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While students tend to enjoy their science learning at a young age, as they mature, they tend to distance themselves from science, becoming less motivated to engage with science and holding negative attitudes towards science. In parallel, a career choice in science often begins to develop during early adolescence. To understand how the environment and students' inner worlds shape the development of their self-positioning in relation to science, this longitudinal study followed nine adolescents, aged 10-14, over 3 years, in and out of school, and created nine individual stories describing these participants' self-positioning in relation to science, and how these positions changed, from their perspective, over time and contexts. We found some common experiences that played a role in the participants' self-positioning in relation to science. In several of these experiences, the longitudinal nature of this study became apparent. This study highlights the complexity of adolescents' self-positioning in relation to science and how these positions change over time.

The purpose of the study is to examine the ethical dilemmas among mid-level school leaders in the social-ecological context through role-play simulations. We examined simulations involving role-played ethical scenarios and group debriefings among 30 mid-level school leaders from different Israeli high schools and districts during the MA course in the educational leadership program. A qualitative analysis generated an expanded social-ecological model for mid-level school leaders. The model consists of six main layers: individual, interpersonal, organizational, community, public policy, and technology. Each of the layers is divided into sub-categories. The study's findings reveal the concurrent appearance of the different layers. These findings emphasize the complexity of the role of mid-level school leaders, as they cope simultaneously with a variety of ethical dilemmas characterized by multiple conflicting values. Moreover, the study findings indicated the interpersonal layer to be the most dominant layer, demonstrating mid-level leaders' dual role as both classroom teachers and as team leaders. This study may contribute toward the development and modification of professional training programs for mid-level school leaders. It may also be helpful when designing strategies to deal with ethical challenges and to strengthen the school's ethical leadership.

Current models of the affinity between syntax and vocabulary are complex and recognize the contribution of bootstrapping and computational processes. To date, the mutual facilitation between these two constructs over time has not been studied in second language (L2) school children. The present study investigated longitudinally the direction and strength of the associations between syntactic and vocabulary skills in English Language Learners (ELLs; N = 409, 204 females, M age = 78 months, low socioeconomic status backgrounds) and their monolingual English-speaking peers (EL1; N = 157, 92 females, M age = 77 months, low socioeconomic status backgrounds). Children were assessed annually from Grade 1 to Grade 4 on a syntactic and a vocabulary task. Overall, autoregressive cross-lagged analyses indicated that early syntax predicted later vocabulary and vice versa, yet, the magnitude of prediction varied across groups. Notably, in the early stages of L2 learning, the predictive power from vocabulary to syntax was stronger than that in the opposite direction. Moreover, the predictive power from vocabulary to syntax was consistently stronger in the ELL than in the EL1 group. The results suggest that, in general, with sufficient quantity and quality of exposure to the L2, lexical and syntactic bootstrapping coexist. However, among novice young ELLs, bootstrapping is stronger from vocabulary to syntax than the other way around. Results underscore the importance of studying the relations between vocabulary and syntax longitudinally, and caution about an injudicious application of L1-based models to young L2 children's language development.

Purpose: The study's main goal is to investigate different leadership styles that characterize middle-level leaders, the intermediate leadership tier of role holders in school, as they practice leadership scenarios through active participation in a professional learning process of role-play simulation, using a social-ecological approach. Design/methodology/approach: Thirty middle-level leaders from different Israeli high schools and districts participated in the study during an M.A. course in an educational leadership program. The authors used qualitative analysis to examine role-play simulations of leadership scenarios based on group debriefings. This content analysis was conducted within a two-dimensional theoretical framework composed of leadership style theory and a social-ecological model. Findings: The study findings address four main leadership styles: authentic, transformational, participative and transactional. Regarding their appearance within different social-ecological layers, the interpersonal layer was the most salient one with a prominent appearance of transformational and authentic leadership styles. On the organizational and communal layers, authentic leadership was more prominent. The study findings demonstrate multidimensionality in both the leadership styles and social-ecological layers, as different styles appeared in different layers concurrently. Practical implications: The findings may help articulate the nature and characteristics of middle-level school leadership. They may also provide relevant theoretical content and instructional strategy to develop simulation-based preparation programs for middle-level leaders. Originality/value: The study findings highlight unique leadership characteristics of middle-level school leaders and suggest a contextual perception of their leadership styles within a social-ecological framework.

