In "The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization" (1990), Peter Senge shows how educators can achieve meaningful change and transform schools into self-renewing learning organizations. Organizations must develop five disciplines: personal mastery, mental models, shared vision, team learning, and systems…

Problem-based learning allows students to tackle significant academic subject matter. A Canadian high school social studies teacher energized students by choosing a relevant problem (the changing family), organizing subject matter around it, making students responsible for shaping and directing their own learning, using small teams, and requiring…

Educators have shown great interest in teaching thinking in the last five years. This overview introduces thinking skills instruction as the theme of this issue of "Educational Leadership" and distinguishes three different approaches: teaching for thinking, teaching about thinking, and teaching of thinking. (TE)

Short and long term strategies for implementing critical thinking skills into school programs are discussed. The short term strategy is to teach analytic skills within established subject areas, while the long term strategy involves recognizing and overcoming the unconscious obstacles to development of sound critical and dialectical thinking. (TE)

Critical thinking alone is reactive, in that it lacks the creative elements necessary for social progress. Accordingly, the author has developed the CoRT (Cognitive Research Trust) program to teach the two aspects of perception: breadth (developing a perceptual map) and change (using the map to discover solutions). (TE)

Describes a research project in a third-grade classroom that explored a spontaneous, bottom-up approach to developing and testing performance measures. After establishing project goals for reading and math instruction, the 14 participating teachers worked with University of Colorado researchers to develop summarizing activities, open-ended math…

For the past four years, a multiage class in Maine has been involved in a pumpkin-growing and -marketing enterprise--a project involving real work and problem solving. Begun with a seed grant, the project raises money for field trips and nonessential teaching materials. Working cooperatively forges strong bonds among children, teachers, and…

Using an integrated curriculum anchored in science and multimedia technology, Project LINCOL'N (Living in the New Computer Oriented Learning 'Nvironment) facilitates active learning for all students. The project's vision is to enable all students, including those with disabilities, to engage in authentic learning in a problem-solving environment.…

Responding to criticism that teaching thinking places a misguided emphasis on process at the expense of curricular content, this article contends that teachers should focus on how to relate both content and process for meaningful learning, because the value of any knowledge or skill depends on its context. (TE)

A Washington State first-grade teacher and her students created the Learning-Centered Curriculum-Making Project, developing each unit over a two-week period and highlighting language and thinking skills related to various subject disciplines. They used dialog, coaching, modeling, questioning, and reinforcing techniques. Students helped select…

The desire for students to graduate with more than basic skills has fueled interest in performance assessment methods such as essay writing, group science experiments, or portfolio preparation. Officials in Vermont, California, Kentucky, Maryland, and other states are betting that performance assessments may prove as powerful a classroom influence…

The intellectual disciplines comprising the traditional curriculum are actually territorial spaces carved out by academic scholars for their own purpose. Although middle-level educators have been engaged in reform efforts for two decades, the interdisciplinary, integrated curriculum is still rare and a working definition of a middle school…

Technology offers tools and information that students need to explore real-world mathematical connections and investigate questions reflecting their own interests. This article illustrates how students can use technology to gather and interpret information, perform descriptive and graphical analysis, make statistical predictions, and create and…

Understanding the nature of science is even more important than mastering its details, says Alan Leshner, Chief Executive Officer of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, in an interview with Educational Leadership. In this article, Leshner discusses the controversy about teaching evolution, and he asserts that demands to…

Describes the Higher-Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) Program developed to help Chapter 1 students learn better thinking skills that improve basic skills and social confidence. (MD)