A project is described which was carried out among Unesco member nations from 1971 to 1974 to investigate multilateral arrangements for the review of high school textbooks in the fields of history, geography, and social studies. Objectives of the project were to provide publishers with feedback about the potential of their textbooks to promote…

A formative goal-free evaluation was conducted to assess products (documents) developed after the first year of a federally funded project. Fifteen packets of sixty-six documents were rated by an external panel of five judges, using a checklist developed for the evaluation. An intermediary between the panel and the goal-free evaluator interviewed…

The purpose of this report is to survey and evaluate the various facets of teaching of Arabic in the United States, and to give an appraisal of the state of the art. The objectives o f Arabic language teaching, the special problems that Arabic presents to Americans, and the various components common to all foreign language teaching programs,…

This report by a committee appointed to review the treatment of minority groups in social science textbooks presents a series of criteria to be applied to the production and selection of these books. It is recommended that material on minorities should be included when relevant to a subject. Treatment of minorities should be accurate, complete,…

To determine whether the distribution of male and female main character roles (sex dominance) differed significantly in the 1976-1978 editions of basal readers and supplementary textbooks from that found in the 1974-1976 editions examined by Gwyneth E. Britton and Margaret C. Lumpkin, an analysis of more than 3,700 stories was undertaken. The sex…

An evaluation of elementary social studies textbooks indicates that eight factors are making textbooks harder to read. These factors are: (1) the reading level of the book and/or the range of reading levels within it; (2) long sentences and/or too many concepts within a sentence or paragraph; (3) the use of vague terms, technical vocabulary, and…

This manual for workshop leaders offers guidelines for planning and conducting a teachers' workshop in assessing the tasks students are asked to perform. The focus is on individual tasks in self-help or auto-instructional materials, although closer examination of such tasks will suggest their value for adaptation and inclusion in standard teaching…

This instrument is designed to provide data on the characteristics of the instructional design of classroom materials. Data is gathered on four constructs: objectives, organization of the material (scope and sequence), methodology, and evaluation. Questions elicit a mixture of yes-no, check list, and summary rating scale answers with open ended…

Short evaluations of all instructional materials (books, filmstrips, cassettes, kits) adopted by the State of California in 1974 are given in the fields of English, spelling/handwriting, and literature. Piloted reading materials were also evaluated. The evaluations were performed by two or more local elementary teachers or educators and are…

This study was undertaken to determine the degree of agreement between science textbooks and scholars in earth science relative to earth science concepts to be included in the K-12 science curriculum. The study consisted of two phases: (1) the identification of a sample of earth science concepts rated by earth scientists as important for inclusion…

Within the Calgary school system, a series of pictorially programed instructional booklets (Articulated Instructional Development booklets) are used for the multiple-activity approach to teaching industrial arts. Using a random sample of 100 students from eighth graders enrolled in the materials section of the Calgary Plan, a Q-Sort instrument was…

College English departments displayed little agreement about the importance of grammar or about the type of grammar students should learn. (JH)

Basic values of moral education in Finnish schools come from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Moral tenets are taught in religion and civics. The textbooks deal with moral questions mainly on the individual level and provide limited opportunities for practice necessary for the internalization of values. (Author/SJL)

Explains how general physics textbooks introduce fundamental concepts on the basis of controversial philosophical outlooks, without indicating this either to the student or the instructor. Examines critically the philosophical approaches in a number of textbooks from a dialectical materialist viewpoint. (Author/GA)

Publishers of textbooks are subject to pressure from public opinion and regional bias as well as criticism from teachers and boards of education. (JD)