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This study investigated whether there was a difference in the level of academic achievement for African American students when instructed through lecture and discussion and cooperative learning methods in the social studies classroom. Participants were 58 African American 12th graders in an urban public school. A control group was instructed using traditional lecture and discussion, while an intervention group received instruction through the Jigsaw II method of cooperative learning. Students' academic achievement was assessed using a pretest-posttest evaluation. Both groups were observed for 96 minutes during their regular instructional time over 5 days. Data were also collected via student surveys and teacher interviews. Results indicated that there was no significant difference in academic achievement levels between students taught using cooperative learning and students taught using lecture and discussion. Intervention students working in heterogeneous groups exhibited a relatively frequent use of cooperative behaviors (e.g., interpersonal skills, cooperative communication, and cooperative physical behaviors). Most students were comfortable working in these groups. Teachers expressed some concerns with cooperative learning, including that students appeared to show more difficulty with and reluctance about cooperative activities. There were racial differences in students' reactions to working cooperatively. (Contains 45 references.) (SM)

This paper addresses issues identified in a survey of regular teachers needing to implement classroom-based remediation programs for children with language and/or learning disabilities. Sixteen teachers from two states completed open-ended surveys and participated in follow-up interviews. The survey examined their opinions concerning the inclusion of these children in full-day classroom programs. All the teachers expressed a concern that they have been given additional responsibilities without the necessary technical and administrative supports. Teachers were most concerned about: (1) their lack of knowledge about specific language/learning disabilities; (2) their unmet need for modeling of effective teaching strategies and collaboration with special education teachers; and (3) their lack of planning time and paraprofessional help. Additionally, teachers reported a lack of information about the child's needs. However, teachers also reported discovering that these children could be successful in the classroom and that the inclusion policy had led to expansion of their teaching methods. Implications for preservice and inservice training needs are drawn. An appendix includes the survey questions. (Contains 14 references.) (DB)

The relationship between language, thought, and concept formation has been a central issue in many studies and theoretical discussions in various domains--philosophy, psychology, anthropology, and linguistics. The relation between language and concept development can be framed as two opposing questions: (1) Does the child learn concepts first and then later attach words to them? or (2) Are concepts formed when a child tries to attach meanings to words she hears? The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between language and the development of children's conception of plants as living things. This was done by comparing the responses of children with different mother tongues (Hebrew and English) to different tasks (verbal and non-verbal) related to the conception of plants as living things. The children (N=696) were from each of grades 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 in Canada and Israel. It was found that both groups of children were less successful in the non-verbal task than in the verbal task, and that Hebrew-speaking children performed at a lower level than English-speaking children in both the verbal and non-verbal tasks. These findings suggest that the difficulty in classifying plants as living things is conceptual in origin and may also suggest that language affects concept development on both the verbal and perceptual levels. (KM)

In the ongoing debate over whether or what sort of multiculturalism should be provided by schools, the origin, evolution, and rhetorical function of the basic term "culture" have been unwisely neglected. The 19th century notion of "culture" implied a process of growth and development, of culturing an organism, or of the human organism becoming cultured. Educators must resurrect and maintain that dynamic imagery in their research and theory, rather than becoming imprisoned in a language of stasis. As a corollary, discussions of cultures or civilizations should be more explicit about what is inherited or borrowed versus a possibly unique synthesis. A weakness of the multicultural argument is that it ignores the fact that "Western civilization" incorporates so much more than the traditions of Europe and North America. As communication, commerce, and political and military relationships unite the peoples of the Earth into a global village, it is of diminishing educational utility to continue with the anthropological model of a plurality of separate and distinct, integrated cultures. When elaborated into the curricular rhetoric of "multiculturalism," this model may express a struggle for political empowerment, but it has no relevance to the historical realities of the development of world civilization. A sounder approach sees a historical sequence of ecumenes, areas of culture contact and exchange that produced cultural efflorescence, and returns to the notion of culturing through education. (SV)

