During the past decade there has been an increase in the training of undergraduates to provide mental health services, as well as an increase in the inclusion of field experiences as legitimate credit courses. These trends have produced two effects, i.e., greater marketability for undergraduate psychology majors and greater use of trained…

A course for first-year architectural students is described. The approach concentrated on developing an understanding of the nature of design activity through exploration of the kind of thinking that may be applied in order to improve the first-year studio work. The course is based on the following premises: (1) it is possible and educationally…

A user's guide for the McGill Evaluation System of instructional evaluation and a bibliography are presented. The guide covers the initial planning of an evaluation, data collection, and making changes in a course or program. The procedure used in the system contains the following sequential steps: describing the purpose of the evaluation,…

A stage in the development of new courses is discussed. Advice is given to course teams in the social sciences faculty at the Open University (England) on arranging for course team review of drafts of new courses. Several methods are discussed briefly: the traditional method of circulating drafts in the course team and having a discussion with the…

This descriptive report examines the objectives and outcomes of two experimental humanities courses designed to offer students fresh perspectives on common human experiences in community and family life through stories, poems, films, art, dance, and essays. After introductory material describing course design, the report outlines cognitive and…

The impact of students' prior interest in course subject matter on their evaluations of instructional effectiveness was determined. Students' evaluations of instructional effectiveness were collected in two different university settings involving 1,102 classes, while instructor self evaluations were also collected in one of these settings…

ALTHOUGH COMMUNITY JUNIOR COLLEGES ARE PRIMARY LABORATORIES OF FORMAL HUMAN LEARNING, THERE IS A SURPRISING SCARCITY OF STUDIES OF THEIR INSTRUCTIONAL EFFECTIVENESS. LITERATURE AVAILABLE IN THE CLEARINGHOUSE FOR JUNIOR COLLEGE INFORMATION INCLUDES DESCRIPTIONS OF INSTRUCTIONAL PROCESSES AND OF INNOVATIVE ACTIVITIES, BUT LITTLE INFORMATION IS…

A course was developed to provide foreign student teaching assistants (TAs) with improved classroom presentational skills. Class size was kept small and classes were offered once each week for two hours to give students sufficient opportunities to practice speaking. Relying heavily on student oral presentations, the teachers assigned progressively…

Reported is a study of sixth-graders' attitudes towards electrical energy. Students in Catawba County, North Carolina schools, which field-tested the Energy for Today and Tomorrow (EFTT) module, completed a 17-item attitude test, the Environmental Opinion Scale. This instrument measured opinions regarding nuclear power, electrical power…

This final report on field testing of minicourses in undergraduate biology lists the objectives, procedures, applications, and conclusions of the project in which twelve schools utilizing minicourses, developed at Purdue University, were sampled. Data were collected and analyzed on student achievement, student attitude changes, and student…

In order to evaluate the format and use of the instructor evaluation instrument at the University of Nebraska, Omaha, an urban commuter campus, 1,238 undergraduates answered a 31-item questionnaire. Results indicated that students' choices of classes were largely dictated by requirements of their major and by their work schedules. The six most…

A questionnaire survey was developed to measure the attitudes of students toward the Air Force Traffic Safety Course. Mandatory for virtually all personnel entering the Air Force, this course was taught in a standardized multimedia format at more than 140 locations . It was a 10-hour course of instruction covering environmental hazards, vehicle…

A lesson was developed containing materials designed to assist students in their adaptation to the novelties of a computer assisted or managed instructional environment, providing students with appropriate role models for increasing acceptance of their increased responsibility for learning and introducing a progress tracking approach to assist…

The Inter-American Center for the Teaching of Statistics (CIENES), Santiago, Chile--an educational unit of the Organization of American States (OAS)--was evaluated. Elements which were assessed included operating costs and program results; methods of meeting user needs more effectively; identification of possible duplication; and ways in which…

A general education course for sophomores at Baker University entitled "Shaping of Western Thought" is described. The goals of the university's general education program are enumerated and the ways in which this course serves those purposes are discussed. Focus in the course is on both personal and social values. Three values--love,…