This study represents an effort to construct a learning framework for knowledge building and collective wisdom advancement in a virtual learning community (VLC) from the perspectives of system wholeness, intelligence wholeness and dynamics, learning models, and knowledge management. It also tries to construct the zone of proximal development (ZPD)…

The purpose of this article is to provide a model of an academic intervention and support program in literacy that focuses on the needs of individual students and revalues them as readers, goals that are of extreme importance when working with adolescents who have repeatedly experienced academic failure and view themselves as poor readers. This…

This case study offers an in-depth look at how one school achieved change in its culture and in its approach to curriculum and instruction. The unit of analysis for this single case study is South Loop Elementary School (SLES) and the time period is from August 2002 to June of 2007, during which SLES students demonstrated sharply improved…

This correlation study examines the relationship between participation in online embedded professional development communities and student achievement gains in a College Algebra course taught by high school teachers to high school students for college credit. The participating teachers met weekly through a web-based meeting format using…

Overcome budget cuts, lack of leadership, top-down mandates, and other obstacles to professional development by using this book's take-charge approach. Joseph H. Semadeni guides you through a systemic method to professional development that: (1) Motivates teachers to continuously learn and apply best practices; (2) Makes adult learning activities…

Recent empirical evidence suggests that the updated DeLone and McLean's information systems (D&M IS) model can identify the determinants of success of online communities in terms of member loyalty (Lin and Lee 2006). This study is similarly concerned with the challenge of identifying the determinants of success of online communities, but it…

This paper describes the signature role played by accomplished, experienced teachers in professional learning communities, and the importance that these practitioners make their teaching public and shared. In so doing, the authors describe how accomplished practices can be shared between classrooms and between practitioners with varying levels of…

This timely book describes the work of the School Improvement Network, a partnership in which university professors and graduate students collaborated with K-12 school leaders and teachers to design, implement, and assess schoolwide action research projects focused on long-term school improvement. Presenting a comprehensive model, this resource…

This paper addresses prospective policy relationships between health and physical education (HPE) and contemporary education policies. It specifically explores the opportunities and challenges that contemporary education discourses present for policy and curriculum development in HPE. Contemporary education discourses of lifelong learning,…

Learning communities are becoming increasingly popular in the quest for enhancing student learning. The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of the "Healthy Youth" Learning Community on student learning outcome measures. In this study, the authors compared student learning outcome measures of students enrolled in those sections…

This paper looks at the collaborative construction of web pages in History by a Year-4 group of children in a primary school in the UK. The aim of this paper is to find out: (a) How did children interpret their involvement in this literacy practice? (b) How the construction of web pages was interactionally accomplished? and (c) How can creativity…

This article previews the emergence of "homo virtualis." Drawing on data from seven research studies, peer-reviewed published research articles, and selected excerpts of 30 months of field notes taken in Second Life [SL], the article examines virtual learning environments and embodiment through the lens of interactions of avatars with…

This study positioned the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act of 2002 as a reified colonizing entity, inscribing its hegemonic authority upon the professional identity and work of school principals within their school communities of practice. Pressure on educators and students intensifies each year as the benchmark for Adequate Yearly Progress…

The purpose of this study was to observe, describe, and analyze the aspects of school capacity within an urban turnaround school. School capacity factors included: "Teacher Knowledge, Skills and Disposition"; "Professional Community"; "Program Coherence"; "Technical Resources"; and "Principal…

Today's engineering graduates will solve tomorrow's problems in a world that is advancing faster and facing more critical challenges than ever before. This situation creates significant demand for engineering education to evolve in order to effectively prepare a diverse community of engineers for these challenges. Such concerns have led to the…