bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Computer-Based Drill and Practice in Arithmetic: Widening the Gap Between High- and Low-Achieving Students
Authors: Hativa Nira
Published: March 2008

Precollege schools use their computers predominantly for drill and practice in arithmetic. It has been shown by research to be the most effective application of CAI (Computer-Assisted Instruction). The present study used naturalistic methods to examine differential effectiveness of CAI in arithmetic for high- and low-achieving students. Seven elementary school students with varied backgrounds with regard to socioeconomic status (SES), grade level, type of school, and achievements in arithmetic participated in the study. The study identifies strategies that students use to advance effectively through the levels of the CAI practice with material not yet studied in class. The study also discusses software- and hardware-related errors that students make while working with the CAI system. In many cases, these errors are unrelated to the knowledge of arithmetic. It seems that the low achievers, more than the high achievers, are prone to make these types of errors, which are partly responsible for ineffective CAI work. The study concludes that the higher achieving students observed were much more able than the observed low achievers to adjust to the special environment of computer work and to derive great benefits from it.
Improving Social-Environmental Studies Problem Solving Through Cooperative Learning
Authors: Ross John A.
Published: March 2008

Previous investigators have found that cooperative learning group approaches to instruction are substantially more effective than methods with competitive or individualistic reward systems in the achievement of computational and recall objectives. The findings for higher order objectives are less clear. Two instructional field experiments were conducted to compare the effects of a cooperative learning group method (Slavin’s Student Teams Achievement Divisions) to a whole-class method on the acquisition of selected social-environmental studies problem-solving skills by grade 4 students. The results showed that both methods outperformed the control and that the cooperative strategy was slightly less effective than the whole-class approach.
Sex Differences in Choice of College Science Majors
Authors: Ware Norma C. , Lee Valerie E.
Published: March 2008

The process of choosing a scientific major was examined in a nationally representative sample of male and female college students of above-average ability. Science majoring was predicted by different constellations of factors for male and female students. Women who were attending a 4-year college, who reported having been influenced by high school teachers and guidance counselors in making plans for college, and who placed a high priority upon aspects of their future family and personal lives were less likely to major in science than their female peers. High socioeconomic status, positive assessments of their high schools, and attending a 4-year college predicted science majoring for men.
Prior Beliefs and Cognitive Change in Learning to Teach
Authors: Hollingsworth Sandra
Published: March 2008

This is a report of the first year of a longitudinal study to investigate changes in preservice teachers’ knowledge and beliefs about reading instruction before, during, and after a fifth-year teacher education program. In particular, changes in global preprogram beliefs about education, teaching, and learning were traced as preservice teachers acquired specific knowledge of how to manage, assess, and instructionally facilitate students’ learning through text. Researchers interviewed and observed 14 elementary and secondary preservice teachers as they entered the teacher education program, attended reading classes at the university, then taught reading in school classrooms. These qualitative data were analyzed to determine (a) the patterns of intellectual change from novice preservice teacher to beginning classroom teacher; (b) the personal, program, and contextual influences or constraints on that change; (c) the role of the cooperating teacher and university supervisor in supporting intellectual change; and (d) the nature of prior beliefs on identity maintenance while learning. Findings include the importance of understanding preservice teachers’ prior beliefs to inform supervision and university course design, the value of cognitive dissonance in practice teaching contexts, the need to routinize classroom management knowledge before attending to subject-specific pedagogy, and the importance of the academic task as part of the teaching knowledge base.
Sex Differences in the Development of Verbal and Mathematics Constructs: The High School and Beyond Study
Authors: Marsh Herbert W.
Published: March 2008

Sex differences in the development of verbal and mathematics constructs (achievement, attitudes, and course selection) were examined with the High School and Beyond (HS&B) data. Longitudinal path models were tested using both multiple regression and structural equation modeling. Sex differences were typically small and determinants of the verbal and mathematics constructs were similar for boys and for girls. Because the HS&B data were recently collected and nationally representative, these findings suggest that stereotyped sex differences favoring boys in mathematics and girls in verbal areas are diminishing. The results also added to a growing body of research demonstrating the content specificity of academic affects. As predicted by Marsh’s internal/external frame of reference model, mathematics and verbal attitudes were nearly uncorrected, better mathematics skills were associated with poorer verbal attitudes, and better verbal skills were associated with poorer mathematics attitudes.
Showing Them That I Want Them to Learn and That I Care About Who They Are: A Microethnography of the Social Organization of a Secondary Low-Track English-Reading Classroom
Authors: Dillon Deborah R.
Published: March 2008

