In California, the typical college-prep course sequence in math includes Algebra I, Geometry, and Algebra II. Students advance through these courses at different rates. A number of students proceed at a quick pace, with some completing Algebra II by the end of 10th grade and a few even earlier. At the other end of the spectrum, some students…

Genre-based approaches to teaching writing have made important strides in heightening students' awareness of audience and purpose but have paid less attention to the ways in which expectations for written performance in school context are embedded in expectations for certain kinds of discipline-based thinking. In this paper we present a study that…

Functions are all around us, disguised as actions on concrete objects. Composition of functions, too, is all around us, because these actions can be performed in succession, the output of one serving as the input for the next. In terms of Gray and Tall's (2001) "embodied objects" or Lakoff and Nunez's (2000) "mathematical idea…

A study released last week suggesting that California's high school exit exams are affecting some student demographic groups more than others is the latest in a small spate of studies pointing to trade-offs from policies that require high school students to pass state tests to graduate. Twenty-six states have exit exams in place or will by 2012,…

Ethnic and generation differences in the frequency and types of ethnic socialization messages that 524 eleventh-grade adolescents from Mexican, Chinese, and European backgrounds received from their parents were examined. Results indicated that adolescents from both Mexican and Chinese backgrounds reported more cultural socialization and…

This study demonstrates an existence proof for "productive failure": engaging students in solving complex, ill-structured problems without the provision of support structures can be a productive exercise in failure. In a computer-supported collaborative learning setting, eleventh-grade science students were randomly assigned to one of…

In her thought-provoking article, Aneta Pavlenko approaches emotion and emotion-laden words in the bilingual lexicon from an impressive number of different perspectives. This is particularly welcome, since most models of linguistic structure do not account for emotional meanings in a systematic way. One exception worth mentioning, however, is…

In this paper we aim to establish a link between two theoretical frames: modelling and its use in the design and analysis of scientific teaching sequences, and the communicative approaches as they alternate in classroom activities. In this case study, we follow the interactions between the teacher and a pair of students during an entire teaching…

The development of intimate same- and other-sex friendships in Arab children and adolescents in Israel was investigated in relation to their perceived parenting styles. It was hypothesized that girls would show higher levels of intimacy than boys, and that cross-sex intimacy in both groups would increase with age, whereas same-sex intimate…

Girls have caught up with boys in math course taking in high school but reasons for taking math still differ by gender. This study, therefore, investigated gender differences in the linkage between peer relations and math course taking by applying multilevel modeling to a nationally representative data set that includes peer networks and school…

This paper situates school-to-work transitional purpose of VETiS in Queensland by comparison of young adults who complete Year 12 for their different groups such as gender, geographic location, indigenous and socio-economic status. The literature indicates that students' educational outcomes are related to their social environment and culture, an…

Educational accountability has grown substantially over the last decade, due in large part to the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. Accordingly, educational researchers and policymakers are interested in the statistical properties of accountability models used for NCLB, such as status, improvement, and growth models; as well as others that are not…

In recent years, teachers have noticed a drop in student effort on complex problems in math and science. The purpose of this study was to determine if incorporating cooperative learning and self-recording strategies had an impact upon student effort on complex problems. A total of 38 9th through 11th grade math and science students at two…

This study examines relationships among weight status, weight perceptions, and dieting behaviors in South Korean adolescents. As perceptions of an ideal body for teens in Korea have changed over time, it is important for school nurses to understand these relationships to help students achieve health. A cross-sectional survey of 3,191 8th and 2,252…

This study aimed at determining the interaction between parents and adolescents pertaining to television advertisements as a consumer socialization agent and the effects of advertisements on the purchasing decisions of adolescents. The effects of age and sex were also investigated. The sample included 240 high school students in grades 9, 10 and…