A teacher of English as a Second Language (ESL) to adult migrant workers from Central America describes the evolution of her efforts to create a sense of community within the classroom and Latino center and to empower students to bring about social change in the long term. While students were pressuring the teacher to teach grammar, the teacher…

This book provides teachers with a practical introduction to the design and development of communicative language learning tasks. The ideas presented are relevant to teachers working in or preparing for a range of situations with a variety of learner types. First, some basic issues concerning communicative learning tasks are discussed, and the…

If pedagogical skills and knowledge are to become relevant to preservice teachers, students must develop their own process of active thought and become involved in their own learning. The question of how to bridge the gap between teaching theory and application can be facilitated by using a case study approach. This methodology is useful for the…

This study describes what some urban teachers at one school believe and know about literacy teaching and learning, and relates what they believe and know to two contrasting viewpoints about the way students become literate (mechanism and contextualism). Quantitative and qualitative measures were used to create summaries of teacher beliefs and…

A way in which second language teachers can use analysis of student discourse to understand how small group interaction defines students' roles relative to each other is demonstrated in a case study. The study compared the participant role of a 21-year-old Japanese male student in an intensive English second language program in two different…

Utilizing self-report data from 32 elementary and secondary teachers, this longitudinal, qualitative study examines the role shifts of both teachers and students as they adapted to teaching and learning in educational, technology-rich, Apple Classrooms of Tomorrow environments. At first, teachers in these instructionally innovative classrooms…

This paper describes cooperative learning strategies, their research base, and the rationale for their use as an instructional process for low English proficiency students (LEPS). The paper examines seven components of effective implementation of cooperative learning with language-minority students, and reports on preliminary work on a 5-year…

Opinionnaires were mailed to 860 Wisconsin Indian college students and graduates, 189 of whom were also interviewed, to identify positive factors contributing to completion of college degrees by Wisconsin Indian people. The opinionnaire used for current students and those graduated from 1977 to 1982 differed from that used with pre-1977 graduates;…

The University of Illinois' Language Learning Laboratory began the process of developing its own videotape materials in 1979 with limited resources. Interest grew gradually among faculty and the graduate teaching staff, who generally designed and produced their own materials and then shared them with colleagues. A wide variety of tapes has been…

Refining and better understanding the roles parents, teachers, administrators, and researchers play in helping children learn to process written language is the focus of this book. Part 1 considers the role of the parents and includes the following articles: "Learning to Read: It Starts in the Home" (David B. Doake): "Let's Read…

Intended for teachers of seventh graders, this communication skills program has two main objectives: (1) to develop in students a heightened awareness of the role communication plays in the totality of their lives; and (2) to begin to develop in students an awareness of their responsibility for their own communication. The program is the first in…

There have been three distinct eras in our expectations for student learning. In Era I (1837-1909), a little learning was expected from many students. Children were to be disciplined and taught the three Rs; learning was achieved through will. In Era II (1910-1975) much learning was expected from some students, but little learning was expected…

Students' macroprocessing of instruction was studied in a learning situation which used adjunct questions. The subjects were offered various macroprocessing options while reading a passage on data processing and computer programming. Each sentence appeared on a computer CRT screen one at a time. The options included: (1) review any sentence or…

High school theology instruction receives little attention in scholarly research. This is regrettable because such a unique curricular component has the potential to add much to the Catholicity of the school and to the religious development of faculty and students. To advance the discussion and application of the ideas presented in this focus…

Selected results from an aptitude-treatment interaction (ATI) study illustrate the importance of including class analyses in ATI research. The interactive effects of motivational aptitude (including locus of control, academic self confidence, and interests) and cognitive aptitude (as measured by a learning task and the Lorge-Thorndike verbal and…