The purpose of this ethnographic study was to construct a description and interpretation of the social organization of one rural secondary, low-track English-reading classroom, using an inductive analysis of the actions of, and interactions between, the low socioeconomic, predominantly black students and their white male teacher. Field notes and interview data were triangulated with secondary data to generate a description of the social organization and a partial theory of the teacher’s actions when working with low-track, at-risk students. Results from the interpretation of the data revealed that the teacher’s effectiveness was defined by his ability to do the following: (a) create a culturally congruent social organization in his classroom that accounted for the cultural backgrounds of his students, and (b) vary his teaching style to allow him to effectively communicate with his students during lesson interactions resulting in increased opportunities for student learning and improved student attitudes toward learning and school in general
Variation in Special Education Classification Across School Districts: How Does Where You Live Affect What You Are Labeled?
Authors: Singer Judith D. , Palfrey Judith S. , Butler John A. , Walker Deborah Klein
Published: March 2008

Using independent information collected from the parents and teachers of a stratified random sample of 829 special education students, we compared the classification practices of five major metropolitan school districts. We examined the functional levels of students with the same labels living in different districts and tested whether differences in functional status were associated with the prevalence of the classification. To determine whether special education designations might change if the students lived elsewhere, we reclassified the students in each district’s sample using discriminant functions estimated within each of the other districts (which empirically replicated that district’s classification scheme). We found that (a) functional levels of students classified as mentally retarded, physically/multiply handicapped and hearing impaired differed across districts; (b) districts that classified more students as mentally retarded were serving less severely impaired students under this label; and (c) districts were least consistent in their use of the mentally retarded and emotionally disturbed designations and most consistent in their use of the hearing impaired and, to a lesser extent, physically/multiply handicapped designations; districts’ use of the speech impaired and learning disabled designations fell between these two extremes.
Reconstructive Elaborations: A Model for Content Area Learning
Authors: Scruggs Thomas E. , Mastropieri Margo A.
Published: March 2008

Past research has documented the effectiveness of various elaborative techniques, such as the keyword method, in facilitating the initial acquisition and retention of isolated facts. However, little research exists in which different elaborative techniques have been incorporated within a comprehensive model for teaching all relevant information within a specific curricular domain. In the present investigation, a system of reconstructive elaborations was developed to adapt elaborative systems to different levels of concreteness of information as well as different levels of meaningfulness (or familiarity) to the learner. Such elaborations were developed for textbook information on World War I. This information was then taught individually to 30 mildly handicapped adolescents, who had been assigned at random to experimental or control conditions. Students in the experimental condition outperformed students in the control condition by a factor of nearly 2:1 on an immediate production test, and maintained a statistically significant advantage over a 3-4 day delay interval on an identification test. Implications for content area instruction of difficult-to-teach students are provided.
The Effects of High School Organization on Dropping Out: An Exploratory Investigation
Authors: Bryk Anthony S. , Thum Yeow Meng
Published: March 2008

A hierarchical linear model analysis ( Raudenbush & Bryk, 1986 ) is used to investigate directly the effects of structural and normative features of schools on both the probability of dropping out and the strongest behavioral predictor of dropping out, absenteeism. We hypothesized that high levels of internal differentiation within high schools and weak normative environments contribute to the problems of absenteeism and dropping out. Conversely, these student behaviors should be less problematic in school contexts where there is less differentiation among students and strong normation. The empirical results reported in this paper support these hypotheses. No single factor makes schools effective in sustaining student interest and commitment. Rather, a constellation of both structural and normative features appears to be involved. The analyses also provide some support for the contention that special benefits accrue to disadvantaged and at-risk youth from attending certain kinds of schools.
Perceived and Actual Linguistic Competence: A Descriptive Study of Four Low-Achieving Hispanic Bilingual Students
Authors: Commins Nancy L. , Miramontes Ofelia B.
Published: March 2008

This ethnographic study investigated the linguistic performance of four Hispanic bilingual students perceived to have limited language abilities in Spanish and English. The study provided data on the students’ language use and abilities, in both languages, in a variety of school and nonschool settings. Data were analyzed qualitatively for evidence of students’ linguistic, discourse, and narrative competencies. Performance was compared across settings and across languages for each student, as well as across students. All students displayed different strengths across settings in both languages. The data indicated that the organization of instruction limited the students’ abilities to demonstrate their full range of competence in the two languages, and that their lack of English structural proficiency and lack of vocabulary in Spanish was interpreted by teachers as a lack of conceptual ability. Observed over a variety of contexts, however, students showed the ability to use language as a vehicle for effective self-expression both socially and cognitively.
Cognition and Improvisation: Differences in Mathematics Instruction by Expert and Novice Teachers
Authors: Borko Hilda , Livingston Carol
Published: March 2008

