Presents a study that used an ethnographic design to examine three inservice teachers' reflections on their experiences as social studies teachers. Finds four themes in the teachers' accounts: (1) content versus methods; (2) dissonance; (3) time; and (4) reconsidered social studies practice. (CMK)

Describes methodologies used successfully to engage the Roma community in Central and Eastern European schools. Notes that the goals of the project were to identify Roma children who were misplaced in special education schools, improve their academic skills, and integrate them back into the mainstream. Notes one of the methodologies used to engage…

Explores English-as-a-Second-Language students' introspective accounts of perceived underlying second language production processes for the purpose of discovering folk models that may impact on pedagogy. Findings reveal that the pervasive image emerging is a translation schema with a subcomponent of conscious grammar rule application. (19…

Discusses the need for teachers who work with immigrant students to become reflective about their ideology and how their belief systems affect their interaction with diverse families, noting the importance of their being aware of the delicate, nonstatic process of acculturation. Presents the voices of four novice teachers as they critically…

Notes that computers challenge teachers to find ways to incorporate technology in support of curricular and pedagogical goals. Profiles two primary grade students' discoveries and struggles as they negotiate the Web and related technology. Illuminates the tensions between guidance and freedom in the instructional process, and suggests some…

Presents findings from a 9-month ethnographic study of cross-cultural learning for the purpose of helping teachers better understand classroom conditions and behaviors that support and hinder students' comprehension of teachers' spoken language. Follows an 8-year-old native English speaker in an Icelandic classroom. Suggests that…

Using ethnographic research, data were gathered from 22 deaf adults, aged 55 to 84. Results indicated the educational programs they attended as children had ramifications throughout their lives, affecting their development of adaptive strategies, particularly their peer-based society and lifetime friendships which maximized sociability. (Author/DB)

Ethnographic techniques were applied to a post hoc examination of children's incidental behaviors during a metalinguistic intervention procedure--behaviors ignored in the original experimental design. The reflective and qualitative nature of ethnography was used to account for the 12 phonologically impaired 4-year-olds' varied perceptions of…

The development of critical ethnography in the field of education is traced. Critical ethnographers focus on research accounts sensitive to the dialectical relationship between social structure constraints and the relative autonomy of human agency. The status of critical ethnography as a research genre is discussed, and criticisms are described.…

Draws on sociolinguistic literature and on an ethnographic study of language use and bilingual education in Quechua-speaking rural communities of Puno. Consider the roles of both language planning and the schools in achieving language maintenance for Quechua. (35 references) (Author/CB)

Analyzes ethnographic data regarding one prolonged speech event, the negotiation of a driver's license at the Ministry of Transportation in Puno, Peru, from the perspective of Hymes' redefinition of linguistic competence. Implications for the acquisition of second language communicative competence are also discussed. (Author/CB)

This study describes and analyzes differences in student output across ethnicity and gender in a mixed monolingual English and bilingual Spanish/English class in order to understand how second-language oral skills are developed in a mixed classroom. Participant observation, informal interviews, and audiotaped classroom and tutorial interaction…

Decreased motivation in 13 female and 9 male tertiary-level Tamil students in an English for general purposes course was contradicted by verbal affirmations of their motivation. The contradiction reflects conflict between cultural integrity and socioeconomic mobility and leads to an ambivalent state with elements of accommodation and opposition in…

A three-day experiment set up by an early childhood teacher explored Piaget's view that children younger than age eight lack ability to take another's point of view. The experiment focused on a bear, the class mascot, and observations of children's empathetic behavior toward its "injury." Age-related differences in the children's…

Reviews an ethnography of the life experiences in home, school, and community of 14 Mexican American immigrant children as they struggle with acculturation processes. Argues that the authors fail to achieve an "ethnography of empowerment" that puts theory into practice and improves the living conditions of its subjects, and that this notion is…