Health-care professionals (HCPs) are key trusted figures in addressing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) challenges. They are thought to influence others' health decisions by personal example. However, during the COVID-19 crisis, some HCPs hesitated to be vaccinated. We examined factors contributing to that decision. We performed 12 semi-structured interviews, between February and May 2021, with Israeli HCPs who had declined or delayed COVID-19 vaccination. Three coders conducted a combined top-down and bottom-up analysis. We identified four main themes shaping vaccine decision-making: (i) sources of information, (ii) perceptions of necessity and risks of the vaccine, (iii) individual versus collective responsibility and (iv) political climate and media influence. Participants were worried about long-term effectiveness and safety, and while many agreed that high-risk populations should be vaccinated, all considered themselves to be at low risk for serious disease. Some felt they should avoid taking a perceived risk (accepting a new vaccine) to protect society, although they felt pressured to do so. Vaccination campaign politization and the way the media approached the subject also contributed to mistrust and hesitancy to be vaccinated. These findings help us understand HCP beliefs and uncertainties about COVID-19 vaccinations. This study can help inform future campaigns targeted at HCPs to promote the acceptance of vaccines.

The sentence repetition (SR) test is considered as a promising diagnostic tool for detecting language proficiency in monolingual learners, but less is known about its potential to identify dual language learners' (DLLs) linguistic proficiency. Considering that challenges with language learning, such as developmental language disorders (DLDs), is evident in both first and second language (L1 and L2), it is important to use tools that can assess language functions in both languages whenever feasible. We found that students' L1 and L2 SR performance levels draw upon their phonological short-term memory capacity, vocabulary and grammar skills in the language being assessed. We also found a positive relationship between students' L1 phonological memory and L2 SR scores, suggesting that DLLs' phonological short-term memory capacity assessed in their L1 indicates individual differences in short-term verbal memory that support SR performance, as assessed in L2. The results highlight a challenge in both research and clinical settings which often use monolingual assessment tools and associated norms to identify DLLs who might be at risk of developing DLDs or other learning difficulties.

This cross-sectional study investigated first (L1) and second (L2) language receptive and expressive vocabulary in a sample of 542 typically developing bilingual children of immigrants (age range 6-13), coming from six different L1 backgrounds in Norway. Results demonstrated that children's L1 and L2 vocabulary skills increased with age. From a deficit perspective, the study confirms that in each age group, there is a vocabulary gap between the ranges of Norwegian vocabulary known by Norwegian monolinguals and by Norwegian L2 children. At the same time, when an additive, conceptual scoring approach (taking into account bilingual children's known L1 and/or L2 vocabulary) was used, the persistent gap in vocabulary knowledge diminished or disappeared altogether. This finding is most evident in older age groups. Conceptual scoring provides a more sensitive and positive picture of bilingual children's overall range of vocabulary. The findings demonstrate a need for more nuanced assessment procedures of semantic knowledge across children's' L1 and L2.

Models of reading development point to a role for knowledge about the orthography quite late in children's reading development; here we explore the contributions of early orthographic knowledge -- of the features of print -- to word reading development between kindergarten and Grade 1. We did so in a longitudinal study of 93 emergent bilingual children whose formal instruction was in French, a different language than they spoke at home, followed from senior kindergarten to Grade 1. Linear regression analyses showed that early print knowledge in both English and French significantly predicted French word reading in Grade 1; no such relations emerged to English word reading. Analyses included control measures of parental education and English vocabulary, phonological awareness, rapid automatized naming, and autoregressive controls of earlier word reading. These results suggest that print knowledge can be used to predict progress in second language word reading in emergent bilingual children.

According to the Componential Model of Reading (CMR; Aaron, Joshi, Gooden, & Bentum, 2008), reading comprehension can be explained by 3 domains--cognitive, psychological, and ecological domains. We examined the direct and indirect contributions of these 3 domains to reading comprehension in bilingual learners. Participants included 124 bilingual children in Grades 4 through 6 who spoke Chinese as their first language. They were administered a battery of language and literacy measures, and motivation and acculturation questionnaires. Additionally, the participants' parents completed a home literacy environment questionnaire in Chinese. Using structural equation modeling, we found direct effects of the cognitive and psychological domains on reading comprehension. The ecological domain only had an indirect influence on reading comprehension via the cognitive and psychological domains. The findings support and extend the CMR model and advance our understanding of the nature of the relationships among the different components of the model among bilingual learners.

