How can an organisation move from awareness raising, in the form of natural history poster production, to the development of systems that change organisations? Through close integration of research and practice, the Gould League has achieved this transformation. It began with extensive research into best practice environmental education, going…

The advent of e-learning in higher education has entailed extensive use of online discussion boards to promote collaborative learning among students; however, the role of instructors as online facilitators is typically ill-defined due to a lack of sufficient standards or guidelines for good practice. In their audit of online discussion forum…

Design pattern creation, especially in the e-learning domain, is a highly complex process that has not been sufficiently studied and formalized. In this paper, we propose a systematic pattern development cycle, whose most important aspects focus on reverse engineering of existing systems in order to elicit features that are cross-validated through…

This article draws on results of an evaluation of Sure Start activities in an area of South Wales in 2004, focusing in particular on measurements of improvements to child development and measurements of benefits to parents. The article reports on the methods that were used to collect relevant data and examines the problems associated with linking…

This past year, Jobs for the Future studied strategies that community colleges are using to improve the quality and effectiveness of their services to low-income youth and adults. Much of this research was conducted for the MetLife Foundation Community College Excellence Awards Initiative. Across the country, in urban, rural, and suburban…

During 2003, Monash University Library conducted a comprehensive quality review as part of the university's program of reviews. A quality management group was established in September 2002 to drive the process. All staff were given the opportunity to contribute input to the initial self-review. Methods of collecting data, collating responses and…

This collection of best practices shares how 18 higher education institutions across the country have successfully evaluated and redesigned their student financial services programs to improve services to students and their parents and find cost savings for the institution. This volume illustrates how other institutions have successfully tackled…

The authors detail technology-based active literacy strategies that they employed with preservice teachers to enhance their skill and comfort level in providing appropriate technology-supported literacy instruction to future students. They examine four theoretical and pragmatic threads to include in course design: active learning, open-ended…

This report looks at the experience of those young people who broaden their learning and develop their essential skills by undertaking school-college partnership programmes. Its primary aim is to identify what makes these programmes successful for young people and what needs to be done better. It is intended to help schools, colleges, and local…

Introduction: This article results from a qualitative study of 1) information behavior in community problem-solving framed as a distributed information use environment and 2) approaches used by a best-practice library to anticipate information needs associated with community problem solving. Method: Several approaches to data collection were…

Recently the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs (MCEETYA) conducted a nationwide survey on programs that exhibit best practice in addressing student behaviour issues (de Jong, 2004). Seven themes related to the characteristics of best practice were identified in this survey. Alternative education programs…

This article briefly reviews the research on word learning and vocabulary teaching, provides a rationale for building a rich vocabulary and identifies nine guidelines for sound vocabulary instruction. Problematic classroom practices are highlighted and a "best-practice" vocabulary teacher is described. The article also includes a…

Drawing on the authors' considerable knowledge of the research and of federal and state policymaking in middle and high reading and writing, the Alliance for Excellent Education has worked for the past 2 months, at no charge to the state, to review existing data, gather opinions, study literacy achievement trends, identify literacy programs and…

This book addresses crucial questions about how to create full access to the general education curriculum for children with disabilities. Based on years of research and innovation at CAST (The Center for Applied Special Technology), the book provides a helpful overview of the digital solutions that are at the forefront of efforts to create…

For over the last 20 years, educators have been trying to find the best practice in using technology for student learning. Some of the most widely used applications with computers have been student learning of programming, word processing, Web research, spreadsheets, games, and Web design. The difficulty with integrating many of these activities…