This article was developed to assist the regular education elementary classroom teacher in utilizing practical bibliotherapy strategies for the inclusive classroom. Using quality children's literature for bibliotherapy helps students to grow socio-emotionally by identifying with the main character in the story with a disability which leads to…

Expulsion is commonly schools' last resort to maintain discipline and keep schools safe. But increasingly, educators are turning to "restorative justice"--an alternative method from the field of criminology--with promising results. According to Randall Comfort, assistant upper-school director, Mounds Park Academy, St. Paul, Minnesota, using this…

This article is a follow up to an earlier publication that developed the rationale for using conversation as a metaphor to teach research writing. We presented this proposed teaching approach at several conferences, including WILU in May 2005 at Guelph, Canada. The discussions with participants in these presentations validated the tenets of the…

An English teacher presents a unit on violence in young adult literature where she starts by helping students understand violence and its origins. The students express strong, informed opinions about "Shattering Glass" by Gail Giles through activities and class discussion to recognize the need to read and view images of violence from an…

Girls' bodies are often constructed negatively and passively in their dominant cultures, but at the same time, girls may collectively construct menstruation and the body in creative ways. By exploring menstrual talk in individual and group interview data from mostly white, high school age girls and boys in the US, this study finds that girls draw…

In an effort to combat racism, antiracist activists often use the structure of dialogue groups for interracial and transcultural discussions. The assumption that spoken English is an equally accessible language can pose barriers to participation in such groups. The use of art processes in interracial dialogue groups can shift the power dynamics…

On May 9, 2003 Christine Borne launched the electronic discussion group NEXGENLIB-L. Her aim was to involve colleagues around her age professionally, a group usually unheard in the professional literature and discussions. The list quickly burned up with complaints about library school and work places, frustration about poor pay and student loans,…

This article integrates research on minority influence and information sampling in groups. The traditional information-sampling paradigm implies that the discussion bias for common over unique information affects all types of groups universally. We proposed an alternative in which information sampling depends on the composition of opinions. We…

This article reports on research into the student experience of learning through discussions in a third-year undergraduate engineering subject. Information engineering students studying e-commerce were required to engage in face-to-face and online discussions as a key aspect of their learning experience. This study investigates the quality of the…

This article reports on an investigation of students' perceptions of an online discussion group conducted using PalTalk, which is Internet-based audio conferencing software. After initial practice with the program, students conducted four group sessions in which they discussed nonconfidential topics related to supervision of counseling. Students…

The rapid acceleration of online course offerings presents a design challenge for instructors who want to take materials developed for face-to-face settings and adapt them for asynchronous online usage. Broadcast lectures are relatively easy to transfer, but adapting content is harder when classes use small-group discussions, as in role-playing or…

Letters submitted to the discussion forum of the Lesbian Connection between 2000 and 2002 were analyzed to identify issues of importance to lesbians. The analysis revealed 5 discussion categories: (a) isolation, safety, and aging; (b) children; (c) lesbian relationships and sexuality; (d) physical and mental health; and (e) political issues. The…

This case study examined interaction patterns between men and women and the effects of the patterns on gender participation in online debates. Students labeled messages to identify each message as an argument, challenge, evidence, or explanation when posting messages to the debates. The results revealed no differences in the number of male and…

This paper draws from social science literature on Whiteness and anti-racism as well as personal classroom experience to examine the obstacles educators face in teaching anti-racism to White college students. Emphasis is placed on popular perceptions and common definitions of the word "racism" as it is used in mainstream American society. The…

One of the most reverberating social changes of the 20th century was the women's liberation movement. As new attitudes about women and their roles in society took hold, changes were made in the way in which females of all ages were represented in instructional materials, such as basal readers, curriculum materials, and tradebooks. Unfortunately,…