In the aftermath of such tragedies as September 11 and natural disasters like the tsunami in Southeast Asia and during contentious election years, social studies becomes more prominent in the curriculum. As such, teachers, not just parents or churches or the government, have the responsibility to help students make sense of the information to…

Innovation is an eight-part multimedia television series airing on public broadcasting stations throughout the United States. It focuses on technological breakthroughs and the personalities and circumstances that bring about dramatic changes in daily living. The series offers an array of fascinating material designed to engage students with…

Two equally powerful forces are helping shape the future of business education. First is the growing requirement for competent business managers on a worldwide basis. Second are the changing demands on our academic libraries as a result of the ongoing digital revolution. These dynamics call for new and innovative education systems such as…

This article provides a science lesson for the middle school level, the metric system is used for all methods of measurement. The example lesson utilizes edible fruit as the real-world focus and offers ideas for additional lessons and the integration of disciplines beyond mathematics. This lesson requires students to handle, examine, and possibly…

While attending a Postgraduate Certificate in Education (PGCE) course, this author was provided with the time and encouragement to try out different activities, styles, and strategies of teaching. She used this time to develop numeracy starter lessons with Y7 students, spending two weeks with each of four sets of students. She decided from the…

This article describes a professional development activity on planning strategies to make mathematics lessons more accessible for students with special needs.

This article explores the idea that teachers can improve their practice through reflection and action research. The author discusses the constructivist and socio-constructivist roots of action research. The case study explores the use of a project to improve learner autonomy and cooperation. Students made key decisions about the project content,…

Making math concepts understandable is a challenge--one that is more complex when a classroom includes students with learning difficulties. With this highly practical resource, teachers will have just what they need to teach a critical content area with confidence: research-based strategies that really work with students who have learning…

This article discusses how poetry can be used for teaching geography. The rational for using and writing poetry, its relationship to the National Standards for Geography, grade levels, pedagogical concerns associated with poetry writing, and subject integration are discussed. There are also classroom activities, sample discussion questions, lesson…

Most Americans are not very familiar with the first peoples of the Americas. Though some might argue that it is wholly unnecessary to have any knowledge about Native peoples, most would probably agree that some exposure to Native perspectives is a good thing for students. In this article, the author offers his perspective on the most important…

Knowing how teachers in China understand excellence in teaching is an important precursor to developing teaching standards. This study explores the conceptions of excellent teaching held by 20 middle school teachers in the north of China. A phenomenographic approach with grounded theory was used to interpret teachers' descriptions of a time when…

This book is designed to be a quick and easy resource for anyone teaching physics for the first time. Written after extensive research, this book is filled with reliable labs, demos and activities that work well in the classroom. Also included are lesson plans, diagrams, and teacher notes for every activity. The book is not the end--it is just a…

In evaluating the success of teacher development programs, valid and scalable measures of teaching practice are needed. We have developed and validated the Science Lesson Plan Analysis Instrument (SLPAI) for quantitative evaluation of teacher-generated multiday lesson plans. This paper presents the SLPAI as a complement to surveys and classroom…

This lesson uses a text about the houseboats of Kashmir to give students practice with descriptions, compound words, and participles. The lesson plan could be adapted to tourist destinations familiar to the students. Students are asked to write a description of their homes and create a tourism brochure for their own cities or towns.

In situations where it is not possible for trainees to practice teaching in local schools, teaching short lessons to their peers--called microteaching--can provide beneficial experience and feedback to teachers-in-training. The article includes guidelines for presenters, observers, and teacher trainers as well as a sample practicum class schedule…