This article analyzes the contents of Arabic grammar curricula authorized for the upper years of primary school by the ministries of education of Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia. The article aims to determine the attitudes and rationales behind these curricula, as well as their objectives, the grammatical materials they cover, the amount of time they allocate to the study of grammar, and their educational and pedagogical approach. Drawing on the results of a comparative analysis, the authors propose developmental alternatives to the current curricula. Arabic language instruction in Hebrew language schools in Israel is not addressed. The results of the study suggest that the examined curricula fail to achieve the functional standards for grammar instruction they set for themselves and to integrate the various domains of linguistic study, and that they suffer from other weaknesses that must be addressed.

The purpose of the present study was to examine the predictive value of a dynamic test of English and French lexical specificity on at-risk reading classification in 13 at-risk and 44 not at-risk emerging English (L1)-French (L2) bilingual Grade 1 children (M = 75.87 months, SD = 3.18) enrolled in an early French immersion program in Canada. Lexical specificity was assessed with a computerized word learning game in which children were taught new English (e.g., "foal" and "sole") and French (e.g., "bac" "bin" and "bague" "ring") word pairs contrasted by minimal phonological differences. The results indicated that the dynamic test of lexical specificity in English contributed significantly to the prediction of children's French at-risk reading status at the end of Grade 1 after controlling for French phonological awareness and nonverbal reasoning skills. However, French lexical specificity did not predict children's reading risk classification in French after controlling for French phonological awareness. Thus, it may be feasible to identify at-risk status in emerging bilinguals using dynamic measures in their stronger language.

This study explores the affective responses and beliefs school-aged heritage-language learners (HLLs) hold regarding learning their two languages. Sixty-three HLLs in grades 3 and 4 were presented with pictorial scenarios involving activities across five language and literacy domains in their HL and second language (English). Children were asked to indicate the affect they associated with the scenario and were queried about their chosen affect. They associated positive affect with listening and speaking the HL at home and with English across all domains regardless of context. Qualitative analysis of children's attributions revealed skill in the domain or language as the most common rationale for their chosen affective responses. Other common themes in children's rationales in descending order of frequency included children's degree of interest in the domain or language, the perceived availability of assistance from others, their membership in language groups, and the influence of language environments on language-learning. Implications for further research with this population and recommendations for relevant parties are discussed. (Contains 1 figure and 2 tables.)

Research involving monolinguals has demonstrated that language impairment can be noticed in the early years and tends to persist into adolescence. More recently, research has begun to address the challenges of identifying and treating Developmental Language Disorders (DLD) in English Language Learners (ELLs). Developmental patterns of DLD are not necessarily consistent over time, and we hypothesized that some monolinguals and ELLs go "under the radar" in lower grades but their language difficulties become more pronounced in later years, as syntactic demands increase, hence "late-emerging DLD". This longitudinal study examined (a) the existence of late-emerging DLD in Grades 4-6 in English-speaking monolinguals and ELLs, and (b) the Grade 1 and 3 cognitive and language profiles that predict late-emerging DLD. This study involved monolinguals (n = 149), and ELLs (n = 402) coming from diverse home language backgrounds. Cognitive (working memory, phonological short-term memory, processing speed), language (vocabulary and syntax), and word reading skills were assessed annually from grades 1 to 6. Separate parallel analyses in the monolingual and ELL samples confirmed that late-emerging DLD exists in both groups. In comparison with their typically developing peers, late-emerging DLD can be identified as early as Grade 1 based on poorer performance on phonological awareness, naming speed, and working memory.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the meaning of the concept "school identity" as reflected in principals' perceptions of their school logo, vision and practice. Design/methodology/approach: In-depth interviews were conducted with 24 principals from Israeli elementary, junior high and high schools. The content analysis of principals' interviews, including open, axial and selective coding and confirmatory qualitative analysis was used to examine the principals' perceptions regarding the school's logo, vision and practice. Findings: The principals' perceptions of the logo, vision and practice comprised five main features: academic, traditional, national, organizational and social-ethical. Different types of relationships were found between these features: correspondence by appearance, correspondence by non-appearance and incongruence. Research limitations/implications: The study suggests a new theoretical model for generating the concept of school identity. The study demonstrates that incongruent findings may be viewed as complementary rather than conflicting when establishing a school's identity. Practical implications: The findings can promote an understanding of the function of school logos and vision statements in school practice, and help develop and maintain school identity. All these may affect the surroundings that come in contact with the school principal, such as parental decision on school choice and governmental activities. Originality/value: To date, no study has investigated the meaning of school identity based on the principals' perceptions regarding the school logo, vision and practice. The findings can facilitate the development of an ecological approach, which can help in understanding the meaning of school identity and its effect on students, staff, parents, wider community and national policy.