This study investigates the nature of pedagogical expertise by comparing the planning, teaching, and postlesson reflections of three student teachers (two secondary and one elementary) with those of the cooperating teachers with whom they were placed. Participants were observed teaching mathematics for 1 week of instruction and were interviewed prior to and following each lesson. Differences in the thinking and actions of these experts and novices were analyzed by perceiving teaching both as a complex cognitive skill and as improvisational performance Novices showed more time-consuming, less efficient planning, encountered problems when attempts to be responsive to students led them away from scripted lesson plans, and reported more varied, less selective postlesson reflections than experts. These differences were accounted for by the assumptions that novices’ cognitive schemata are less elaborate, interconnected, and accessible than experts’ and that their pedagogical reasoning skills are less well developed. We offer several recommendations for student teaching based on this analysis.
Intellectual Conventions Versus Matters of Substance: Elementary School Students as Curriculum Theorists
Authors: Nicholls John G. , Thorkildsen Theresa A.
Published: March 2008

Elementary school students were interviewed about substantive and conventional aspects of academic knowledge They considered the learning of intellectual conventions (spelling and methods of representing addition) less important than matters of substance (mathematical logic or facts about nature). They also viewed didactic teaching as more appropriate for matters of convention than for matters of logic and fact. These results support the theses that even young students (a) distinguish intellectual conventions from the substance of disciplines and (b) construe intellectual conventions as arbitrary (rather than logically or empirically necessary) social practices that foster communication about matters of substance. We suggest that this distinction might be accorded more attention, for example, in research on the effect of teaching practices on student motivation.
When the Problem Is Not the Question and the Solution Is Not the Answer: Mathematical Knowing and Teaching
Authors: Lampert Magdalene
Published: March 2008

This paper describes a research and development project in teaching designed to examine whether and how it might be possible to bring the practice of knowing mathematics in school closer too what it means to know mathematics within the discipline by deliberately altering the roles and responsibilities of teacher and students in classroom discourse. The project was carried out as a regular feature of lessons in fifth-grade mathematics in a public school. A case of teaching and learning about exponents derived from lessons taught in the project is described and interpreted from mathematical, pedagogical, and sociolinguistic perspectives. To change the meaning of knowing and learning in school, the teacher initiated and supported social interactions appropriate to making mathematical arguments in response to students’ conjectures. The activities students engaged in as they asserted and examined hypotheses about the mathematical structures that underlie their solutions to problems are contrasted with the conventional activities that characterize school mathematics.
Item Characteristics and Gender Differences on the SAT-M for Mathematically Able Youths
Authors: Becker Betsy Jane
Published: March 2008

Item responses of a group of mathematically talented junior high school students were studied to explore the significant advantages that have been reported for males on the mathematical sections of the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT-M). Rasch latent trait item difficulties were estimated, and a regression-like linear analysis was used to examine the interactions of item features with sex of examinees. SAT-M items were classified by subject-matter content, item format, section membership, and whether a figure was presented with the item; their serial position also was considered. Examinees were grouped by sex, grade, and level of performance. Data sufficiency items were easier for all examinees than were multiple-choice items, and were much easier for the girls than for the bosys. Serial position of the items was important, with later items being more difficult, and girls found the first and last items “more extreme” than did the boys. Girls found miscellaneous items to be much easier than did the boys, but found the algebra items more difficult. Differences between mean item difficulties of boys and girls for arithmetic and geometry items were negligible. Results suggested that a number of specific aspects of mathematical performance were being measured by the SAT-M for this group of able youths. The patterns of response suggested weaknesses and strengths that might be a focus of mathematics instruction for these bright students.
Analysis of Patterns in Time: A Method of Recording and Quantifying Temporal Relations in Education
Authors: Frick Theodore W
Published: March 2008

Analysis of patterns in time (APT) is a method for gathering information about observable phenomena such that probabilities of temporal patterns of events can be estimated empirically. If appropriate sampling strategies are employed, temporal patterns can be predicted from APT results. As an example of the fruitfulness of APT, it was discovered in a classroom observational study that elementary students were on task 97% of the time if some form of direct instruction was occurring also, whereas they were on task only 57% of the time during nondirect instruction. As a second example, APT results were used as a rule base for an expert system in adaptive computer-based testing. When two different computer tests were studied, average samples of 9 and 13 test items were required to make mastery and nonmastery decisions when items were selected at random. These decisions were, respectively, 94% and 98% accurate compared to those reached from two much larger test item pools. Finally, APT is compared to the linear models approach and event history analysis. The major difference is that in APT there is no mathematical model assumed to characterize relations among variables. In APT the model is the temporal pattern being investigated.
Socialization of Student Teachers
Authors: Hoy Wayne K. , Woolfolk Anita E.
Published: March 2008

