A U.S. frontier theme park is opening in your (the student's) home town. The featured adventure rides will be forms of transportation used in the late 1700s to early 1800s to journey west across the Appalachian mountains. Each ride represents an historically accurate time and place. The students need maps identifying where the mode of…

In this activity, first grade students learn their addresses and their places in space. Each student pretends they are a student in Ms. Frizzle's class and are to help the class figure out how to get home. The students create their own intergalactic address book, so that on their next trip into the universe they will have a map to guide them back…

The "No Child Left Behind" Act (2002) requires that all students have access to the general curriculum at their designated grade level. Federal guidance received from the US Department of Education noted that these extended standards are intended only for students with the most significant cognitive disabilities. A key goal is to assure…

Using data from in a large Mid-western district, this study analyses the use of academic skills in work-based learning. The primary question asked in this study has to do with the impact of participating in work-based learning on the use of academic skills. Four sets of academic skills were measured using surveys (language arts, math, science, and…

This book is designed to help teachers, teacher-librarians, administrators, and district staff create a literature program that integrates literature within the context of resource-based learning. The book is organized into three sections. Part 1: "Critical Components of Learning through Literature" discusses in detail how each of the…

To successfully reach out to a diversity of learners requires substantial support. The Digest addresses some sources of support intended as a complement to and a scaffold for teachers and administrators who experiment with different ways of meeting a diversity of learning needs. It highlights ways in which classroom teachers and learning center…

This is the 17th year of statewide student testing under the Arizona Student Achievement Program. To fulfill the requirements of Arizona law, a nationally standardized, norm-referenced achievement test in the subjects of reading, language, and mathematics must be adopted and implemented for Arizona schools. For the 1996-97 school year, the State…

Linking Multiple Intelligences theory and portfolio use is discussed. The question asked by Multiple Intelligences theory is: "In what ways is this person smart?" rather than "How smart is this person?" The portfolio compiler is forced to think about the ways particular intelligences are demonstrated or performed. Attempts to…

This book provides activities for fourth, fifth, and sixth grade teachers and librarians to use in the spare moments that can be transformed into educational experiences. The activities range from individual paper-and-pencil games, to partner activities, to whole-class ideas, and combinations thereof. The activities are arranged by subject (i.e.,…

This lesson for grade 12 is designed to raise student awareness of the potential of human cloning and of the effects it could have on the present, naturally born population. Students work in teams to research the issue and are provided with background information, detailed instructions, on-line resources, and reflection questions. The teacher's…

This book suggests that both students and teachers should think constructively about classroom literacy practices through the use of diagnostic-reflective portfolios--the result of a process of collection and reflection in which teachers and students collaborate to demonstrate a learner's growth over time. The book tells the story of a…

A reflective thinking model has been developed by reading/language arts faculty at Northwest Missouri State University to provide opportunity for elementary education majors to think reflectively about their teaching and to determine ways to improve their instructional practices. During a 7-week reading/language arts practicum experience,…

This collection of 45 lesson plans contributed by English language arts scholars and practitioners provides activities that have been tested and proven effective with all levels of learners in middle school and high school classrooms. The activities in the collection advocate using unconventional strategies, competitive games, art and multimedia,…

"Crosstown," the television program featured in this videotape and teaching guide, depicts a teenager who is forced, due to her father's lack of child support payments, to leave her comfortable home four years after her parents' divorce and to move across town to an apartment in an inner city neighborhood. The teenager decides not to be…

This book provides functional, pragmatic activities for educators, future teachers, and parents to promote the gift of literacy to others. The book offers 101 detailed lesson plans for the four literacy domains of oral and written language, word recognition, comprehension and strategic reading for narrative text, and study skills and strategic…