To support and substantiate the assertion that the relationship between teacher and students matters a great deal when written literacy is at stake, a case study was made of a teacher in one high school creative writing class during one semester. The intent was to learn more about the socially negotiated nature of school writing and to identify…

Approaching literary study from two distinct yet interlocking perspectives (by looking at the major genres of literature and by examining the forms in which students of literature are expected to write about the literature they read), this book has two main sections. Following the Prelude, which treats the relationships between reading and writing…

Theoretically and practically, this book helps teachers develop a repertoire of practical consequences to use when students forget or do not know how to perform the behaviors agreed upon in their social contracts. A range of strategies are suggested for creating additional consequences and encouraging treating students in fair, dignified, and…

A study gathered quantitative and qualitative data on the cognitive and affective outcomes for gifted students (grades 3-6) in full- and part-time programs from three classrooms in each of two neighboring school districts, one urban and one rural. While the belief emerged in both districts that the full-time program served the needs of gifted…

A multi-purpose, multi-user evaluation system was designed to improve the quality of the reporting of information gathered in testing and evaluation practices. One part of the system, the reporting system for information resulting from a district standardized testing program, was described. The Student-Problem Package software was modified to…

A study was conducted at the University of Maryland (College Park, Maryland) in the Fall 1985 15-week semester to test the effects of advanced knowledge of grading criteria on students' writing skills and attitudes in a Freshman Composition class. A holistic grading scale, which was distributed to students as a checklist for revising writing…

Women who reenter college after years of work or family responsibilities were compared to women with similar backgrounds who do not reenter school on measures of fear of success and achievement anxiety. A questionnaire designed to determine reentry status, age, socioeconomic standing, facilitating and debilitating anxiety, and fear of success was…

Literature on the impact of stress on various elements in the teaching-learning process in the school environment is reviewed. Writings and research findings on stress are discussed in relation to: (1) children and adolescents; (2) gifted students; (3) mentally handicapped student; (4) teachers; (5) teacher stress as it affects learning; and (6)…

Two ninth-grade classrooms and the dynamics between the social organization of the classroom and the teaching of subject matter were studied. A general mathematics and a social studies class, both geared for the academically deficient, were observed during one academic year. Observations focused on student and teacher behavior in the two classes…

Many influential style guides endorse the stylistic prescription that writers, particularly technical writers, should revise noun compounds into phrasal or clausal paraphrases. While the prescription is well-intentioned, it fails to take into account that a reader's comprehension of compounds, whether long or short, is a complex process dependent…

During 1975-1979 this research into the potential of computerized adaptive testing to reduce errors in the measurement of human capabilities used Marine recruits for a live-testing validity comparison of computerized adaptive and conventional tests. The program purposes were to: (1) identify the most useful computer-based adaptive testing…

Intended for students taking the Grade 12 Diploma Examination in English 30 in Alberta, Canada, this reading test contains 80 multiple choice test items based on the ten readings in the readings booklet. The questions examine the student's skills in (1) understanding meanings, (2) understanding and interpreting the relationships between form and…

A communicative repair has been defined as the ability to persist in communication and to modify, repeat, or revise a signal when the initial communication attempt failed. From an operant perspective, initial communicative acts and communicative repairs can be considered members of a response class in which each response produces the same outcome.…

This article describes 1) the special features and accessibility of an innovative web-based practice instrument (WebMA) designed with randomized short-answer, matching and multiple choice items incorporated with automatically adapted feedback for middle school students; and 2) an exploratory study that compares the effects and contributions of…

A series of four studies (employing combinations of multiple baseline and reversal designs) examined the effects of both antecedent and consequent events on the social interactions of four primary grade withdrawn children. These four experiments were conducted during the first year of pilot-testing a program aimed at increasing the social…