During the spring of 2006, CAEL (Council for Adult and Experiential Learning) conducted a national Career Advising Survey (CAS) to better understand the current state of employer-provided education and career advising or coaching benefits. The CAS research gleaned detailed information about the design, administration, use and effectiveness of employer-sponsored advising and coaching benefits programs. The two major goals of this survey were to identify the profile of employers offering advising and coaching benefits programs and to establish a baseline understanding of the current state of such programs. The survey generated responses from a total of 287 companies, with the largest industry groups represented being: Manufacturing (13%), Healthcare (13%), Financial Services (6%), and Government (6%). Companies responding to the survey were fairly evenly spread among the geographic regions of the U.S., with just over ten percent having an international workforce. The results of this survey give an overall picture of what type of companies are providing advising and the value that some find in it in terms of employee retention and performance. Among the challenges for CAEL is to show that the costs associated with an advising program can be considered an investment in the company's future through the better informed choices employees will make for their education and the resulting knowledge and productivity they will bring to the workplace. Advising can lessen employees' time in the classroom, thereby saving tuition dollars and increasing the return on investment for the participating company.

Current developments in an experiment on Computer Communications via the ATS-1 geosynchronous satellite are described. Initiated by the Spacecraft Data Systems Branch of the Ames Research Center, NASA, this experiment is designed to demonstrate the feasibility of utilizing satellite communication links to provide computer-computer and terminal-computer communications between remotely located areas. In order that the experiment be conducted under realistic conditions, computing facilities at the University of Hawaii and the University of Alaska are connected to the Advanced Research Projects Agency computer net via an ATS-1 VHF link to the NASA-Ames Research Center. A detailed description of the experiment is provided in the ATS-1 Computer Communications Experiment Plan, attached as Appendix A. (SK)

The advantages and elements of a therapeutic daycare program for preschool children with emotional and behavioral problems are described in this paper. The goal of the therapeutic preschool is to meet the needs of behaviorally disordered and emotionally disturbed children in a special education setting, and then to mainstream the children into less restrictive settings as soon as possible. Eight program elements that can be combined to create a therapeutic daycare program are as follows: (1) a developmental evaluation and behavior observation made prior to admittance in the program; (2) planned structure in the areas of space, time, relationships and knowledge; (3) use of behavior modification procedures at several levels; (4) a mental health curriculum designed to focus on identification of emotions, acceptance of feelings, and ways to cope with and solve social problems; (5) one-to-one remediation sessions with therapists; (6) a high staff-to-child ratio and staff relationships characterized by consistency, the ability to increase prosocial behavior and decrease inappropriate behavior, and the ability to reflect and interpret children's feelings; (7) parent involvement; and (8) follow-up procedures at several intervals subsequent to the child's discharge from the program. This sort of program can alleviate presently distressful symptoms for the child and his family, and can help prevent mental health problems from occurring at a later life stage. (Author/SS)

This document is composed of five essays on various aspects of school desegregation. In "The Community Context of Five Desegregated Schools: Systems of Power and Influence," Mercer Lee Sullivan provides a comparative description of the schools studied and introduces the term "culture contact" to organize his data. In "Coping with Desegregation: Individual Strategies and Organizational Compliance," Jacqueline Scherer and Edward J. Slawski, Jr., make the distinction between desegregation as an event and desegregation as a process. "The Organization and Representation of Social Race Relations in Six Desegregated Schools," by Dorothy C. Clement and J. Michael Livesay, discusses black-white relations and the constraints which shape these relationships. George W. Noblit and Thomas W. Collins explore the economic, political, and cultural contexts of the alienation of black students in "The Social Context of Alienation: New Policy Research on Lower-Class Black Students in Desegregated Schools." In "Integrating the Desegregated School: Perspectives, Practices and Possibilities," H. Andrew Sagar and Janet Ward Schofield distinguish between desegregation and integration using the concepts of assimilation and cultural pluralism. (RLV)

In this study, the attitudes of Israeli children aged 6 to 15 years were surveyed regarding their conceptions of plants as living things. It was desired to find out whether children consider plants to be alive, the knowledge differences between the different age groups in the study, how children classify plants according to biological criteria and correlations between the classification according to the concept of living/non-living and the classification according to biological criteria. Both individual interviews and paper-and-pencil questionnaires were used in which children were asked to classify animals, plants and inanimate objects. It was found that: (1) there was a high percentage of incorrect classifications of plants at all ages; and (2) there were no consistent connections between the classification of plants into living/non-living and according to biological criteria. The study proposes that part of the deviance of Israeli children from others in other research studies could be explained by characteristics of the Hebrew language. (CW)