This study explores attitudes towards and affecting online learning implementation (OLI). In recent years there has been greater acceptance of online learning (OL) by institutional decision-makers, as evidenced by higher levels of institutional involvement; nevertheless, the increase in faculty acceptance lags behind. This gap affects the widespread adoption of OL. This paper proposes that faculty acceptance of OL is influenced by attitudes related to four variables that affect practice change: intellectual reluctance, support, change and cost-benefit. Inherently, these attitudes translate into behaviours that influence the level of resistance toward OLI. (Contains 4 endnotes and 5 figures.)

In recent years, universities have been under increased pressure to adopt e-learning practices for teaching and learning. In particular, the emphasis has been on learning management systems (LMSs) and associated collaboration tools to provide opportunities for sharing knowledge, building a community of learners, and supporting higher order learning and critical thinking through conversation and collaboration. Due to the greater level of data continuity, reliability, and privacy that LMSs can provide compared to the available free applications, LMSs are still the central platform for many universities to deliver e-learning. Therefore, it is vital to investigate the LMS structure requisites that affect user engagement. This paper focuses on the important LMS design factors that influence user engagement with e-learning tools within LMSs. Results were extracted from 74 interviews about Blackboard with students and lecturers within a major Australian university. A user-friendly structure, avoidance of too many tools and links, support for privacy and anonymous posting, and more customisable student-centred tools were identified as LMS design factors that affect user engagement.

Learning management systems (LMS) have become the norm in recent years in higher education to further engage students and lecturers. The e-learning tools within LMS provide knowledge sharing and community building opportunities that can support both critical thinking and higher order learning skills through conversation and collaboration. However, the mere existence of tools does not guarantee users' adoption and acceptance. Several effective arrangements are required to engage users. This paper focuses on different aspects of lecturers' attitude that impact user engagement with LMS tools reporting on findings from 74 interviews with students and lecturers from different disciplines within a major Australian university. Results indicate that lecturers' teaching style and habits, active participation in online activities as well as designing appropriate tasks and assessment procedure are important determinants of lecturers' attitude in engaging students with LMS tools.

Educators and researchers increasingly recognise the impact of language policies on bilingual education. The present study examined the similarities and differences in how the teachers and principals in two different contexts, a Mandarin-English bilingual programme in a Canadian kindergarten and elementary school and a Russian-Hebrew bilingual preschool programme in Israel, understood their language programmes and made curriculum decisions with respect to instructional time for each language. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with five teachers, two principals and a programme manager from the two programmes. Four main themes emerged from the data analysis: (1) experiences in the search for an ideal language programme, (2) challenges arising in realising the bilingual programmes; (3) looking ahead and (4) a flexible and creative approach towards a language separation model. Despite differences in programme ideology and student demographics, findings showed that staff in both contexts faced similar challenges. Educational implications are discussed in relation to the findings.

This study examined cross-language transfer of word reading accuracy and word reading fluency in Spanish-English and Chinese-English bilinguals. Participants included 51 Spanish-English and 64 Chinese-English bilinguals. Both groups of children completed parallel measures of phonological awareness, rapid automatized naming, word reading accuracy, and word reading fluency in their first language (L1) and in English, their second language (L2) in Grade 1. Word reading accuracy and word reading fluency were assessed in L1 and L2 again in Grade 2. Cross-language transfer of word reading accuracy was found only in the Spanish-English bilinguals. In contrast, cross-language transfer of word reading fluency was found in both the Spanish-English bilinguals and the Chinese-English bilinguals. Our results suggest transfer of word reading accuracy is based on the structural similarities between the L1 and L2 scripts. By contrast, word reading fluency operates largely as a script-universal process. Implications for reading theory and for assessment and instruction of bilingual children are discussed.

