The 11 papers in this volume were presented at the 1996 American Statistical Association (ASA) meeting in Chicago (Illinois), August 4 through 8. This is the fourth collection of ASA papers of particular interest to users of National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) survey data published in the "Working Papers" series. The…

The failure of major educational reform efforts to acknowledge the multicultural needs of tomorrow's teachers illustrates the marginal status that issues of multicultural education and multicultural teacher education typically receive. This paper examines the literature on multicultural teacher education. The review suggests that teacher education…

This paper reports the outcomes of a study that utilized descriptive, qualitative methods and a series of case studies to investigate how students are diagnosed with pervasive developmental disorders, specifically Asperger syndrome under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. The study focuses on students attending elementary schools in…

This book includes: a theoretical summary of the various facets of motivation, an examination of how the theoretical insights can help classroom practitioners in their everyday teaching practice and practical recommendations on how motivation can be researched and assessed. The following chapters are included: "Main Challenges of Motivation…

A study explored the lives of families and successful readers within "at-risk" environments. This inquiry sought to identify and understand the home and family characteristics that enable children to defy the myths and become successful readers and literacy users, when individuals and institutions would suggest they would fail. Through…

This study evaluated the communicative, social, and emotional development of 22 deaf Swedish pre-school children with cochlear implants over a 2-year period. Video-recordings (every 3 months) and observations of the children in natural interactional settings at home and school as well as interviews with parents and teachers provided the study…

Based on collaborative learning theories, this qualitative study describes seven adult students' experiences of learning in a context of synchronous computer-mediated communication within a distance education environment. The setting was an 8-week, Internet-based undergraduate/graduate sociology course sponsored by Indiana University Purdue…

Within the South African tertiary education context, information management is taught from a variety of perspectives, including computer science, business management, informatics, and library and information science. Each discipline has a particular multidisciplinary focus dealing with its fundamentals. To investigate information management…

This paper reports the results of a 3-year study of children's use of computers in their homes and examines the implications of such use for educators. Subjects were over 400 children between ages 5 and 12 who came from a variety of social, economic, and cultural backgrounds in urban Sydney (Australia). The study aimed to develop knowledge and…

The purpose of this study was to describe and interpret the cognition of a graduate student during information retrieval using the World Wide Web. The participant was a doctoral student in psychology with little experience using the Internet, and even less experience with the World Wide Web. The student performed an open search of her dissertation…

This paper provides an overview of the IT (Instructional Technology) Clinical graduate course at Virginia Tech and compares the perceived reality of the Clinical experience, in terms of benefits and concerns, with students' initial expectations. The paper begins with a discussion of the IT Clinical plan, the sociology of the learning environment…

The purpose of this study was to examine and describe the incidental learning activity of students in an asynchronous online course in a higher education setting. This research was conducted with data collected from interviews, journals, observations, email messages, and online conferencing software postings of 22 members of three sections of a…

This paper reports on the findings from a qualitative case study evaluating an online curriculum framework for high school students. This framework integrates content, context, and technology with primary documents for the "Valley of the Shadow" Civil War Web site. Data were collected through interviews with selected students and the…

The purpose of this study was to determine the influence of the school board/superintendent relationship on academic achievement in one Texas school district that serves high-poverty, majority-minority students. Previous studies identified successful school systems with school boards and superintendents who functioned as a true leadership team.…

The Young Scholars Program at The Ohio State University is a 6-year pre-collegiate intervention program designed to prepare academically talented, economically disadvantaged minority students for college education. This study describes the success of this effort to reshape the traditional presentation of agriculture. (Author/DKM)