Nonformal educational programs, which are frequently characterized by their transmission of knowledge outside the limitations and role expectations of the traditional classroom, exist today as they have throughout the past. Among the common characteristics of the diverse nonformal educational programs throughout the world is their responsiveness…

This paper discusses present child care provision for children of preschool age in the United States. After a brief historical preface that points out deficits and needed improvements in public school and infant programs, the discussion focuses on several aspects of established programs for 3- to 5-year-old children. In particular, research…

A school of education faculty designed the Doctoral Portfolio as a device for assessing their doctoral students' competence in the tasks that professional academics routinely perform. Each student assembled a portfolio after the completion of a set of core courses and before the dissertation. The components assessed in the portfolio were: (1) a…

The success of a new paradigm depends upon the level of coherency and organization within its supporting community, and Thomas Kuhn's argument concerning the resistance to new paradigms and their power to change the existing order can be used in the context of bilingual education. Bilingual education programs have the potential to create a…

A case study of curricular change compares two leading models of organizational change. One model stresses the uncertainty and disorder of major changes and views them as dramatic events. The other model sees major organizational shifts as the result of ordinary day-to-day processes and emphasizes their routine nature. For this study, the…

As part of a broader study of the National Institute of Education's Research and Development Utilization (RDU) program, this report focuses on the process by which collections of products (the knowledge base) were developed to serve clients' needs, the types of products included for dissemination, and the types chosen by sites. The seven project…

This publication discusses how the open-space school can facilitate the development and utilization of science learning units. The following three concepts are presented to establish a basis for this discussion: (1) the open classroom, (2) the open-space school, and (3) the learning center. An attempt is made to convey an operational definition of…

This project developed as an effort to investigate how the school could become more actively involved in educational innovation. This final report highlights work conducted over the period 1972-75 in the nineteen Organization for Economic Cooperation and Innovation member countries that took part in the project. The first two chapters summarize…

This paper focuses on the conflicts between communities and schools that occur as change and reform activities are implemented. The discussion (1) describes the nature of the relationship between educational organizations and the local (and more remote) environment; (2) suggests conditions that may cause the relationship between schools and local…

The purpose of this study was to estimate the costs in both money and teachers' and administrators' time required to implement the School Planning Evaluation and Communication System (SPECS). The primary source of data was the SPECS field test site activities records maintained by the SPECS development team. Costs were calculated for each…

Intended to provide information for Ivorian decision makers, this paper presents an overview of technological alternatives for the delivery of instruction at the post-primary level and their accompanying costs. Five alternatives for regular secondary education as it now exists in the Ivory Coast are reviewed: traditional, audiovisual-traditional,…

This handbook reviews some of the forms that can be used to package educational projects for dissemination to other schools, such as written reports, slide tape presentations, news releases, conference presentations, and workshops. Guidelines and suggestions in the essays on each format are supplemented by the appendices, which include a report…

This paper, designed to assess the degree of implementation of the important features of a curriculum innovation, was presented at the 1978 Bat-Sheva Seminar on Curriculum Implementation and its Relationship to Curriculum Development in Science, Rehovot-Jerusalem, Israel. It investigates the use of sub-interviews within the main interview to…

This dissemination and diffusion handbook for the Florida State Department Division of Vocational Education is divided into ten chapters. Chapter 1 describes the functions of the dissemination and diffusion (D&D) section of the division of vocational education. Identifying the procedures and processes to be followed, chapter 2 focuses on the…

This paper lists and tentatively assesses three experiments in preschool education in rural areas in France, and outlines the Massif Central development program which draws extensively on these experiments. In Experiment I, a peripatetic teacher worked with young children, concentrating on speech activities in four different single-class schools.…