The Senior Program at the private Blake School (Minnesota) gives all students an opportunity to create, plan, and execute their own educational program, a structured learning experience that reflects the individual student's personality and interests. It was developed to engage students at the end of their senior year and to assist in the…

Describes Greek language preparation for English students participating in an exchange program as part of their primary teacher training. It is concluded that the self-directed preparation can be improved by an outline of the stages in the learning of Greek, the availability of required support materials, progress checks, and testing of students…

Examines factors that should be considered in designing an independent study undergraduate library skills course using computer-assisted instruction based on experiences at the University of Minnesota, Saint Paul. Highlights include the use of HyperCard, revising modules, interaction, simulations, student attitudes, lack of instructor feedback,…

A science teacher at a Portland (Oregon) parochial school has made the school a major contender at local, state, and national science fairs. He instills confidence in his students through high expectations. Science projects are 25 percent of a student's grade, and through public presentation of findings, they learn public speaking skills and…

Describes an on-going action research project in which information and communication technology (ICT) is being employed to equip students with the tools for autonomous learning. Results of surveys given to determine previous experience and attitudes towards ICT and language learning--both before and after intervention--are reported. (Author/VWL)

Offers teachers practical advice on enhancing student learning through the use of online discussion. (PKP)

Quality is a value-laden and context-bound concept. Drawing on cultural psychology, this study examines the nature of cultural values underlying definitions of quality in American early childhood programs. From semi-structured interviews with 15 teachers and 15 administrators in center-based early childhood programs, three themes emerged: (a)…

Mathematics educators have found sociocultural models of teaching and learning to be powerful in their ability to describe and support the pursuit of instruction based on recent standards documents (e.g., National Council of Teachers of Mathematics [NCTM], 1989, 2000). These models of instruction, however, have been criticized for their lack of…

Gifted students are often described in the literature as being self-regulated, self-directed learners. Ten gifted primary students were interviewed in order to clarify the concept of self-directed learning in students of primary age. The students provided information on their knowledge of self-directed learning, explanations of the self-directed…

This study set out to investigate the self-teaching of good and poor readers in pointed Hebrew--a highly regular orthography. Four groups of children (three groups in Grades 4 to 6, and one group in Grade 2) were included in this study; poor readers with large discrepancies between IQ and reading ("dyslexics"), IQ-nondiscrepant poor…

Problem-based approaches to learning have a long history of advocating experience-based education. Psychological research and theory suggests that by having students learn through the experience of solving problems, they can learn both content and thinking strategies. Problem-based learning (PBL) is an instructional method in which students learn…

A distance education system may be viewed in terms of intrapersonal and interpersonal instructional dialogues that mediate the learning and instructional resources that enable such dialogues. Instructional resources include self-instruction texts, tutorial sessions, instructor availability, Web sites, and more. This study investigated the kinds of…

This research developed from the recognition that work-based placement briefing and debriefing sessions need to encourage reflection and student self-directed learning. An action research methodology was used to obtain students views of the value of briefing and debriefing sessions. Changes to session format were introduced and then in response to…

The National Consortium on Leadership and Disability for Youth (NCLD-Youth) is one of 15 Youth Resource, Information, and Training Centers focused on empowering youth and emerging leaders with developmental disabilities. The NCLD-Youth is a youth-led center with partners in the District of Columbia as well as in the states of Florida and New…

Self-regulated learning (SRL) researchers have paid relatively little attention to questions concerning (a) the level of experience and expertise required to create high-SRL environments, (b) how teachers acquire such expertise, and (c) how expert instruction needs to be to influence students' SRL positively. We agree with Randi and Corno (2000)…