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Following the whirlwind standards movement of the 1980s, the beginning of the 1990s ushered in an overwhelming interest in and use of testing to document students' progress. In 1991, the Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI) issued its second position paper calling for a moratorium on standardized testing in the early years of schooling. Citing the rising use of tests to label children, place children in special programs, and retain underachieving children in a grade level, ACEI denounced the use of these tests in the early grades and questioned their use in later grades as well. This article presents another position paper from the Association for Childhood Education International that denounced the continued use of standardized testing in the primary grades. ACEI also cautioned against the use of standardized tests as a sole means of assessment in every year throughout the upper grades. A detailed explanation on the effects of standardized test on student motivation, learning, and curriculum is presented. A list of alternative assessments in lieu of standardized tests are also discussed.

Childhood is a unique and critical stage of life. All children share the same basic needs for safety, health, nurturance, and dignity. The Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI) is committed to supporting children's development; respecting individual differences; helping children learn to live and work cooperatively; and promoting children's physical and mental health, self-worth, resiliency, education, academic competence, self-control, and responsibility. Corporal punishment conflicts with these goals and has no place in any child's life. This article provides the definition of corporal punishment, discusses worldwide initiatives for banning corporal punishment, cites the consequences of corporal punishment, and discusses the alternatives to corporal punishment.

This article presents an adaptation of the keynote address Steve Silvern delivered at the 2006 ACEI Annual International Conference and Exhibition in San Antonio, Texas. In his address, Silvern observes how educators seldom educate children "wholly." No one ever includes spirit when talking about the whole child, probably because spirit is thought of as a religious construct and public educators separate church and state. He also discusses the importance of consciousness raising among children. He relates that he does not advocate for a change in content of the curriculum but he advocates for a change in teachers' thinking, approach, and awareness of the learner. He also cites several strategies to help raise consciousness.

Reviews the history and uses of standardized testing, and suggests alternative methods of assessment. States the belief that testing exerts undue pressure on children, provides no useful information on individual children, and limits educational possibilities. Discusses the Association for Childhood Education International position paper which states that all testing of young children in preschool and grades K-2 should cease. (BC)

Worksheets hold a special place among the many well-intentioned--yet ineffective--items in the early childhood and elementary toolkit. They are nearly ubiquitous in some elementary classrooms and are even popular in preschools. Parents are encouraged when they see worksheets in their children's backpacks; they see such papers as indicators that their children are learning, particularly when the paper is endorsed by an official checkmark or adorable sticker. This article contains the author's beliefs about children's learning, all of which are incompatible with the regular use of worksheets. They suggest a few alternatives to worksheets in each area, which are intended to serve as a springboard for discussion and deliberation. Classroom teachers are daily presented with ideas for projects that emerge from their own students' minds; these can be transformed into learning opportunities.

Recognizing the valuable role nature plays in human development as well as humans' responsibility toward the earth is critically important when considering how to transform education for the betterment of the individual and society. In this article, the author views nature as a force or phenomenon of the metaphysical world. As such, she suggests that there is an interrelatedness between all parts of the natural world; that it is in constant movement, flux, and adaptation; and that it is living and non-living and concurrently observable and unobservable. She goes on to suggest that children benefit from being in nature, not as a panacea for all ills, but rather as a situated, complex location that varies across lived experiences. While discussing nature pedagogy, she also notes that the simple process of noticing, seeing, selecting, holding, and then making or eating completes a learning cycle that is missing from many children's lives. She concludes that nature pedagogy embraces the tangible and intangible. Ultimately, it guides one to develop a way of living, thinking, and being with the natural world that is sustainable. "Forest School and Nature-Based Education: An Exploration into 'Home' (Marlene Power and Petra Eperjesi) is included at the end of this article.

In this article, the authors selected two urban teachers to study, one from 3rd grade and one from 5th (hereafter referred to as Ms. Third and Ms. Fifth), whose students, in spite of the school's failing grade, did well on the exam. Both were nominated as exemplary teachers by their principal and other teachers and had been selected as teacher of the year. Despite their shared exemplary status, they differed in obvious ways. Ms. Third, a white female in her fifth year of teaching, never had a desk or a piece of paper out of place in her classroom. Ms. Fifth, an African American woman in her 26th year of teaching, taught in a class that was crowded, with piles of papers and student projects cluttering every corner. Months of classroom observations and interviews with the teachers, their students, and others revealed that, despite their obvious differences, the two teachers believed in several common principles of practice. This article elaborates on just one of those principles--the use of a variety of strategies to help students make sense of and understand new skills and concepts. Referred to in the research literature as "representing," this principle was a cornerstone of both these teachers' efforts. By providing and seeking representations, the teachers collaborated with their students to promote mastery of new ideas.

