The Quality Assurance Program for Learning Resources Specialists is part of the Houston, Texas, Plan for Excellence and addresses the renewal and professional growth opportunities for the specialists. The program is administered by a bi- or tri-dimensional assessment team that may consist of the principal, an instructional supervisor, and the…

Social participation behavior of 33 2- and 3-year-old children was observed during free-play in order to identify differences between age groups as well as differences between contemporary outcomes and Parten's 1932 findings. Trained observers recorded the frequencies of play behaviors, utilizing a time sampling procedure and Parten's categories…

This report introduces the concept of a "metacourse"--i.e., the provision of mental models, problem solving strategies, key concepts, and other structures--to assist students in learning programming, and examines the effect of the use of such a metacourse on high school programming students. The experimental group consisted of 6 teachers…

The purpose of the Delaware Performance Appraisal System is to assess instructional performance of teachers so that the quality of instruction can be improved, professional development activities can be prescribed, and a foundation for administrative decisions can be developed. The procedures outlined in this publication are the minimum standards…

A study was conducted to create an instrument for systematically coding qualitative processes of children's cooperative and associative play. Data were gathered through observations of 16 preschool children ranging in age from 47 to 59 months and attending a day care center using the High/Scope Preschool Curriculum Model. A total of 20 hours of…

Reports, summaries, and recommendations are presented on the following research studies: (1) Beginning Teacher Studies; (2) Instructional Skills for Teaching Higher Order Thinking; (3) Development of the Conferential Observation Instrument; (4) Predictive Validity Studies Conducted to Test the Relationship Between Teacher Performance as Measured…

The work of the Florida Teacher Evaluation Project was based upon the assumption that one of the most promising approaches to the improvement of student learning is through the study and modification of teacher behavior. The work has produced products in the areas of domain documents, handbooks, and manuals. This report is an extension of the…

This paper discusses how kindergarten children and their teachers "perform" in kindergartens and how they "account" for their actions. Reported are conclusions from a series of three studies carried out in 15 Israeli kindergartens. Data for the first two studies were collected in non-participant observations, audio-recordings,…

A project was designed so that two Ph.D candidates in English education at New York University (NYU), Bob and Betsy, could observe one another's classes and participate in the course, taking part in discussions and group work and even writing some of the assigned papers. For fifteen weeks, the teachers attended each other's freshman writing…

The relationship between preschool children's level of social maturity and their drawing expressions was tested; findings stregthened the contention that the drawings of preschoolers are not appropriate indicators of their social maturity. (SDH)

This article illustrates how data on second language learning can contribute to linguistic theory and to teaching procedure. (AM)

This paper discusses playfulness and creativity and draws educational implications. The suggestions in the paper are intended to provide a rationale for incorporating foolish interludes, humor, flexibility, and the playful side of human nature into classrooms to stimulate creative thinking in young people today. Play is described as a mode of…

The Coping Analysis Schedule for Educational Settings (CASES), an observation instrument to identify students' primary coping or interaction styles, was evaluated with 44 educable mentally retarded (EMR), learning disabled (LD), or normal children (7 to 11 years old). CASES is intended to be a quantitative tool for collecting the data required…

Important aspects of field research in education were discussed at this seminar. A wide spectrum of topics included the theoretical foundations of field methodology, information gathering, access, validity, reliability, interpretation and explanation, limits of methods, ethical issues, and approaches to write-up and presentation of data. Four…

The purpose of this study was to develop a reliable instrument for observing the behaviors of caregivers in infant day care centers. Identification of custodial and developmental tasks of infant caregivers was accomplished by a review of the relevant literature, narrative recordings of infant caregivers, and verification of the tasks by a panel of…