The authors constructed the Textbook Assessment and Usage Scale (TAUS) to measure students' textbook evaluations. They tested the scale in 6 introductory and 3 upper level classes. In Studies 1 and 2, the authors developed the TAUS, tested its psychometric properties, and determined which factors predicted how much students read the book and…

The purpose of this study was to investigate the appropriateness of "English Textbook 2" for Iranian EFL second grade high school students from the teachers' perspectives. The participants of the study consisted of 25 English teachers (8 females and 17 males) randomly selected from different high schools in Boukan, Iran. The evaluation…

This paper first reviews the developmental history and status quo of Business English Program in China. Then based on the theory of needs analysis, it researches on 226 questionnaires from Business English Program students from Guangdong University of Foreign Studies to investigate the problems encountered and current situation of Business English…

This study dealt with analysis of the study units in the textbook "Horizons" for 9th-grade students studying English in mixed ability classes. The study sought to examine the variety in the cognitive level represented by the WH-questions in the textbook according to Bloom's taxonomy. The study also attempted to examine the extent in…

This instructional paper examines the lack of L2 English skills demonstrated by Chinese post-secondary education students and the results of empiric testing to determine what key language functions were missing from a student's tool box when exiting their primary education phase.The identification of these skills and ability gaps allowed for…

In this article, the author examines Louise Rosenblatt's "Literature as Exploration," a popular textbook used since 1938 (in five successive editions) in high school English classrooms across America. He discusses how the one-time college roommate of Margaret Mead managed to transform teaching literature into a form of student therapy that…

This paper deals with the nature and the level of difficulty of teaching and learning physics in the first year of undergraduate engineering schools in France. Our case study is based on a survey regarding a classic and basic question in applied physics, and which was conducted with a group of second-year students in a post-baccalaureate 1…

Teaching nature of science (NOS) is beginning to find its place in science education in China. This exploratory study interviewed twenty-four Chinese science teacher educators about their conceptions of teaching NOS to pre-service science teachers. Although five dimensions emerged, this paper mainly focuses on reporting the findings relevant to…

The objective of this paper is to present certain results of my doctoral research, concerning the application of "Competence Pedagogy" in the teaching of geography in Portugal, particularly an analysis of Portuguese geography textbooks in order to improve our understanding of how they incorporate, or do not incorporate, this new…

Student knowledge about plants is typically less than student knowledge about animals. Textbooks are a commonly-used curriculum material in elementary grades and contain embedded cultural ideologies that may impact instruction. This study analyzed two nationally-syndicated elementary science textbook series to explore their presentation of plant…

In the program of primary education in Turkey, comprehensive modifications were made by the Ministry of Education and The Chairman of the Board of Education (TTKB) in 2004. In this new Social Study and Instruction program some values like assiduity, scientificity, responsibility and respect to variety are defined as "the value given…

This study aims at evaluating Top-Notch series through a checklist devised by the researchers based on the elements of the Multiple Intelligences (MI) theory proposed by Gardner (1998). With the shift from teacher-centered classrooms to learner-centered one, more and more research is needed to be done in the realm of students' need analysis. One…

Recognizing that textbooks play a prominent role in fostering students' understanding of reasoning and proof, the authors conducted a study to examine the extent to which textbooks used in U.S. high schools provide opportunities for students to encounter proof-related reasoning and how the nature of proof-related reasoning in textbooks varies by…

The authors examined curricular effectiveness in high schools that offered parallel paths in which students were free to study mathematics using 1 of 2 content organizational structures, an integrated approach or a (traditional) subject-specific approach. The study involved 3,258 high school students, enrolled in either Course 2 or Geometry, in 11…

This study created a medical word list (MWL) to bridge the gap between non-technical and technical vocabulary. The researcher compiled a corpus containing 155 textbooks across 31 medical subject areas from e-book databases (totaling 15 million running words) and examined the range and frequency of words outside the most frequent 3,000-word…