Operation Magpie was a citizen science project that involved the community in collecting data about magpies. This article describes one aspect of the project from an education perspective. The study began with a collaboration of teacher educators, environmental scientists and a local radio station. After an initial workshop with 75 teachers, three…

This article reports a study of one high school senior's process of academic bullshitting as she wrote an analytic essay interpreting Shakespeare's "Much Ado about Nothing." The construct of bullshit has received little scholarly attention; although it is known as a common phenomenon in academic speech and writing, it has rarely been the subject…

This article reports on a quasi-experimental investigation with a pre-test/post-test control group design carried out in the second semester of the academic year 2006-2007 with Spanish pre-service English teachers at the University of Jaen in Spain. Its aim was to determine whether the use of virtual learning environments (VLE) and…

How can teachers build students' interest and engagement in reading texts in the high school English curriculum while still providing access to challenging texts from the canon? Teachers typically expect their secondary students to read texts from the English canon because these texts offer opportunities for meaningful reflections on essential…

The Bologna Declaration attempts to reform the structure of the higher education system in forty-six European countries in a convergent way. By 2010, the European space for higher education should be completed. In the 2005-2006 academic year, the University of Murcia, Spain, started promoting initiatives to adapt individual modules and entire…

This review of state English language arts (ELA) and mathematics standards is the latest in a series of Fordham evaluations dating back to 1997. It comes at a critical juncture, as states across the land consider adoption of the Common Core State Standards. These are the authors' major findings: (1) Based on their criteria, the Common Core…

Gunther Kress's call for a curriculum based on textual creation in a global era of instability is particularly appropriate to the present historical moment. Here I argue the need for a notion of creativity as the basis for a national curriculum in English. The kind of creativity envisaged issues out of a systems theory approach which sees…

In this article I use the occasion of farewelling my Year 12 students at the end of their schooling, some intertextual references to "Hamlet", and some conceptual frames of Derrida, to reflect dialogically on the role of critical literacy in Australian English curricula in the past, the present and into the future. (Contains 11 notes.)

The author helps some kids make personal connections to what can seem irrelevant within the confines of classroom and curriculum. Interestingly, though, the most meaningful connections she has made with students have come not through quirky English teaching, but through her extracurricular interloping into the realm of social studies. The most…

Defining and understanding a generation of Americans has always been difficult until years after the generation ends. Although there is universal agreement on the Baby Boomer generation (1946-1964) and most people agree that Generation X started in 1965 and ended around 1979, after that it gets murky. In his research, the author believes that the…

Business English is the core course for ESP (English for Specific Purposes) programs which empathizes the effectiveness and pragmatism. Feasibility is the crucial element for business English programs especially for in-services business people. Business English-An individualised learning programme is an effective and radical business English…

In English language teaching, it is not unusual to come across a student who seems to lack certain basic organizational skills. However, many of the language teaching techniques and materials require students to rely heavily on these skills. The use of textbooks and handouts, the assigning of tasks and homework, and the planning of a syllabus or…

A longitudinal study of student growth gains was conducted in Title I schools to assess growth in reading comprehension and critical thinking. Results suggested that all students benefited from the intervention of Project Athena units of study designed for high-ability learners. In addition, the study suggested that the comparison curriculum also…

Textuality is often thought of in linguistic terms; for instance, the talk and writing that circulate in the classroom. In this paper I take a multimodal perspective on textuality and context. I draw on illustrative examples from school Science and English to examine how image, colour, gesture, gaze, posture and movement--as well as writing and…

An article entitled "Pupils Persevere" covered the front page of Madison's local newspaper in February 2005. Highlighting the plight of four alternative programs in Madison's public school system, the article both angered and pleased students at this school. Although the central point of the front-page article was a plea for a larger physical…