The Center for Autonomous Learning is designed to serve as a creative base for gifted students to learn through independent study, as they choose a topic of interest, determine questions that need to be answered, collect data, complete various activities, present the project to an audience, and have the project evaluated. (JDD)

Lists 193 class projects proposed by teachers participating in Foxfire courses and workshops, 1985-88. Cites grade level, project description, product, audience, teacher, and school. Organized by grade level and subject. (SV)

Describes a poetry assignment in which students select a poem to analyze and present before the class. Observes that unlike the traditional postures of detachment and impersonality, this approach of self-selections encourages students to establish an intimacy with poetry. (MM)

Describes a poetry-presentation assignment in which students select poems from examples studied in class and prepare oral presentations incorporating visual, dramatic, technical, or musical arts. Describes several student presentations resulting from this assignment. (MM)

This article describes Challenge Education, an instructional approach to student teaching which authentically and directly involves students in their own learning and utilizes the school culture as the learning laboratory. (IAH)

Describes a three-part career research project for high school seniors: a library-research chapter describing the career; an interview chapter about a person working in the career field; and a personal-experience chapter about spending a full day observing and working with a professional from that career field. (MM)

Consists of an interview with a teacher who advised a group of students in a money-making venture, the building and selling of model boats. Provides hints for working with young people in a group. (CH)

Describes a simulation game requiring students to role play and complete extensive writing exercises to help them become interested in Willa Cather's "My Antonia" and the pioneer experience of relocation and resettlement. Contains an extensive description of the simulation rules and procedures. (TB)

Presents a detailed assessment of a summer national Science Foundation Young Scholars Program for ninth and 10th graders. Results indicate that students perceive program success (emphasis on project success) differently from teachers and program organizers. Identified six variables that must be incorporated appropriately into the design of a…

In a clothing for special needs class, one student project involved becoming a clothing consultant to a blind man. The student and client evaluated and coded his wardrobe using a Braille-adapted computer, made Braille labels for clothing, and shopped to fill gaps in the wardrobe. The service learning project connected classroom learning with a…

Presents classroom curriculum and student projects that use dynamical systems--something that changes over time, such as weather or populations--to capture students' attention. (MKR)

Presents a rationale and method for introducing a hypertext authoring assignment in a professional writing course in computer-aided publishing. Describes a rhetorically centered pedagogy that incorporates portfolio assessment, collaborative authoring, and real world projects for teaching hypertext within the context of situated problem-solving…

Describes how one elementary school teacher uses three cornerstones to build a safe community for herself and her students: getting to know parents by asking herself to dinner; working with big ideas on long-lasting projects that grab students' attention and focus their drive to belong and to communicate with their classmates; and portfolios. (SR)

Technology is no "silver bullet" for transforming education. Observations in nine technology-using schools suggest that for technology to serve reform purposes, it must be tied to a coherent, schoolwide instructional agenda. Reform-minded schools should articulate their mission and restructure activities around student needs and…

Provides a guide for helping students perform melodramas via the intercom. The benefits include motivating students to read and heightening student self-esteem. Suggests five elements for a successful performance: a clearly written script, rehearsals, optimal voice levels and microphone distance, an introduction by the principal, and…