School classes can be conceptualized as bounded communities of practice made up of teachers and students working together to build knowledge. Teachers make design decisions about physical and virtual spaces supported by information and communications technologies, and about curriculum. Design influences how students go about their work, and their…

Practical guidelines are offered for the use of synchronous online conferencing software by session administrators and moderators. The configuration of the software prior to conferencing sessions is discussed, and the planning and implementation of useful collaborative activities such as "synchronised browsing." The combination of these…

One Texas elementary school's teachers uncovered a straightforward method to raise achievement for every child who wasn't succeeding.

Adding new chapters on emergent literacy, special needs children, and technology in the reading/writing classroom, the second edition of this book emphasizes that teaching children how to read and write is not enough--teachers must create an environment that invites children to want to read and write for real, communicative purposes. Chapters in…

Based on a Secretary's Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills (SCANS) Life Management Retreat held in June 1996, this two-part compilation provides instructional resources and teaching strategies developed by life management faculty in California's community colleges. Following an introduction to the teaching of life and home management and a…

Although basic skills and English language instruction are often viewed as real needs at the workplace, few companies provide this for their workers. Those that do are motivated by one or more of these factors: product quality improvement, commitment of top management to training and education, or the sales effort of an educational provider. Those…

Several factors have indicated the necessity of formally requiring computer literacy at the university level. This paper discusses the reasoning for, the development of, and content of two computer literacy courses required of all freshmen. The first course contains computer awareness and knowledge that students should have upon entering the…

Preservice teachers must see appropriate instruction in action; they must see content in conjunction with process. Content, process, and active student involvement are necessary for the creation of new cognitive structures that are congruent with the view that reading is an interactive-constructive process. Three types of literacy course…

The 18 papers in this proceedings describe strategies and practices used in undergraduate psychology courses at two- and four-year colleges. The following presentations are included: "The Costs and Benefits of Critical Thinking," (Randall E. Osborne, Judy Laws, Ken Weadick, and Vicki Mantooth); "What's a Developmentalist To Do?" (Judith Luis);…

This presentation describes the distance education program at Memorial University (Newfoundland), which operates the Telemedicine Centre, including an audiographic, teleconference network that uses a combination of hardware and software to turn an MS DOS computer into an interactive long distance blackboard. Topics covered by the presentation…

As part of the education reform movement seeking change in both teaching and teacher education, a graduate teacher education course at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, "Integrating Museum Resources into Classroom Instruction," offers teachers a chance to engage in problem solving for their own students through varied…

Reviewing accreditation standards and employer needs surveys emphasizing the importance of general skills for graduating occupational students, this paper describes the 5-year process utilized at Tacoma Community College, in Washington, to develop and implement a general education program for its occupational degree and technical certificate…

This paper presents a model that profiles organizations as they attempt to implement strategic distance learning. This model, Stages of Organizational Technology Capability for Distance Learning, identifies behaviors exhibited by business and industry that maximize use of technology for education and training at a distance, and ultimately…

The CLASS (Communication, Learning, and Assessment in a Student-centered System) Project is creating a complete, accredited, high school sequence for delivery on the World Wide Web. The Department of Distance Education of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) is a recipient of $18 million in federal funding to develop the sequence. When…

This paper discusses the remaking of the MIS (Management Information Systems) core course in a graduate business degree program. The graduate MIS course has many of the same problems as the undergraduate one, which has been described as "the widow maker." Several attempts to modify the course resulted in lower evaluations. The course…