Second in a series of columns on helping children develop content area literacy. Gives children's perspectives on appropriate uses of various media and tools in the elementary school curriculum, including computers. Comments on the future use of traditional resources such as books. (ET)

Discusses changes in higher education that are resulting from the use of hypermedia. Topics addressed include the structure of traditional texts; a distributed model for academic communication; independent learning as a model for higher education; skills for hypermedia literacy; database searching; information retrieval; authoring skills; design…

Presents the ASSURE (Analyze learners, State objectives, Select media and materials, Utilize media/materials, Require participation, Evaluate and revise) model, an approach for training professional staff on implementing technology in schools. Design and implementation of workshops for school staff are described, and a sidebar outlines a six-day…

Argues, on the basis of research carried out in Canada and Belgium, that not only does the formal learning of the ancestral language in school enhance the overall cognitive abilities of immigrant children but also constitutes the optimal means by which such children can gain literacy in the dominant language. (37 references) (MDM)

Describes how to create a school or district model for an Internet staff development training program for integrating information access skills into the school curriculum. Highlights include instructional design; facility development, including computer workstations; hands-on workshops that include electronic mail, gopher, and downloading;…

Reviews current research on free voluntary reading and discusses its benefits for vocabulary development, reading ability, writing style, spelling, grammar, pleasure, personal discovery, and literacy. Positive correlations are made between free voluntary reading and academic achievement and second-language acquisition. Eleven relevant documents…

Results of a quantitative analysis of empirical evidence related to parent-preschooler reading support the hypothesis that parent-preschooler reading is related to outcome measures such as language growth, emergent literacy, and reading achievement. Book reading apparently affects acquisition of the written language register. (SLD)

Studies the social interactions of two bilingual ethnic minority children during informal work and play settings in a kindergarten program. Finds that their literacy learning is hampered by isolation, the staff's apparent lack of interest in the children's home language and culture, and the staff's unawareness of cultural biases in the testing and…

A professor at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf (New York) describes an instructional approach used in a computer applications course. The approach employed classroom and individual interactions with deaf and hard-of-hearing students, personal computer demonstrations, laboratory sessions for hands-on learning, and criterion-referenced…

Many American Indian students are alienated from schooling by the obvious disparities and conflicts between language usage in the oral tradition of their communities and that required in written academic discourse. A community-based language model used with Lakota college students empowers students by teaching critical writing that fuses…

Comments on the articles presented in this issue with respect to their implications for classroom practices. Stresses that in this issue, the researchers describe how social context factors (such as adult viewpoints and adult-child interaction patterns) and physical context factors (such as variations in classroom space-time organization and…

Examined the effects of print exposure on growth of declarative knowledge and vocabulary in 133 college students and 49 elderly adults. Compared groups on two general knowledge tasks, vocabulary, working memory, syllogistic reasoning, and print exposure. Found that exposure to print was a significant predictor of declarative and vocabulary…

Discusses the challenges and opportunities facing social science academic reference librarians working with researchers in a rapidly changing technological environment. Highlights include faculty relations and training needs; assistance to graduate students, such as suggestions for bibliographic instruction; information products and user…

In critiquing the Sandia Report, Lawrence Stedman faulted it and other revisionist reports for emphasizing trend data rather than quality and not acknowledging educational requirements within a democratic society. The article addresses the issues, presenting evidence from additional studies to argue that none of Stedman's general contentions…

Elementary school teachers, administrators, and counselors need to implement educational strategies that effectively help children develop skills necessary to manage technological demands and interpersonal challenges related to living in a highly diverse modern society. Discusses projects and activities that involve the use of computers among…