When describing activities in today's K-12 science classrooms, the word inquiry often causes some confusion. As a result, many of us find ourselves asking the same questions: How do we know when inquiry is authentic? What should happen in an inquiry-centered science classroom? What is the teacher's role in an inquiry-centered class and what is the…

As teaching becomes more "student-centered"--i.e. considers the learning needs and interests of students--it is likely that students will be more committed and, thus, better able to process the materials and, ultimately, learn more Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (BMB). Unfortunately, BMB teaching proceeds largely unaware--or in disregard--of…

Read-alouds nurture language and literacy practices required for a successful schooling experience. They motivate children to read more and nurture language expression across the curriculum. Read-alouds not only provide content for learning, they also introduce authors and genres; model ways of reading, types of writing, and other ways of…

The purpose of this study is to determine whether a pedagogy grounded in dialogical ideals has the potential to empower students to make changes in English classroom interaction. The study first scrutinized the traditional "banking" educational system in English classrooms in which students were passive learners to realize students'…

College attainment rates are increasing in every industrialized and post-industrialized nation in the world--except America. Stagnating postsecondary graduation rates in the United States leave millions of Americans cut off from economic prosperity and impede our nation's ability to compete globally. Education philanthropy, which has long worked…

This retrospective study sketched the educational pathways of two seniors attending an alternative high school in an attempt to discern how relational identities of students, families, and educators are defining forces of such pathways. Cumulative school records and special education files were triangulated with interviews of the students, their…

This qualitative case study examines the initial implementation of a problem-based version of an undergraduate course in materials science for the purpose of identifying areas of improvement to the curriculum prior to a planned second implementation. The course was designed around problems that students work in small teams to solve under the…

Preparing all students to succeed in today's increasingly global economy and complex world requires a shift from a teacher-centric culture to learner-centered instruction, according to a new report from the Alliance for Excellent Education. This report examines the characteristics of learner-centered instruction and the support that educators and…

In this article, the author shares her experience teaching at Rita Cannan Elementary, in Reno, Nevada, and describes how she and her colleagues teach lessons on citizenship education that are part of their social studies program. She describes an approach she used, which focused on student leadership rather than teacher intervention, that led to…

This article focuses on student participation in the research process as a contribution to school improvement. The specific aim of this article was to explore students' participation in different phases of a research process and discuss how their participation can contribute to school improvement. Based on a life-world phenomenological ontology,…

A common desire among music educators is to help students develop the ability to reflect on and evaluate their own music making. To achieve this goal, music educators often provide their students with a variety of instructional activities, such as watching their ensemble's latest concert performance and writing a critical review of it, allowing…

In this study we examine how elementary teachers in Brazil and Turkey approached the translation and subsequent classroom implementation of an instructional activity that promotes environmental awareness through a combination of student role playing and teacher oral delivery of an environmental story about river pollution. A discourse analysis…

During the past three years, the author's administrative team at Milken Community High School in Los Angeles, a 7-12 school where the author is the middle school principal, has been discussing assessment. They decided that they wanted assessment to tell students what they did or did not do and enable them to self-adjust. To accomplish this, the…

This in-depth case study of classroom interaction illuminated how a white female teacher and African American students used talk to build positive authority relationships across their racial difference. Racial difference in classrooms can engender cultural misunderstandings between teachers and students around behavior, communication, and learning…

Qualitative studies of alcohol's ritual influences indicate that college undergraduates who drink heavily tend to view alcohol use as integral to the student role and feel entitled to drink irresponsibly. Our analyses, based on a standardized measure of these beliefs administered to approximately 300 students, confirmed these findings. Among our…