According to the author, last year they set out to apply the four-step approach that they found in research from the University of Kentucky to design a unit for their language arts curriculum. They identified the appropriate standards, figured out what skills they would teach in conformance with the standards and what outcomes were expected, and…

Communicative self-efficacy serves as an important link between discussing controversial issues and civic engagement because confidence in one's discourse skills is important to managing conflicting perspectives and developing solutions to community-based problems. Freely available to schools, "Word Generation" is a cross-content…

Developing and implementing curriculum that is relevant, challenging, integrative, and exploratory is central to successful middle grades education (Erb, 2005; Jackson & Davis, 2000; National Middle School Association [NMSA], 2003, 2010). However, as one language arts teacher suggests, it can be difficult to create curricula that meet these…

Over the past three decades, environmental issues have been on the global forefront and continue to affect people's daily lives. Although the need for environmental attention is at an all-time high, outdoor and environmental education (OEE) plays an insufficient role in school systems. As technology continues to contribute to advancements in every…

Interviews with project directors of various research and development centers provide information on programs intended to give teachers practical help in teaching mentally retarded children. (GW)

In 1979, the Yonkers Public School district (New York) launched a project to design and implement secondary school language arts curriculum guides with an emphasis on written composition. A theoretical framework was developed, based on the work of James Britton and the philosophy of the Bay Area Writing Project (BAWP). Britton's work provided the…

The purposes of this study were to develop a theory from a humanities program in the elementary school and to implement the theory by designing prototypes in the humanities for kindergarten through the second grade. The method used in developing the theory was library research. The humanities were limited, for purposes of the study, to include…

"Viewing and Representing in the Middle Years" was a 2-year project to investigate the development of visual literacy in the classrooms of 3 Canadian middle school teachers. These teachers tried a large variety of approaches and were generally optimistic about the increased use of visual materials to make classrooms more inclusive. They…

This document presents materials related to the Framework for Aesthetic Literacy, which provides a model for integrating the study of the arts and English/language arts in kindergarten through high school. The instructional guide included in the document describes the philosophy, purposes, and curriculum design of the framework, suggests ways the…

J.E.B. Stuart High School moved into the minicourse elective program five years ago from an anthology-survey oriented English curriculum. The students are grouped into two levels, one offering minicourses for eleventh and twelfth graders and the other offering minicourses for ninth and tenth grade students, with some courses open to all of the…

Describes a project to integrate teaching of the separate language arts in three California elementary schools. Includes the philosophical statements of the project; guidelines; activities for before, during, and after reading; and a positive evaluation of the project. (HTH)

Describes a summer institute for classroom teachers and arts specialists on integrating the arts into language arts in order to meet newly mandated viewing and representing strands in school curricula. Outlines the results of a survey sent to participants one year after the institute. Concludes that an intensive professional development experience…

The purpose of this study was to develop a rationale for and to organize sequences of visual education concepts and skills that could function as a part of a secondary language arts program embodying the approaches of James Moffett. The literature on visual education was studied to identify those factors related specifically to professional…

An elementary school project using computers to enhance the teaching of basics in mathematics, language arts, and early learning is described. (MP)