The purpose of this study is to analyse pupil welfare team meetings as an institutional context for handling dilemmas of schooling. Our focus is on how difficulties encountered by teachers and pupils are categorized and accounted for by team members (teachers, school administrators, and various experts). As a discourse community, the pupil welfare…

Because growing up has become the art of survival for many young people, a professionally conducted course in street smarts can help them identify problems, understand consequences, and make good decisions. The information and activities contained in this text can teach students how to take care of themselves when confronted with challenges. It…

An exploration of writing anxiety suggests that it is a normal form of behavior rather than a pathology, but that it varies in degrees of its dysfunctionality. Excerpts from the log books of college students in a writing anxiety workshop illustrate four broad categories of writing anxiety: procrastination, feeling emotionally distressed, thinking…

Calls attention to a process of social negotiation in specific contexts between the distressed person and those with whom he/she is involved that shapes the way troublesome events are progressively understood. (Author/AM)

A survey designed to inventory problems encountered by pharmacy students is described. Student problem prevention programs, it suggests, should focus on financial counseling, workloads, student participation in committee and planning activities, the importance of learning and professional performance as opposed to grades, and job and career…

Describes elephant experience as situation which person is unable to integrate. Discusses ways in which school personnel can help student to cope more effectively by understanding the symptoms, sources, and process of using experience constructively. (CJ)

Surveyed 53 Greek elementary school teachers and 55 teacher trainees regarding school psychologists. Subjects rated usefulness of school psychologist in solving learning, conduct, and attention problems of students. Findings suggest that teachers and trainees held positive perceptions about school psychologists. Willingness to follow through with…

Recent papers document that student problem-solving competence varies (often strongly) with representational format, and that there are significant differences between the effects that traditional and reform-based instructional environments have on these competences [Kohl and Finkelstein, Phys. Rev. ST Phys. Educ. Res. 1, 010104 (2005); Kohl and…

Discusses the difficulty of breaking bad news to parents, whether the news pertains to center policy or a child's behavior. Provides strategies for presenting news and for helping parents to overcome difficult situations, including gathering facts in advance, arranging an appropriate time, and having resource materials available for parents. (MOK)

Presents framework for collaborative problem solving between elementary school counselors and teachers. Describes factors that effect the use of the framework and the impact of the behavioral conceptual framework on teacher behavior. Strategies for counselor to collaborate with teachers in developing, implementing, and evaluating interventions is…

Forty 17- to 18-year-old subjects scoring above or below a sample median on the Beck Depression Inventory participated in a controlled study to assess their reactions to solvable and unsolvable problems with and without the interference of noise. Under helpless and nonhelpless conditions, depressive symptomatology affected problem-solving ability,…

This paper articulates a perspective on learning to discuss ways in which students develop personal sense and negotiate meaning in a middle school algebra context. Building on a sociocultural perspective that incorporates mental objects, learning is described as a mutually dependent process involving personal sense making and the public…

In "creative listening" sessions, participants alternately present their ideas (for fixed periods of time) and listen silently to the other participants. This paper examines the value of this method as an aid to problem solving and offers suggestions for teachers serving as mediators and participants in creative listening sessions. It describes…

Counselors can perform an invaluable service to teachers by leading teacher groups. Teacher groups have repeatedly demonstrated their ability to help beginning and experienced teachers significantly improve their attitudes in the affective domain. Teachers find that changing their attitudes creates an easier, more positive working relationship…

Problems in mathematics education as a social activity are the major focus of this document. Paragraphs that describe major problems in mathematics education point out at least eleven major issues as seen from the author's perspective. (MP)