Swaffield School, a nursery and primary school in innercity London, developed a multidisciplinary recycling project, Save the Trees, which focuses on paper and its link to the forest. The project involves group participation in handmade paper storycloths based on forest images and development of stories derived from the storycloths. (LB)

Students can imitate scientists at work by conducting inquiry investigations in the classroom, thereby exhibiting a multitude of skills and competencies. As stated by Bransford and Donovan (2005), learning science as a process of inquiry involves students in observation, imagination, and reasoning about the phenomena under investigation. Rather than giving students "recipes for experiments," which might be described as hands-on activities with explicit step-by-step directions on how to collect data, involving students in inquiry investigations provides students opportunities to generate their own questions about everyday phenomena, design ways to collect data, use creative thinking to make inferences about their data, and propose possible explanations of the phenomena. This paper illustrates the specific elements of scientific inquiry that are essential features of an inquiry lesson. The authors state that science trade books can be a wonderful addition to conducting inquiry in the classroom, and can facilitate the inquiry process, provide accurate science content, and motivate applications to new topics. Incorporating science trade books with hands-on, inquiry science is an excellent way to facilitate students' questioning, observing, analyzing, and reporting skills. Trade books are defined as books published for a retail market and are available at bookstores and libraries. These books are accessible to teachers and can be used to supplement science teaching. The authors also provide examples of inquiry investigations supported by science trade books. (Contains 4 tables.)

The recent rise in terrorism around the world has caused families, educators, and indeed everyone to consider again how to help young children grow up tolerant, accepting, and, above all, non-violent. Policies that support a tolerant, inclusive curriculum are essential if children are to survive in the years ahead. Curriculum policies must be proactive in order to lessen the problems of conflict, of peoples being intolerant and unable to accept the views of others. Curriculum policies must embrace a global perspective. There is no simple recipe for peaceful globalization; a global, future orientation is something that is built up over time. However, it has to start somewhere, and the early childhood formative years are as good a time as any to inculcate in children a sense of responsibility and an understanding of outcomes as the basis of effective citizenship. The idea of globalization, as with a future-oriented perspective, can be incorporated into an educational program with young children. This article discusses the need for a change in curriculum policies to meet the challenges of global citizenship.

Field trips provide active learning as children have firsthand experience with information they had previously encountered only in textbooks. In this article, the author describes how she used an interesting textbook to plan a field trip for her elementary social studies methods class to Oakwood Cemetery in Montgomery (Alabama). The textbook, "Dynamic Social Studies for Elementary Classrooms" (Maxim, 2003), described social studies content as anthropology, geography, history, civics, sociology, and economics. The chapter concerning history illustrated the motivation of one teacher in taking her 6th-grade students on a trip to the local cemetery. Still wary of the idea, the author consulted the course of study objectives for the state of Alabama and realized a field trip to the cemetery would correlate with the objectives to have elementary students learn Alabama's history. The author's experience with the students before, during, and after the field trip helped her understand that for classroom teachers considering a cemetery as a field trip, much planning is necessary. One must consider the weather conditions, provide appropriate guidance, and have an understanding of child development as well as prior knowledge about experiences with close ones' deaths. Traditionally, teachers use the K-W-L chart to determine what children already know about a topic (K), what they want to learn about a topic (W), and what they have learned as a result of a lesson (L). This article describes how the K-W-L chart is implemented by classroom teachers for use in creating powerful historical and artistic cemetery investigations for primary-age children. (Contains 4 figures.)

Activities that promote "active thinking" help children learn mathematics and science by allowing them to work at forming relationships, making connections, and integrating concepts and procedures. Dynamic and exciting children's books invite and motivate children to learn mathematics and science by responding to stories, characters, and their experiences. This paper presents an investigation on how students are able to connect mathematics, science, and literature using the Hush-a-bye Babies. The primary focus is on understanding the meaning of environment and habitat--more specifically, how habitat and environment differ for different living things. The overall goal is to encourage the use of higher level thinking skills (synthesis, analysis, and evaluation). The author gives suggestions on how a teacher can introduce a book, share a book and promote concepts to students. (Contains 8 online resources.)

Despite some characterization as being uninvolved in the education of their children, African American parents have always valued education and recognized it as the key to economic and political freedom. Despite laws in the United States prohibiting the education of slaves, African Americans were the first southerners to campaign for universal, state-supported public education. Yet, schools for African American children were not fully established in the United States until the middle of the 20th century. Even today, African American parents are still battling for equitable education for their children. With fewer resources and less experienced teachers, it is no surprise that a gap exists in achievement test scores between African Americans and European Americans. While progress was made in narrowing the gap during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s, little progress was made in the 1990s. What is conspicuous about the gap is that it widens perceptively in upper elementary school. Therefore, elementary teachers have a crucial role to play in closing the gap in mathematics achievement. They can do so by providing high and clear standards, assessing students' work in alignment with these standards, and encouraging parental involvement in mathematics. While homework is an established practice in schools, research indicates that it is only effective if it is relevant, creative, and meaningful to the student and parent. When homework meets these criteria, it can have significantly positive effects on African American students' educational aspirations and chances for academic success. Mathematics FunPacks replace the traditional homework of paper-and-pencil drills with meaningful, hands-on learning for the whole family. FunPacks can best be described as traveling learning centers, in that they contain all the materials needed to engage the whole family in mathematics explorations. This article describes FunPacks and lists what each pack includes.