In this study of organizational socialization, student teachers became more controlling in their perspectives as they completed their practice teaching. They became significantly more custodial in pupil-control orientation as well as more controlling in their orientation toward social problem solving. Student teachers also became less confident that they could overcome the limitations of home environment and family background. It is surprising that these same student teachers did not temper their optimistic belief that they had the personal ability to motivate and be effective with difficult students; in fact, their sense of personal teaching efficacy improved as their sense of general teaching efficacy declined. Similar students who were preparing to teach but had not yet enrolled in student teaching did not experience these changes in perspectives during the same time.
Time Spent Reading and Reading Growth
Authors: Taylor Barbara M. , Frye Barbara J. , Maruyama Geoffrey M.
Published: March 2008

Despite the perceived importance of time spent reading on reading growth, research supporting this notion is limited. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of time spent reading at school and at home on intermediate grade students’ reading achievement. One hundred and ninety-five students in Grades 5 and 6 kept daily reading logs from mid-January through mid-May. A stepwise multiple regression analysis, in which standardized reading comprehension scores prior to the study served as a covariate, revealed that amount of time spent on reading during the reading period contributed significantly to gains in students’ reading achievement. Time spent on reading at home was not significantly related to reading achievement gains. Findings provide needed research support for the idea that time engaged in silent reading at school is beneficial to intermediate grade students.
Linkage Between Researchers and Practitioners: A Qualitative Study
Authors: Huberman Michael
Published: March 2008

Work in the area of research utilization has emphasized the importance of contacts between researchers and practitioners not only at the close of a study, but also before and, above all, during its conduct. These contacts have a strong influence on the impact of apiece of research on practitioners. More important, however, is the finding that, in settings in which educational researchers and practitioners have had few previous interactions, intensified contacts in the life of a research project can result not only in applications of the main findings, but also in the establishment of multiple areas of collaboration between the two parties that transcend the impact of a single study.
Continuity and Change in Soviet Education under Gorbachev
Authors: Long Delbert H.
Published: March 2008

Development of good citizens who willingly permit their thoughts and actions to be shaped by officially approved communist ethics has always been a vital function of Soviet schools. In Mikhail Gorbachev’s words, a good citizen is a “fighter for perestroika, ” a restructured society. After providing some historical background that is intended to give the reader a better idea of what is old and new in Soviet education today, the discussion moves to how Gorbachev’s concept of restructuring has shaped the efforts of the school to promote communist ethics, the human factor, and independent thinking. The author concludes that Soviet education will proceed, though at a deliberate pace, toward becoming more open, more humane, more diversified, more decentralized, and more democratized.
Meaning Construction in School Literacy Tasks: A Study of Bilingual Students
Authors: Langer Judith A. , Bartolome Lilia , Vasquez Olga , Lucas Tamara
Published: March 2008

This study examined the ways in which Mexican-American students construct meaning when reading school materials. It focused on the strategies they use when reading English and Spanish, the knowledge sources they call upon, and the ways in which these relate to understanding.

Twelve fifth-grade students, all who come from bilingual homes, were asked to read both Spanish and English stories and informational pieces. Interspersed questions, post reading probes, and oral and written recalls were designed to tap their text understanding over time, as well as what they recalled after reading each piece. Interviews and school records provided background information about the students’ personal and school histories both in the United States and in Mexico.

Transcripts, fieldnotes, and student writing samples were analyzed for patterns in the students’ approaches to the construction of meaning and in their differential uses of language and genre.

Findings indicate that: (a) beyond a necessary basic, but limited knowledge of English, the students’ abilities to use good meaning-making strategies made the major difference in how well they comprehended in both Spanish and English; (b) the students’ language competence in Spanish helped them understand and respond to questions in both languages; (c) the students’ familiarity with genre affected their ability to build meanings in both languages; and (d) the kinds of questions the students were asked affected their ability to communicate what they understood.
Impacts of the School Social Unit on Teacher Authority During Work Redesign
Authors: Hart Ann Weaver
Published: March 2008

