Poetry of the romantic age is often uninviting to students, leaving them puzzled because they do not sense the connections between the poetry and themselves. Yet, much romantic poetry can be enjoyed and comprehended if approached in terms of some personal, reflective, and connective readings. Wordsworth and Whitman are often avoided because they…

A study of feedback in conversational question-response exchanges focused on the questioner's feedback to the respondent. It examined three types of "followup" moves: the ordinary type revealing the questioner's attitude to the response and closing the exchange; the type signaling the questioner's reaction to the response and inviting…

Although many researchers conclude that education is a profession marked by high levels of stress or experience of "burnout," this paper contends that educators are more adaptable and hence less stressed than the literature would indicate. The paper surveys literature on educator stress, presents studies indicating low educator stress, and…

The Flesch readability index yields meaningful information about the responses of readers to texts. Because the formula is so simple, a group of English teachers wrote a program in BASIC that would count some obvious surface features of a text and calculate Flesch scores. Among the programing problems encountered were counting words (taking into…

The spontaneous use of imaging and its relationships to verbal recall and literary analysis were investigated in a study in which 72 college students read a literary text under one of three sets of instructions that manipulated processing depth in an externally valid fashion. Imagery reports and free verbal recalls of the story were collected…

This study examined the nature of teacher layoffs and their effects on the role enactment and coping strategies of teachers. Fourteen high school teachers, who were employed in a large urban school district plagued by declining enrollment, were interviewed. Each teacher had been "riffed" (reduction in force) and recalled at least once in the…

Many psychological and physiological disorders may have some etiology in an unconstructive response to anger. Still others may be exacerbated by repressed or suppressed anger. Anger is often a problem for clients seeking therapy, yet psychologists have little research upon which to develop a viable therapeutic approach. While skills in…

Based on the observation that taller males seem to have an advantage in date/mate selection, a study investigated the role that height plays in the choice of a partner. Subjects, 594 student volunteers from communication classes at a large Mid-Atlantic university, completed a questionnaire designed to assess such factors as respondent sex, present…

An exam analysis procedure was developed at Loma Linda University School of Nursing to help students who do poorly on tests identify problem areas. Using the student's exam paper, the student and instructor discuss each incorrectly answered question, and record the problem on a check sheet. The procedure makes it possible to identify how many…

This study examined the language of teachers and children during small group instruction in two cognitively oriented preschools. A total of 22 small group instruction sessions were videofilmed in each preschool. Lesson relevant utterances from the 44 videotapes were coded for grammatical and cognitive variables. In an examination of five specific…

In 1986-87, the Writing to Read (WTR) program was piloted in kindergarten classes of four elementary schools in Tampa, Florida. Under the direction of their teachers and the WTR aide, kindergartners worked in the WTR laboratory for 1 hour per day. Students moved through the five-station laboratory where they learned and practiced phonetic,…

The development, pilot implementation, and formative evaluation of a teacher evaluation system for schools in a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia, are described. The system also assessed counselors and media personnel. A committee of 17 teachers and 9 administrative personnel developed the evaluation procedures and instrumentation. A 3-year cycle, which…

A study investigated the effects on students' cognitive development of a freshman composition course in which reading, writing, and discussion were integrated in an attempt to increase students' awareness of ambiguities, uncertainties, and complexities. The design of the one-semester course was derived from William Perry's theory of…

A survey of 500 teachers attending graduate classes sought their opinions on the problem of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) in the schools. The questions dealt with the admission of children with AIDS to the school and the employment of teachers with AIDS. Results indicated that many of the teachers had reservations about having either…

The choice between the fusion of literature and life and a pedagogy of engagement, on the one hand, and the separation of literature and life and a pedagogy of detachment, on the other, is a painful one. Philosopher of education James Gribble would rather risk some form of aestheticism than allow that a great work of literature could be viewed in…