Discusses the challenge of providing preservice teachers with the knowledge and skills needed for effective participation in a democratic society. Focuses on the importance of understanding the rights and responsibilities of citizens living in a democracy. Emphasizes citizenship for a democracy, dimensions of effective classroom management and discipline, and seizing every lesson and decision. (SD)

Highlights some common misunderstandings of multicultural education that impede understanding among minority children. Provides society-, school-, family-, and child-related justifications for intercultural understanding among children from different minority groups. Offers suggestions for an ideal intercultural program, focusing on schools' policies and practices and curriculum design. Includes suggestions for intergroup, issue-based, and literature-based curricula. Urges schools to address the existing omission of intercultural understanding among minority children. (KB)

Explores how teachers can use picture book illustrations to teach children the art of collage. Focuses on three children's picture books and offers art activities showcasing three collage techniques: (1) cut and torn paper collage; (2) photomontage; and (3) texture collages and collage constructions. Relates each activity to the National Standards for Arts Education. Concludes with a 28-item bibliography of children's picture books with collage illustrations. (KB)

Discusses students' inability to make the connection between manipulative materials and pencil-and-paper calculations in mathematics instruction. Outlines the development of mathematical ideas through the concrete, representational, and abstract phases of instruction. An annotated bibliography listing teacher resources for representational-level connecting activities is provided. (DST)

Recounts Polynesian legends and folktales as examples of how the informal knowledge passed on through shared traditional stories can broaden children's worldviews and contribute to a culture vision. Maintains that reading, telling, discussing, and making creative interpretations of folklore are one way to share the intimate side of a culture. (Author/KB)

Discusses how working with 10- and 11-year olds in a tutoring program revealed the tension between classroom routines and the repertoire teachers use to facilitate learning. Argues that developing a repertoire of educational approaches is necessary for creating meaningful learning experiences. Examines the implications of considering teaching as the development of a repertoire for inservice and preservice education. (KB)

Discusses four leadership roles for school superintendents to help teachers respond to increasing and often conflicting demands. These roles are (1) future interpreter and meaning maker to build an educational vision; (2) capacity builder to ensure student success; (3) collaboration builder both within and outside the district; and (4) organization builder to maintain constancy of focus and operation. (KB)

University of Washington educator discusses school reform, and offers reasons why school change will not be as fundamental as many think. Asserts that education occurs within the schools' primary function of day care. Discusses how teachers' roles have changed in the last 20 years and what those roles should be. Discusses universities' role in preparing teachers for their changing roles. (KB)

Discusses the role of power in effective teaching. Describes how power is used on, for, and with children. Explores how the use of teacher power can support family involvement, contribute to professional development, communicate the importance high expectations for all students, contribute to the profession of teaching, and convey excellence to the larger good of society. (KB)

Argues that the arts are basic to educational development, as they provide the tools and skills that are central to early language development including story, metaphor, rhyme and rhythm, binary structuring and mediation, image formation from words, affective abstraction, and others that underlie more complex learning. (Author)

Argues that children need play time to explore the world because it is valuable, irreplaceable, spontaneous, and provides situations where children can learn with all their senses. Examines play in terms of its role in exploration, imagination, creative activity, work, learning, knowledge expansion, art, and the culture of children. (Author/SD)

Presents a short biography of Jennie Wahlert, who taught in the St. Louis Public Schools in the early 1900s, and later served in supervisory positions in the schools and as a college professor. Her career spanned seven decades and had a significant influence on education in St. Louis. (MDM)

Play allows children to make creative discoveries. This is a result of the fact that creation comes from tinkering and the absence of fear of failure, rather than from minds trained to follow what is already known. Suggestions for building a curriculum based on serious play are offered. (LB)

Discusses three types of journals: (1) writer's journals, which encourage recording of events for later literary work; (2) learning logs, which encourage interaction with curriculum content; and (3) diaries, which allow free flow of emotions and ideas. For each type, student samples and teacher comments are provided. (BC)

Discusses possible solutions to the problem of schools' widespread failure to meet minority students' needs. Considers theoretical perspectives that underlie these possible solutions, and illustrates the application of the solutions through examples of teachers' work with students of native Hawaiian ancestry at the Kamehameha Elementary Education Program. (BB)