During a year-long comparative case study, the redesign of teacher work in two schools was examined. A major goal of the redesign effort was teacher empowerment—an increase in the power and authority of the best teachers. The complexities and unanticipated consequences of implementing this general policy are described and explanations grounded in the theoretical and empirical literature on work redesign and social systems are presented. In spite of the expectation that restructured teacher work would improve the appeal of the teaching career and the effectiveness of the work structure in schools, the influence of the school social unit was found to outweigh the strength of individual teachers’ efforts or the formal work structure in its impact on teachers’ assessments of the new structure and on the functions of redesigned work in schools. Implications for educational reform and for structural- and social-systems aspects of work redesign theory are discussed.
Choices Made, Worlds Created: The Rhetoric ofAERJ
Authors: Marshall Margaret J. , Barritt Loren S.
Published: March 2008

Expectations go with us everywhere. We expect the sun to rise, the rains to come, and December to bring snow storms, even blizzards. Expectations also inform our reading of texts. We expect fairy tales to begin with “once upon a time” and end “happily ever after. “ We recognize poetry by its shapes and rhythms, and sermons by their cadences and the echoes of sacred texts.

Academicians have expectations as well for the research texts they read. Scholarly articles are not sermons, nor poems, nor fairy tales. Before you began to read this article, you had expectations about how it should present itself, how it should address you as the reader, and how it should speak about its topic. You may never have considered those expectations, but now, as you read this article, appearing as it does in this journal, you are likely struck by its failure to conform to the usual expectations. You are likely wondering what is going on here, whether this article is scholarly and worth your time, and why the editors have accepted it. Sometimes, conventions must be broken in order that they may be examined. Sometimes, expectations keep us from noticing that the forms determine what can be said.
An Observational Study of Small-Group Mathematics Instruction in Elementary Schools
Authors: Good Thomas L , Grouws Douglas A , Mason DeWayne A , Slavings Ricky L , Cramer Kathleen
Published: March 2008

This article reports a naturalistic study of small-group instruction in elementary school mathematics classes. Three school districts from three cities (a small suburban city, a large urban city, and a middle-sized city) in three midwestern states were studied. Observations (N = 206) of entire mathematics periods were made in the classrooms of 33 teachers (primarily fourth-, fifth-, and sixth-grade) in 21 schools. This article describes the types of small-group formats observed, the variation in teachers’ use of time in 12 teaching functions, and the extent to which group structure and use of teaching functions affected the task climate in which students learned mathematics. Six types of small-group formats were found: whole-class ad hoc, two groups, three groups, four groups or more (mixed-size groups), heterogeneous work groups (cooperative learning), and individualized grouping.
Coursework Mastery and School Success: Gender, Ethnicity, and Poverty Groups Within an Urban School District
Authors: Farkas George , Sheehan Daniel , Grobe Robert P
Published: March 2008

Unique data containing coursework-mastery test scores for all middle school students in a large urban school district are employed to test the narrowly defined meritocratic hypothesis that course-grade differentials for gender, ethnicity, and poverty groups are accounted for by the differential coursework mastery of these groups. A broadly defined meritocratic hypothesis is also tested by a model which includes measures of student absenteeism as well as “frog pond” and “bad school” contextual effects. Both the narrowly and broadly defined meritocratic hypotheses are rejected. With coursework mastery and the other variables held constant it is found that girls receive higher course grades than boys, Asians receive higher course grades than Anglos, and nonpoor youths receive higher course grades than poor youths. Black/Anglo and Hispanic/Anglo differentials are mixed. Implications are drawn for future studies of the educational stratification process.
Influences on the Choice of Math/Science Major by Gender and Ethnicity
Authors: Maple Sue A. , Stage Frances K.
Published: March 2008

Women and minorities continue to be underrepresented in quantitatively based fields of study. Additionally, selection by all students of such majors is declining. Math/Science major choice is of concern in light of the occupational demands created by advancing technology as well as the potential gaps in occupational and economic attainment of women and minorities. This article reports the analysis of a longitudinal model of math/science major choice upon entrance to college for black and white, female and male students. The model was tested using a sample drawn from the “High School and Beyond” data base. The model included background characteristics of students, ability, and an array of high school experience factors to explain choice of quantitative major. Significant predictors of major choice for the subgroups included sophomore choice of major, mathematics attitudes, math and science completed by senior year, and various parental factors. However, there were differences across groups and the model explained nearly twice as much variance for the black male, black female, and white male subgroups compared with the white female subgroup. Recommendations include broadening our ways of researching migration into and out of the mathematics/science pipeline. Argument is made for a focus on success of students enrolled in low level college mathematics classes as a way of augmenting the mathematics/scientific pipeline.
Generation and Verification of Inferences by Experts and Trained Nonexperts
Authors: Yekovich Frank R. , Thompson Michele A. , Walker Carol H.
Published: March 2008