Although burnout has been extensively studied in business and various public services, only a few studies in education have been conducted, and these were primarily with teachers. Few studies of school administrator burnout have been conducted using instruments appropriate to that field. This paper summarizes a study examining the relationships between colleague perceptions and administrator burnout as measured by the Administrator Role Perception Inventory. This study also investigated the relationships between colleague perceptions and factors associated with burnout. The sample was drawn from the membership of a west coast, state-level organization of school administrators. All 2,113 members received a biographical questionnaire and the inventory; 62 percent completed and returned the packet. For a random sample of 159 members, colleague questionnaires were distributed, for a 48 percent return rate. Means and standard deviations for the subsample of administrators on the ARPI were calculated. Coefficients of correlation between the ARPI scales and colleague perceptions were also calculated. Results indicated that burnout exists and that the characteristics of burnout among school administrators (depression, lowered motivation, isolation from others, and reduced accomplishment) can be identified by colleagues. As this study suggests, it is possible to develop skills in identifying emerging burnout, perhaps aided by an inventory developed for this purpose. (18 references) (MLH)

Debates over what sort of multiculturalism should be provided have neglected the origin, evolution, and rhetorical function of the basic term culture. Viewing humanity historically, it is sounder to think in terms of an ecumene of civilization, and to return, in education, to the concept of culturing. (Author/SLD)

This study was conducted in 1989 in a suburban school district in Oregon for the purpose of determining the impact of high, medium, and low usage levels of cooperative learning on teacher efficacy. Elementary school teachers in the district were engaged in a staff development training program for teaching cooperative learning in the classroom. This type of learning includes helping, communicating, encouraging, teaming and supporting, with the teacher acting as model. Elementary classroom teachers (N=129, a 71% response rate) responded to a questionnaire which gathered information about an independent variable, the amount of classroom time spent in cooperative learning situations within a week's time, and its effects on teacher efficacy. Results indicated that teachers using the highest level of cooperative learning experienced the highest levels of efficacy, power, confidence in working with students, and willingness to innovate. Since this study is exploratory, suggestions are made for further investigation through experimental designs. The survey form is appended. (LL)

Surveyed 41 graduates of a school counseling program for specialists with hearing impaired individuals. Results indicated that almost all graduates were employed in settings consistent with their training. Continuing education needs were in consultation skills, networking strategies, and administrative and management training. (JAC)

Describes a day-long Aging Awareness workshop in which a group of 12 elderly were involved in a poetry-writing exercise focusing on meaningful life change. Ramifications of this positive experience are discussed in view of the cultural/language barrier and traditional aging awareness issues such as reminiscence. (JAC)

Since American Indians are extremely diverse in their social and cultural situations and are widely scattered geographically, any set of educational prescriptions must be flexible, allowing for variations among individuals, tribes, and regions, as well as among occupational and social class positions. Local representation and control coupled with careful monitoring via research, investigation, and evaluation are needed to prevent waste of Federal funds and to meet the educational demands of Indian diversity. Program provisions for tribal traditional Indians living in a rural enclave should include: (1) parental school board representation; (2) specifically tailored bilingual and bicultural curricula; (3) reservation based training programs for teachers and adults; (4) counseling for boys via physical education programs; (5) elimination of mass boarding facilities for elementary school children; and (6) use of innovative small residential systems for secondary education. Provisions for middle class rural Indians should be directed toward preservation of cultural ties and successful college experiences, while urban Indian education should be directed toward exploring educational alternatives via use of Indian centers, existing boarding schools, or reservation facilities. Options of graduate and vocational training should be provided for Indian adults. (JC)

The Northeast Academic Science Information Center (NASIC) was developed to promote the increased and more effective use of machine-readable bibliographic information resources to support the information needs of the academic research community of the Northeast. NASIC was involved with the continued testing and evaluation of available computer-based information services; extensive marketing of information services to a significant portion of the academic community of the Northeast; the development of training materials and programs to enable academic libraries to provide the intellectual interface vital to the effective utilization of machine-readable information services; and the development and implementation of managerial arrangements that would allow for the maximum utilization of computer-based information services in the Northeast consistent with the continuing existence of NASIC as a self-supporting program. A prominent aspect of NASIC was its effective training program as well as the development of administrative and reference materials. (Author/DAG)

