Evaluates the impact of a four-year early childhood teacher education program in which preservice teachers were trained to identify and understand the roles of teachers through classroom observation, readings, and discussion. (DE)

Reviews "Full Service Schools: A Revolution in Health and Social Services for Children, Youth and Families," by Joy G. Dryfoos, and "Transdisciplinary Play-Based Assessment: A Functional Approach to Working with Young Children," by Toni W. Linder. (HTH)

Suggests that when teachers study their children in systematic ways to enhance classroom management, they are participating in action research. Discusses how data for action research are collected, for example teacher diaries and student portfolios. Presents two examples of action research: one on block play and the other on curriculum…

The Student Record of Behavior (StRoBe) is an instrument that provides information about students' behaviors in the classroom. Researchers had preservice teachers use the StRoBe during their field experiences. The students believed it helped them focus on specific school behaviors, clarify behavioral patterns, and integrate what they observed with…

Eleven adolescents with serious emotional disturbances and 11 nonhandicapped peers, and their teachers, were observed in vocational education settings. The behavior of the two student groups did not differ significantly nor did the behavior of teachers toward the students differ. Implications for mainstreaming in vocational education classes are…

This study of book interest behaviors of preschoolers focused on four year olds who exhibited a low interest in books in classroom contexts. It was found that providing access to books without teacher mediation did not result in increased book interactions or changes in the childrens' book interests. (18 references) (LRW)

Describes a pilot gender issues course in the University of Ottawa's Bachelor of Education program. The course considers the role of gender issues in adolescent and teacher development, the school curriculum, organizational structure, and interactions. Evaluations indicated that the course was strongly supported by most students, although some…

Reports on a pilot study that attempted to uncover, through classroom observations, how experienced social studies teachers explore and reinforce student understanding of concepts that comprise the adopted curriculum. Particular attention is paid to the use of metaphors, analogies, and similes as examples or reinforcements of verbal or written…

Discusses a case study of how experienced social studies teachers convey the concepts that comprise the curriculum. Reports that researchers observed 3 teachers for 20 hours each. Describes a preference among the teachers for anthropomorphic, familial, and popular culture references. Explains that visual representations were used only as passing…

Introduces a system for recording and using classroom observation (consisting of cycles of teacher entries based on classroom observation, related hypotheses about students' strengths and needs, and regular checking and revision of the hypotheses) that was developed for elementary and middle school students who have difficulties reading. (SR)

This commentary focuses on the application of D. Rogosa and G. Ghandour's work to observational research on classroom processes. Rogosa and Ghandour have shown that the short length of an observation is typically the dominant source of error. Investigators should conduct observations for as long as possible. (SLD)

Advocates the Redfern Model of teacher evaluation, which involves the teacher in the evaluation process through goal setting and self-evaluation in cooperation with the evaluator. The Redfern Model can be combined with the Classroom Observations Keyed for Effectiveness Research (COKER) as an objective measurement of classroom performance. (KS)

A creative solution is offered for the problem of finding good quality recordings of classroom events for a master's TESOL (teaching English to speakers of other languages) course on classroom observation: short excerpts from television programs and films where classroom scenes take place. Three instruments are applied to the excerpts. (21…

This study examined whether teacher-implemented classroom measurement procedures of short duration are as reliable as methods used in research studies to determine behavior state (e.g., awake active, awake inactive, asleep, drowsed) of six students with profound mental disabilities. Results indicated that more frequent but briefer measurements…

Discusses the meaning of being a teacher-researcher, emphasizing the need to involve teachers in research to link theory and practice and noting how participant observation helps them inquire into practice. Practitioner-researcher examples from teachers involved in a graduate research course are presented. The cases support and explicate…