, and Japan. Findings suggest that written reports about teaching disseminated to teachers may have little effect on classroom practices. (SLD)

Reports on teaching strategies employed to teach Spanish to eighth-grade students with learning disorders, such as auditory problems, attention deficit disorders, and dyslexia. The teacher, who became her students' personal support system, conducted a structured, multisensory, and "alive" class and used many visual aids, such as flashcards, books,…

In the author's experience, Colombia is among the most misunderstood Spanish-speaking countries. Most of the news about Columbia involves drug trafficking or guerilla warfare, due to the many social and political problems that face the country. It is rare that the public is informed about the culture and people of this beautiful South American…

Background: Teachers play a critical role in promoting interactions between students and engaging them in the learning process. This study builds on a study by Hertz-Lazarowitz and Shachar (1990) who found that during cooperative learning teachers' verbal behaviours were more helpful to and encouraging of their students' efforts while during…

The students targeted were third and fourth grade students with learning-disabilities and seventh-eighth grade science students who exhibited poor test scores, motivation, and behaviors that negatively impacted their learning. The objective of this study was to change the level of student engagement in order to increase their academic achievement…

Formal cooperative learning strategies and simple peer support structures provide a potential means of accommodating diversity in ability through use of collaboration principles like group interdependence. The effectiveness of various peer tutoring and peer support strategies for students with comorbid learning and behavior problems has been well…

This paper reports on a project involving student recall of the dialogue in a movie and retention of the "anchor," which in this case refers to a videotape recording of "To Kill a Mockingbird." The project looked at how students retained knowledge over a few days and what kind of activities resulted from expertise with an…

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships between classroom instructional practices and computation and geometry achievement. Relationships between mathematics achievement and classroom characteristics were also explored. The sample of 1,032 students and their teachers (n=147) was selected from the 1992 Trial State Mathematics…

The report describes an experiment for increasing retention of foreign language vocabulary by using multiple intelligence approaches and memory enhancement tools. The targeted population was approximately 100 seventh- and eighth-grade Latin students. Student difficulty with vocabulary retention had been ascribed to the teacher's emphasis on…

Recently a number of writers and researchers have praised the editing and text moving capabilities of word processing programs, proposing that they can be useful in helping students revise more readily and skillfully. With this premise, 16 eighth grade students participated in a program in which they used a text editor or word processing system to…

This study examines ways in which teachers who are more and less effective classroom managers prevent misbehavior and deal with misbehaviors they cannot prevent. Six middle-grade teachers in a suburban, midwestern school district were observed during spring, 1988. Information on misbehavior in teachers' rooms was coded according to four…