The Northeast Academic Science Information Center (NASIC) program, funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation to the New England Board of Higher Education, experimented in using a regional organization to develop an intermediary role in the process of providing machine-readable bibliographic search services to the academic research community. This final report emphasizes management and decision making in the history and evaluation of program development, and includes analytical observations of the program. Sections cover the area of: (1) pre-grant history; (2) initial program organization; (3) program development; (4) initial dissemination; (5) expansion; (6) consolidation; (7) self-support efforts; and (8) NASIC 1976-1977. The report concludes that NASIC, despite funding difficulties for self-support, was successful in increasing the awareness of academic research and information communities as to the utility of computer-based bibliographic information services. It provided assistance in initiating services, provided a foundation for operation, produced training materials, and influenced search system vendors to make on-line searching more accessible to the academic community. Sample pages from training materials are appended. (KP)

This is a summary and synthesis of five ethnographic studies of desegregated schools over a period of about two years. It seeks to determine whether the desegregation process in the public schools has resulted in integration. (Desegregation and integration are seen as distinct phenomena, with integration defined as the attaining of, and respect for, cultural diversity in the educational setting.) To determine to what extent integration has taken place, the report analyzes five schools in communities with different economic, social, and geographic characteristics. It is reported that in these schools, desegregation occurred, but not integration; as white students declined in numbers, resegregation emerged. The relationship of the schools to their districts and community, the role of principals, and attitudes on race and education are also discussed. Student behavior, attitudes, and activities are analyzed to determine their relationship to racial cooperation and respect for different life styles. Also included are three critical essays that interpret the main body of the report and apply it to other specific situations, and several bibiliographies. (WP)

The study examined the relation of language use and logical thought to social experience with both age and class held constant. The primary assumptions under study were: that the logic of symbolic grouping was highly sensitive to a child's experience with the objects to which that logic was applied; that the existence of diglossia in a bilingual community and/or relative shifts in language dominance might create a situation of language specialization by domain, particularly along the dimension of immediacy and distance; that the content of grouping (those final organizations produced by the logic) was a far more stable aspect of cognition than the logic used to construct it. The study was conducted in a fourth grade classroom in a bilingual school in Las Vegas, New Mexico. All of the children had Spanish surnames. Twenty-eight children took part in an extensive set of interviews in two languages. These interviews were designed to examine inter-relations of language use and the logic and content of symbolic grouping to social experience. Findings included: the logic of grouping was related to children's experience with the objects of grouping; town children had a much narrower and more specialized portion of their experience occurring in Spanish than did the rural children; the logic of grouping employed by these children was not related to school achievement with the one exception of the clustering of the tight-loose factor in Spanish with achievement test scores. (NQ)

Divorce can be viewed as a multi-faceted, interactive process which represents a dislocation in the life cycle of a family. A set of critical developmental tasks must be met and mastered for a family to cope with the transition through the divorce experience. The first of these developmental challenges facing the children of divorcing parents is their acceptance of the reality of the parental divorce. A study was undertaken to explore the relationship among attributes of the child, characteristics of the parent-child relationship, and characteristics of the divorcing experience as these variables influence the child's reliance on denial in fantasy as a mechanism of defense in response to parental separation. Latency aged children (N=42) and a matched sample of 30 children from intact homes completed the Child's Report of the Impact of Separation by Parents-Revised, the Children's Personality Questionnaire, and the Child's Cognitive Grasp of the Divorcing Experience measure. Mothers of all the children completed a series of questionnaires designed to measure the variables under investigation. Multiple regression analysis revealed that the most significant predictor of a child's reliance on denial in fantasy in response to parental separation was the set of variables representing the attributes of the child. Specifically, the child's age at the time of parental separation was the most powerful predictor of reliance on denial, representing 41 percent of all variance. These results suggest that very definite age-related responses to parental separation may be observed and that denial will be seen most often in younger children. (NRB)