Teachers of English as a second language in Japan often have difficulty in stimulating spontaneous classroom discussion; Japanese social and classroom custom dictates subdued and respectful student behavior. Suggestions for overcoming this inhibition are made. (CHK)

Discusses the role of Student Personnel Services in aiding students to identify and evaluate, through rational dialogue, the "causal variables" of human misery and degradation as the strategy of their preparation to innovate societal change. (Author)

With proper inquiry into pertinent source material, a teacher can spark discussion and intelligent analysis of current issues on days when planned curriculum is not productive. Preplanning and questions for a discussion on Vietnam are offered as an example for teacher preparation. (DE)

This paper discusses teaching psychological foundations courses to undergraduate preservice teachers. It is argued that the current approach to pedagogy in this area is ineffective because it does not take account of the fact that most prospective teachers, after years of acting as participant observers of the acts of teaching and learning, have…

A study examined the influence of discussion questions with a dual focus on important and implied text ideas in children's story understanding. Subjects, 106 third-grade children from 2 middle-sized Illinois cities were randomly assigned to 4 experimental groups and 1 control group. Their comprehension was measured with free and probed story…

This summative evaluation of two educational television programs, "The Edge" and "The Fortesque File," was based on a sample of "white" and "colored" classified respondents in the Greater Cape Town (South Africa) area. The two samples, which were divided into small panel groups of six to eight respondents…

An ethnographic approach is taken to describe the development of student critical thinking in the Pittsburgh Discussion Project, focusing primarily on discussion experiences in three classes (one college-bound 9th-grade class and two mainstream 11th-grade classes) over the school year. Weekly discussions were audiotaped, and interviews were…

A need exists for development of communication competence as a part of management. Although public relations literature has dealt with the nature of management counseling and when and why it should be practiced, the literature has not clearly defined the importance of audience analysis, location of the management counseling sessions, and…

While covering various English language forensics activities in Japan, this special journal issue is heavily devoted to debate. The 22 articles in the journal are divided into five sections as follows: (1) general information on the Japan English Forensics Association (JEFA); (2) debate, including reports on debate tournaments around the world, a…

The double-entry journal requires students to write affective response statements to literature readings and to compare such entries with those of classmates. Use of the double-entry journal is intended to activate students' prior learning and present feelings, foster collaborative learning, integrate major language skills, and encourage the…

The extent of use of the Personalized System of Instruction (PSI), also called the Keller Plan, at a large university campus was investigated. Attention was also directed to the features of PSI used: mastery criterion, self-pacing, proctors, number of times students could retake an exam, and the number of forms of each examination used. The PSI…

This paper reviews some of the findings of research on classroom questions, and considers ways in which sociolinguistic theory may help resolve some questions it leaves unanswered. The paper is divided into three sections, which correspond to three features of questions. The three features are the "context" of questions, the "content" of…

A series of studies addressed basic questions about instruction in subject areas such as science and social studies at the elementary level, focusing on group discussion of textbook content and addressing the effects of instruction in terms of students' knowledge acquisition and their independent reading comprehension of new content. Subjects,…

Written for professionals and paraprofessionals involved in counseling, educating, or providing treatment or other services to parents and children, this manual details a training program for parents having difficulty managing their child's behavior. The program consists of eight weekly 2-hour group meetings, followed by individual consultations…

Prompted, in part, by a concern over the surprise and disillusionment many new teachers have expressed about the problems they encounter in the classroom, an instructor of an advanced writing class (required of all English majors and minors in the teaching curriculum) distributed to his students a five-page questionnaire/survey to see how they…