This experiment explored how expert credit administrators and trained, but not yet expert, credit administrators (i.e., trained nonexperts, TNEs) differ in their ability to generate and verify inferences. Subjects read a case study describing a bank that appeared to be growing rapidly but, because of quality control problems, was heading for major difficulty. Subsequently, they performed a retelling task, a recognition task, and a problem identification/justification task. For each task, dependent measures were derived to detect the ability to retrieve explicit facts about the case and the ability to infer and reason about the case. Results showed that experts and TNEs did not differ in their ability to encode or retrieve the facts given explicitly in the case. However, for each task, marked differences appeared for inferencing and reasoning ability. Taken together, the data argue that the ability to reason within a complex domain is not simply the result of acquiring the requisite declarative knowledge. Rather, reasoning ability depends on problem solving practice and real-world experience in the domain. Implications for instruction are discussed.
Students as Judges of Teachers’ Verbal and Nonverbal Behavior
Authors: Babad Elisha , Bernieri Frank , Rosenthal Robert
Published: March 2008

Students differing in ages and teachers differing in experience were exposed to extremely brief samples of teacher behavior when talking about, and talking to, students for which they held high or low expectations. Judgments of teacher characteristics as well as those of the unseen student with whom the teacher was involved were collected. An expectancy detection effect was found such that when teachers were involved with their high-expectancy student, raters judged the unseen student more positively than when teachers were involved with their low-expectancy student. This detection was facilitated differentially by the teachers’ verbal and nonverbal behavior. Ratings of teacher characteristics showed similar expectancy effects but only for older raters. Findings demonstrate the detectability of teachers’ expectancy-related behavior. We discuss the implications of young students’ detecting teacher expectancies from brief samples of behavior and the educational significance of the observed discrepancies between verbal and nonverbal communications.
Musicians Go to School: A Case of Knowledge, Control, and Cross-Professional Action
Authors: Kushner Saville
Published: March 2008

This article looks at performing musicians working with teachers and children in schools and examines the political, cultural, and professional implications of this kind of interaction. This is offered as a case study of cross-professional collaboration and the issues involved. It argues that in order both to understand (evaluate) such exchanges and to redefine what makes for professional knowledge in such novel exchanges we need to focus on context. But this sets us in opposition with other currently fashionable movements which seek to define professional action in de-contextualized (eg., competency-based) terms. What is at stake is the political control of social programs through controlling what counts as professional knowledge.
The Pedagogic Nature of Subject Matter Knowledge
Authors: McEwan Hunter , Bull Barry
Published: March 2008

The concept of pedagogic content knowledge is by now a familiar one: Lee Shulman introduced it into the lexicon of research on teaching in order to pick out a distinctive, subject-centered feature of the knowledge base of teaching. But is teachers’ knowledge of subject matter different in kind from that of scholars? This article investigates that question. First, it rejects a possible answer derived from objectivist epistemology on the grounds of its untenability. Second, it explores Dewey’s account of subject matter knowledge to determine if his position justifies a division in subject matter between scholarly and pedagogic forms. The article concludes by rejecting Shulman’s dualistic theory and affirming an alternative: that all knowledge is, in varying ways, pedagogic. This result points to a community of teaching and scholarship that is at odds with our institutional arrangements and practices.
Making Strategies and Self-Talk Visible: Writing Instruction in Regular and Special Education Classrooms
Authors: Englert Carol Sue , Raphael Taffy E. , Anderson Helene M. Anthony Linda M. , Stevens Dannelle D.
Published: March 2008

Expository writing is an important skill in the upper-elementary and secondary grades. Yet few studies have examined the effects of interventions designed to increase students’ expository writing abilities and their ability to generalize their knowledge to write expository texts using novel text structures. The present study examined the effects of an intervention that attempted to improve students’ expository writing abilities through an instructional emphasis on teacher and student dialogues about expository writing strategies, text structure processes, and self-regulated learning. The findings suggested that the dialogic instruction was effective (a) in promoting students’ expository writing abilities on two text structures taught during the intervention (explanation and comparison/contrast) and (b) in leading to improved abilities on a near transfer activity, in which students wrote using a text structure not taught during the intervention. Although students in the control group exhibited some pretest-posttest gains on specific text structures, they were not successful in using their knowledge to write about student-selected topics and text structures. The results support the importance of instruction that makes the writing processes and strategies visible to students through teacher-student and student-student dialogues.
On the Reading of Historical Texts: Notes on the Breach Between School and Academy
Authors: Wineburg Samuel S.
Published: March 2008

