Since 1980, an increasing number of state and local education agencies have reintroduced a world history requirement into their secondary curricula. This ERIC Digest examines five key questions related to that trend. Questions raised, together with some salient points made in the discussion of each, are as follows: (1) What is the background to…

Education in, for, and about the outdoors is an effective way to develop students' knowledge and appreciation of their environment, to stimulate their curiosity, and to motivate them to learn. Steps involved in establishing an outdoor education program for public schools include: (1) gaining support of school teachers and administrators, parents,…

Given the global significance of Soviet-U.S. relations, elementary and secondary school students should learn about the Soviet Union, but most students graduate from high school with little knowledge and many misconceptions about this country. It is important to teach about the Soviet Union because of: (1) its emphasis in the U.S. media; (2) its…

Labor unions have provided English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) instruction in the workplace since the early 1900s, to serve a growing immigrant workforce. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, an increase in immigrant population, decline in manufacturing jobs, new technology, and work restructuring brought a new urgency to union-sponsored worker…

An examination of foreign language syllabus design reviews current literature on six syllabus types and discusses the process of choosing and integrating syllabi for classroom use. The six syllabus types are structural, notional-functional, situational, skill-based, task-based, and content-based, characterized as differing by increasing attention…