Compares two studies of service learning: a case study of a beginning special education teacher who implemented service-learning, and the results of a survey of graduates of a teacher training program who were asked about the extent to which they transferred their knowledge of service-learning to their classroom practice. (Contains 11 references.)…

Examines the outcomes of a two-part service learning project in a summer practicum for English as Second Language teacher endorsement candidates. The first component was to implement a summer family literacy program for ESL students; the second was to have the students participate in a service-learning project. Responses to the projects varied.…

Describes the results of the evaluation of a service-learning project designed to facilitate delinquency prevention and to promote resiliency in at-risk youth in the community. The involvement of undergraduate and graduate students in this mentoring initiative proved instrumental in the overall success of the program. (CAK)

Describes a two-year service-learning project for undergraduate students in a physical education teacher education program. Students reported that their experience had a direct impact on their collaborative skills, ability to apply their subject matter, their leadership skills, and ability to communicate their ideas in a real-world context.…

Discusses the Systemic Change Model for Leadership, Inclusion, and Mentoring (SLIM), designed to help directors of child care organizations lead successful systemic changes. The model includes recommendations for building caring, consistent relationships with the total system, staff empowerment, a mentoring program to help the director focus…

Describes and evaluates three computer-assisted simulations used with Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) and Microsoft Excel. Designed the simulations to reinforce and enhance student understanding of sampling distributions, confidence intervals, and significance tests. Reports evaluations revealed improved student comprehension of…

This article is based on a comparative study of French and English infant schools. The first section examines the understanding of "mistakes" from a socio-cultural perspective, relating assessment to teachers' culturally situated practice and values. While mistakes and failure for some are an inevitable outcome of French pedagogic choices, they…

This study identified effective teachers of high-achieving Grade 12 students in New South Wales, Australia. Nineteen teachers, across a variety of curriculum areas, were observed teaching and then interviewed. A further six teachers were interviewed only. Despite the high-stakes end-of-schooling examination, generating interest in and…

During the 1990s, there was considerable emphasis on promoting particular kinds of pupil grouping as a means of raising educational standards. This survey of 2000 primary schools explored the extent to which schools had changed their grouping practices in response to this, the nature of the changes made and the reasons for those changes.…

This paper argues that growing inequalities make it imperative that schools reinvent themselves around the issue of social justice. Through a case study of an Australian primary school, teacher-based forms of social capital are explored revealing progressive pedagogies to be an important precursor to the 'socially just school'.

In those far off days, before the days of the National Curriculum, there lived two rare beasts in the primary jungle. The beasts were known as "science" and "citizenship", and it depended on which school one went to, and which teacher one got, as to whether one learned any science at all or whether discussion of ethical issues…

When one begins to look at science in primary schools elsewhere, one is immediately struck by the fact that those in England are the odd-ones-out. Hence this is the second in a series of articles looking at how science is dealt with in other systems, beginning with England's immediate neighbours and then looking outwards towards school systems in…

For as long as people have sought to understand the world in which they live, stories have played an important role in helping to clarify and communicate their ideas. In ancient times, stories such as the four humours of the body provided a way of explaining health and disease. In the modern world, stories have largely been replaced by rational,…

The essential purpose of primary science should be to help children make meaningful sense of the world around them. This will enable them to develop into scientifically literate adults who have a critical understanding of the ideas of science, but who also have respect, care and sensitivity for the world they live in and their impact on it. If…

Protein synthesis is a complex process and students find it difficult to understand. This article describes an interactive discussion "game" used by first year biology students at the University of Sydney. The students, in small groups, use the game in which the processes of protein synthesis are actioned by the students during a…