In this article I explore what it means to read a historical text. In doing so, I draw on my research with historians and high school students, who thought aloud as they reviewed a set of texts about the American Revolution. I begin by providing an overview of what I learned from historians, sketching in broad strokes an image of the skilled reader of history. Next, I compare this image to what emerged from an analysis of high school students’ responses to these same documents. I then speculate about the source of differences between these two groups, arguing that each group brings to these texts a distinctive epistemological stance, one that shapes and guides the meanings that are derived from text. I end by outlining the implications of this work for how we define reading comprehension and how we define the place of history in the school curriculum.
Effects of Curriculum-Based Measurement and Consultation on Teacher Planning and Student Achievement in Mathematics Operations
Authors: Fuchs Lynn S. , Hamlett Douglas Fuchs Carol L. , Stecker Pamela M.
Published: March 2008

The purpose of this study was to assess the effects of (a) ongoing, systematic assessment of student growth (i.e., curriculum-based measurement) and (b) expert system instructional consultation on teacher planning and student achievement in the area of mathematics operations. Thirty-three teachers were assigned randomly to treatment groups: curriculum-based measurement (CBM) with expert system instructional consultation (CBM-ExS), CBM with no expert system instructional consultation (CBM-NExS), and control (i.e., no CBM). Teachers implemented treatments for 20 weeks. Analyses indicated that, compared to the control group, both CBM groups appeared to revise students’ instructional programs more frequently. However, only the CBM-ExS group effected superior student achievement. Analysis of the nature of teachers’ instructional adjustments indicated that the teaching revisions of the CBM-ExS teachers incorporated a dual focus on what types of problems to teach and what strategies to employ for teaching. By contrast, the CBM-NExS teachers focused solely on what types of problems to reteach. Findings are discussed in terms of previous studies of teacher planning and implications for practice.
Conversations With Self and Settings: A Framework for Thinking About Teacher Empowerment
Authors: Prawat Richard S.
Published: March 2008

A framework for thinking about teacher empowerment is presented. Two important dimensions are used as a basis for highlighting some important similarities and differences emerging in the literature on empowerment. The first relates to the context in which the process occurs; some educators highlight the importance of the personal context (i.e., conversations with self), while others assume more of an outward perspective in their thinking about empowerment (i.e., conversations with settings). The second important dimension relates to the focus or agenda of the conversations. Here, a distinction is made between agendas that are more epistemological in nature and those that are more political. An illustration is provided of how this framework can be used to better understand the dynamics involved in collaborative work with teachers.
Higher Order Skills, Job Design, and Incentives: An Analysis and Proposal
Authors: Hannaway Jane
Published: March 2008

There is a growing consensus that the curriculum as taught in schools is “out of balance.” Emphasis on basic skills outweighs to a far greater extent than appropriate the emphasis on problem solving and higher order skills. Drawing on ideas about the effects of specialization from behavioral decision theory and on recent work in the economics of organization, this article proposes structural changes in the teaching job to address this problem. The possible limitations as well as advantages of the proposal are discussed.
Constructive Activity in Learning From Text
Authors: Chan Carol K.K. , Burtis P. J. , Scardamalia Marlene , Bereiter Carl
Published: March 2008

This study examined the constructive cognitive activity of children listening to text and assessed the contribution of this activity to learning. Informative statements were read to 109 children (in grades 1 to 6) who were asked to think aloud about each statement. Analysis of the protocols led to a scale identifying five levels of constructive activity, with three subtypes at each level. The five levels were prefactual confabulation, knowledge/detail retelling, assimilation, problem solving, and extrapolation. The three subtypes were declarative, interrogative, and evaluative responses. Measures of prior knowledge and new learning were also obtained. A path analysis suggested that the level of activity identified by the scale exerted a direct effect on learning and mediated the effects of age and prior knowledge on learning.
Is Learning From Media Distinctive? Examining Children’s Inferencing Strategies
Authors: Neuman Susan B.
Published: March 2008

The purpose of this research was to investigate the influence of different media on children’s interpretations of stories. Two studies are reported that examine whether different inferencing strategies are elicited with different media presentations. Study 1 explored the inferencing strategies children use across text and video by asking 2 fifth graders to think aloud as they read and viewed episodes from two mystery stories. A qualitative analysis identified a range of inferencing strategies. Study 2 examined the extent to which 83 fifth-grade high and low achievers used these strategies and whether there were strategy differences across media presentations. High and low achievers were randomly selected to either read or watch brief episodes of stories and to report verbally on their predictions and thinking processes. Results indicated that there were no significant differences for medium or achievement; nor were there interaction effects. Rather, a similar pattern of inferencing strategies appeared to be employed by children in both print and video forms. These results suggest that the interpretive process may be similar across different media presentations and that the medium per se may have little direct influence in cognition and learning.
Teachers’ Work and the Politics of Reflection
Authors: Smyth John
Published: March 2008