The current study examined the predictive roles of L2 vocabulary knowledge and L2 word reading skills in explaining individual differences in lexical inferencing in the L2. Participants were 53 Israeli high school students who emigrated from the former Soviet Union, and spoke Russian as an L1 and Hebrew as an L2. L2 vocabulary knowledge and decoding accuracy predicted L2 reading comprehension, which in turn was strongly related to lexical inferencing abilities in the L2. In addition, decoding accuracy predicted additional variance in lexical inferencing, beyond the role of reading comprehension. These findings support the idea that beginning L2 readers with more precise and efficient lexical representations demonstrate better lexical inferencing abilities, most likely due to the increased automatization of word reading, which frees up resources for higher level processing. These results suggest that lexical inferencing from text in the L2 might be limited not only by vocabulary knowledge and higher order comprehension processes, but also by basic decoding skills.

We describe a survey of children with ASD aged 4-10 years. The main dependent variables were out-of-pocket expenditures for health services and hours of therapy. Multivariable logistic regression models were used in order to find independent predictors for service utilization. Parents of 178 of the children (87%) agreed to participate. The average annual out-of-pocket cost was $8,288, with a median of $4,473 and a range of $0-89,754. Higher severity of ASD and a parent with an academic degree were associated with higher expenditure. Having at least one older sibling, siblings without developmental disorders, regular education setting, lower parent education and low income were associated with lower expenditure.

The overall objective of this article is to examine how oral language abilities relate to reading profiles in English language learners (ELLs) and English as a first language (EL1) learners, and the extent of similarities and differences between ELLs and EL1s in three reading subgroups: normal readers, poor decoders, and poor comprehenders. The study included 100 ELLs and 50 EL1s in Grade 5. The effect of language group (ELL/EL1) and reading group on cognitive and linguistic skills was examined. Except for vocabulary, there was no language group effect on any measure. However, within ELL and EL1 alike, significant differences were found between reading groups: Normal readers outperformed the two other groups on all the oral language measures. Distinct cognitive and linguistic profiles were associated with poor decoders and poor comprehenders, regardless of language group. The ELL and EL1 poor decoders outperformed the poor comprehenders on listening comprehension and inferencing. The poor decoders displayed phonological-based weaknesses, whereas the poor comprehenders displayed a more generalized language processing weakness that is nonphonological in nature. Regardless of language status, students with poor decoding or comprehension problems display difficulties with various aspects of language.

The present study examined the development of morphological awareness and its contribution to vocabulary and reading comprehension among young Chinese-speaking English language learners (ELLs). We focused on two aspects of morphological awareness: derivational awareness and compound awareness. Participants included 46 kindergarteners (younger cohort) and 34 first graders (older cohort) of Chinese descent in Canada at the beginning of the study. Children were administered a battery of English measures including derivational awareness, compound awareness, phonological awareness, receptive vocabulary, and reading comprehension at two time points spaced 1 year apart. Results demonstrated a steady growth in Chinese-speaking ELL children's derivational and compound awareness from kindergarten to Grade 2. Importantly, for the first graders, morphological awareness accounted for unique variance in vocabulary concurrently, and unique variance in both vocabulary and reading comprehension a year later. Generally speaking, the variance explained by morphological awareness increased with grade level, and derivational awareness accounted for more variance in vocabulary and reading comprehension than did compound awareness. These results underscore the emerging importance of morphological awareness, especially derivational awareness, in young Chinese-speaking ELL children's English reading development.

This study evaluated the impact of two metalinguistic factors, English derivational awareness and English-Spanish cognate awareness, and the impact of two sociocultural factors, maternal education and children's length of residence in Canada, on English Language Learners (ELLs)' vocabulary knowledge. The participants of the study were 89 Spanish-speaking ELLs, 77 Chinese-speaking ELLs, and a comparison group of 78 monolingual English-speaking children in Grades 4 and 7. The sample included both first-generation (born outside of Canada) and second generation (born in Canada) immigrant children. The study yielded several important findings. First, it confirmed the strong link between derivational awareness and vocabulary knowledge observed in the previous research, and extended this relationship to two groups of ELLs from different first language backgrounds. Second, this study unveiled differences in vocabulary learning between Spanish-speaking and Chinese-speaking ELLs. While Spanish-speaking children were able to utilize the cognate strategy to learn English words, this strategy was not available for Chinese-speaking ELLs. With respect to the sociocultural factors, length of residence in Canada was significantly related to ELLs' vocabulary development. Interestingly, length of residence in Canada only influenced the development of noncognate vocabulary, but not cognate vocabulary, in Spanish-speaking ELLs, which provides additional evidence for these children's use of the cognate strategy. Finally, maternal education was not related to English vocabulary development. The theoretical and educational implications of these findings were discussed.

