This guide is intended to provide direction to Kentucky districts and schools as they develop local curricula designed to meet the state's six learning goals and academic expectations as identified in the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA). Specifically, the guide provides direction to local curricula development teams; effects change by…

The media has criticized the American education system for being slow to implement technology in schools. To remedy that perception, the federal government and private corporations have planned additional funding for technology. This paper reflects on previous attempts to change, such as "New Math" or the "Follow Through" post-Head Start program,…

A study explored attitudes of adult vocational instructors in Central Ohio toward the use of higher-order thinking skills in vocational education. The attitude instruments developed by Kitinoja and Miller (1989) and Baldwin (1989) were adapted into a six-point Likert-scale to collect data from 32 of 33 full- and part-time instructors in 10 adult…

Preparing students to be both constructors and consumers of visual information will be an important responsibility for all teachers. This will mean giving learners the tools to go beyond what is merely visual to the deeper, human meanings that lie beneath. One important way that educators can prepare students to be wise visual consumers is to help…

Current research at Brigham Young University (BYU) determined that basic visual literacy instruction is needed in disciplines outside of the arts. Following a needs assessment survey of BYU's 83 departments, an honors general education Arts and Letters course in visual literacy was piloted in the 1996 winter semester. Lectures were presented by…

This digest briefly summarizes the contents of the "Civics Framework for the 1998 National Assessment of Educational Progress" in terms of the Framework's development and components including civic knowledge, civic skills, and civic dispositions. The framework may be used to inform and guide curriculum development projects in civics and…

While Purdue University Calumet (PUC) (Hammond, Indiana) has been a receiver of distance education for a number of years, a number of faculty expressed interest in developing courseware that would allow PUC to be a provider. After a distance education mission statement and goals were outlined, a pilot course was established. The distance education…

This paper describes one educator's experience with creating multimedia presentation materials for a college computer literacy class. The paper discusses: selecting software--the decision between authoring software and presentation software; selecting hardware--what type of computer systems to select, and issues when classrooms are equipped with…

Evolution is often equated with natural selection and is taught from a primarily functional perspective while comparative and historical approaches, which are critical for developing an appreciation of the power of evolutionary theory, are often neglected. This report describes a study of expert problem-solving in phylogenetic tree construction.…

The Student Learning Imperative (SLI) was created to stimulate discussion on how student affairs professionals can enhance student learning and personal development. This paper outlines the antecedents and background of the SLI position paper. A member of the committee that developed the SLI discusses here student affairs' historical goal of…

Six articles by Lynn Olson, published in various issues of "Education Week" starting in January 1993 and ending May 1995, describe a Maryland project to improve elementary education in the State: (1) "Winning NASDC (New American Schools Development Corporation) Project Takes Flight" (the basic skills children need to succeed in…

The 16 papers in this proceedings describe strategies and practices used in undergraduate psychology courses at two- and four-year colleges. The following presentations are included: (1) "Using the IDEAL Problem Solving Method in Groups," by R. Scott Smith; (2) "The Soul of Active Learning: Connecting Psychology and Faith," by…

This practicum paper discusses the development, evaluation, and revision of a student sex education syllabus at American River College (California). The syllabus is intended to provide an alternative learning format to the traditional lecture format. After a review of the literature, it was decided to use a fill-in or sentence completion format…

The purpose of this project was to develop, implement, and evaluate a simple, teacher-friendly, environmentally-based anxiety reduction intervention for fourth-grade students. Review of related literature indicates that children are often victims of stress due to academic and sociological variables which exist within the school environment.…

This document contains information designed for sex education in secondary schools. The materials here are for classroom use, and share a number of features: (1) they consist of "modules" of various lengths to fit within subject areas; (2) they place no special demands on the skill of the teacher; and (3) they all contain a component for…