There has been a plethora of material written in recent times on reflective approaches to teaching and teacher education, but a dearth of material that looks behind these studies or asks why these reflective approaches are enjoying such popularity. This article tackles what has really become a major policy issue in the literature in four ways. First, it argues that the rhetoric of devolution and practitioner forms of knowledge may not be entirely altruistic and that such calls are occuring in contexts that display significant moves to bolster central control. Second, it proposes that this apparent contradiction is only explainable when we look at wider structural adjustments occurring in Western capitalist systems. Third, it argues that reflective practices, far from being emancipatory for teachers, entrap them within the New Right ideology of radical interventionism. Finally, the article concludes by describing what a more socially, culturally, and politically reflective approach to teaching might look like.
Teacher Under Construction: A Collaborative Case Study of Teacher Change
Authors: Hunsaker Linda , Johnston Marilyn
Published: March 2008

This article describes a 4-year longitudinal case study of changes in the teaching of reading and writing that were made by an elementary school teacher. The case study documents changes in her teaching beliefs and practices, and the influence of reflective thinking and collaboration promoted by a master’s program and research project. Atypical forms of writing are used in order to reflect the perspectives of both the teacher and the researcher and to represent the historical phases of their collaboration.
Nonconventional Family Life-Styles and School Achievement: A 12-Year Longitudinal Study
Authors: Weisner Thomas S. , Gamier Helen
Published: March 2008

The life-styles of countercultural, nonconventional families have potential risks as well as benefits for children’s school achievement. The effects on children’s school achievement of nonconventional family organization, parents’ values and commitment to their family life-style, and family stability were examined in a 12-year longitudinal study of 146 nonconventional families and a comparison group of 43 stable, two-parent conventional families. In spite of considerable instability and other potential risk conditions in nonconventional families’ lives (single parent or unmarried couple status, frequent change, stigma, low incomes, and others), most of their children do as well or better in school than a comparison group of conventional families. These effects were still present after adjusting for child WISC-R, gender, and family SES. Those children doing best in school come from families who have a stronger commitment to their nonconventional family life-style while those doing less well have families with a lower commitment. Children in single parent families had grades similar to those of children in two-parent families. Family stability—regardless of the form of the family (single parent or couple)— also was associated with higher grades. Strong commitment to meaningful values regarding the importance of one’s family life-style can protect children against some of the risks that were a part of many countercultural family’s lives.
A Longitudinal Characterization of Young Students’ Knowledge of Their Country’s Government
Authors: Sinatra Gale M. , Beck Isabel L. , McKeown Margaret G.
Published: March 2008

This study investigated young students’ conceptions of their country’s government, with a particular interest in the concept of representation, and examined the influence of instruction and development on the formulation of these ideas. The same 26 students were interviewed before and after instruction in American history in fifth and eighth grade. Interview responses led us to characterize students’ conceptions of their country’s government as focused on its structure with limited understanding of its philosophical or historical roots. Additionally, students tended to view their own system as positive and focused on negative features of other systems in drawing comparisons. Longitudinally, students’ conceptions tended to show more consistency than growth. The discussion explores the content emphasis in traditional instruction and its effect on students’ understandings of the foundations of their country’s government and emphasizes the importance of the teacher’s role in fostering development of students’ nascent understandings of complex content in social studies.
Self-Motivation for Academic Attainment: The Role of Self-Efficacy Beliefs and Personal Goal Setting
Authors: Zimmerman Barry J. , Bandura Albert , Martinez-Pons Manuel
Published: March 2008

The causal role of students’ self-efficacy beliefs and academic goals in self-motivated academic attainment was studied using path analysis procedures. Parental goal setting and students’ self-efficacy and personal goals at the beginning of the semester served as predictors of students’ final course grades in social studies. In addition, their grades in a prior course in social studies were included in the analyses. A path model of four self-motivation variables and prior grades predicted students ‘final grades in social studies, R = .56. Students’ beliefs in their efficacy for self-regulated learning affected their perceived self-efficacy for academic achievement, which in turn influenced the academic goals they set for themselves and their final academic achievement. Students’ prior grades were predictive of their parents’ grade goals for them, which in turn were linked to the grade goals students set for themselves. These findings were interpreted in terms of the social cognitive theory of academic self-motivation.