This study examined compound awareness in relation to Chinese children's vocabulary acquisition and character reading. Two aspects of compound awareness were investigated: the ability to identify the head of a compound noun and the ability to construct a new compound word from familiar morphemes. The compound awareness tasks, along with rapid automatized naming (RAN) and phonological awareness tasks, were administered to 29 first graders and 30 second graders in Mainland China. Results show that (1) compound awareness develops relatively early among Chinese children and improves with age, (2) compound awareness explains unique variance in vocabulary and character reading, after controlling for age, RAN, and phonological awareness, and (3) the contribution made by compound awareness to vocabulary is much larger than the contribution made by phonological awareness. These results demonstrate that compound awareness plays a central role in Chinese children's literacy development, particularly in vocabulary acquisition.

The paper reported an exploratory study that tested (a) the relationship between phonological and morphological awareness in English (L1)-Arabic (L2) bilingual children in Canada (N = 43), and (b) the relevance of these skills to word and pseudoword reading accuracy, and to complex word reading fluency. The results showed a significant correlation between phonological awareness in English and in Arabic. However, morphological awareness in the two languages was not correlated. Phonological awareness predicted reading cross-linguistically, but only Arabic morphological awareness predicted word reading in English. Moreover, while both phonological and morphological awareness in English predicted independent unique variance in English word reading, only phonological awareness in Arabic predicted Arabic word reading. Complex-word reading fluency was predicted by morphological awareness within both languages. Similarly, in both languages, phonological awareness was the single factor predicting pseudoword decoding accuracy. The results are discussed in terms of cross-linguistic differences between English and Arabic in orthographic depth and in morphological structure and transparency.

This study investigated the effect of acculturation on definitions and attributions towards children's school achievement. Iranian and Iranian-Canadian immigrant mothers and their upper-elementary school children were interviewed about their definitions and attributions about school success and failure. There were significant effects of acculturation on the definitions and attributions of both mothers and children. Definitions of school success and failure held by Iranian mothers and their children were product-based, whereas the immigrant mothers and their children used definitions that were more process-based. While Iranian mothers attributed their children's school performance primarily to "effort", "family" appeared to be the most frequent attribution held by Iranian-Canadian immigrant mothers. The Iranian children consistently attributed academic success and failure to "effort", whereas the immigrant children's responses were variable, demonstrating acculturation to Western belief systems. The findings demonstrate how acculturation influences mothers' and children's beliefs about school achievement through the process of immigration. Implications for theory are discussed. (Contains 1 table and 12 figures.)

Interviews regular and special education teachers concerning knowledge and attitudes towards attention deficit hyperactivity disorders (ADHD) and learning disabilities (LD). Determined that general knowledge was low among both groups. Three-quarters of teachers favored increasing peer awareness as to problems LD students encounter at school. No correlation was found between teacher knowledge of ADHD and LD and their attitudes. (Author/JDM)

Used semi-structured interviews to examine a grounded theory of beliefs that Canadian teachers and Japanese immigrant parents hold regarding schooling and learning. Results indicate that the participants' belief systems can consist of three layers: the general belief system concerning school and learning; opinions regarding learning difficulties; and opinions concerning actions to take in order to solve the difficulties. (Author/VWL)

Evaluates the largely successful retraining program for immigrant science teachers from the former Soviet Union to Israel in 1990-91 following the mass Soviet immigration. A list of policy recommendations is offered. The retraining considerations and models from this study might be applied in other countries experiencing major social changes. (SLD)

The extent to which evaluation results answer different stakeholders' needs was explored in the evaluation of a business English course at Van Leer Institute for the Development of Executive Assistants in Tel-Aviv (Israel), using diagnostic tests. Students (n=52), teachers, curriculum team, and administrators could use the evaluation results. (SLD)

Describes a radio program in an English-as-a-Foreign-Language classroom in Israel. Classrooms of English students listen carefully to daily broadcasts, waiting to solve the brain teaser. Personal messages and catchy music follow the program. The project has encouraged students to use English actively and purposefully. Evaluation of the broadcasts provides practice in oral presentations and written projects. (Author/VWL)