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Teaching is often characterized as an isolated activity, yet opportunities for teachers to work and learn together in schools are increasing. Underlying this shift is the view that as teachers work on new practices and teaching challenges together, they will express varied perspectives, reveal different teaching styles and experiences, and stimulate reflection and professional growth. Despite strong research interest in teacher learning groups, few studies have looked at the relationship between teachers' conversations and collaboration outside the classroom and their actual classroom teaching. Drawing on data from a larger study of literacy instruction with middle‐school teachers, this article describes how three teachers participated in an ongoing literacy program with a research group. Two were seventh‐ and eighth‐grade language‐arts teachers, the third was a special‐education teacher who taught a substantially separate class of cognitively delayed and learning‐disabled students. Case studies of each t...

Middletown High School is a comprehensive high school with 1,970 students, located in the environs of Washington, DC. It is distinguished by an open enrollment policy for all courses; a strong emphasis on inclusion of students with learning disabilities (LD) in general education classrooms; block scheduling that allows for more in-depth and meaningful study of important concepts and ideas; and team teaching in English, mathematics, science, and social studies. In a schoolwide 30-minute daily Learning Seminar, all students learn study skills, do homework, take tests, or go to the library, and teachers have opportunities for departmental meetings and problem solving. A visual representation of a “percolator” frames the school's system of opportunities and supports. Through case studies of two students with LD and analyses of 55 transcripts of recent graduates, we describe the academic and social opportunities, support structures, and strategies that make Middletown a “good high school” for students with disabilities.

Located in the Florida panhandle, Apalachee High School has a student population of 1,894 students, 13% of whom have identified disabilities. The school has a highly experienced teaching staff and a special education faculty that provides acknowledged leadership in the school. Apalachee includes students with disabilities in all aspects of school life and sustains a high level of community involvement in students' success. The graphic metaphor used to represent Apalachee's approach is a set of globes and pathways that represent the academic programs and the support structures that students use to progress within and between programs. Three student case studies help to illustrate how the “pathways” respond to students with disabilities at different points on a continuum of academic and social needs and abilities. Four-year transcripts for 39 students reflect the range of opportunities and supports (pathways) that characterize Apalachee and are illustrated by the three students we shadowed.

This article summarizes the findings and themes from the three high schools we studied. All three schools engaged in five schoolwide strategies for educating students with disabilities. They provided a broad array of academic courses and program options; provided schoolwide support structures that could be combined and customized to the needs and strengths of individual students; worked intentionally to connect students to the school and build their motivation to succeed; created a connected and caring adult community to serve students' academic and social/personal needs; and developed responsive leaders who managed the tensions inherent in the commitment to prepare students with disabilities to be successful in their lives beyond school. The article also reviews the different ways these three school instantiated these strategies. We describe the “theory of action” that integrates the five schoolwide strategies into a synergistic approach in each school and explore implications of the Good High Schools study for practice and for future research.

This special issue presents findings from Good High Schools, a 3-year study of high schools that have strong participation and positive results for their students with disabilities. In this introductory article, we describe the national search for three “good high schools” and the final selection of schools in Virginia, New York, and Florida. We review the goals and research questions that guided the research and describe the mixed methods research approach used to study the three high schools. Methods included individual and focus group interviews of school administrators, department heads, community representatives, teachers, parents, and students; classroom observations; shadowing of students throughout a school day; surveys of students and teachers; collection of documents on the school mission, course offerings, and students' rights and responsibilities; achievement test scores; and 4-year transcripts of courses taken by senior students with disabilities. We foreshadow the finding from the three case studies that follow, that a theory of action underlies the approach to educating students with disabilities in the three schools.

Walter Cronkite High School is a comprehensive high school of nearly 4,000 students, located in New York City. The population of students with disabilities includes many students with severe and low-incidence disabilities, including 70 students with visual or hearing impairments and 20 students with orthopedic impairments. Cronkite High School's academic program reflects the belief that if students with disabilities can choose among a motivating set of intellectual options, receive appropriate academic support, and assume responsibility for their learning, they will be successful. The school puts that belief into practice through an “assembled puzzle” of academic opportunities, academic supports, and social opportunities designed to respond to highly varied student interests and academic needs. We describe “how the school works” through case studies of three students with learning disabilities and through an analysis of the high school transcripts of 36 students with disabilities who are recent graduates.

This article describes a promising form of professional collaboration: coteaching between a content area teacher and a special education teacher. In an investigation of a schoolwide coteaching model in an urban middle school that places students with disabilities in heterogeneous classrooms, researchers interviewed key school leaders and made detailed observations of coteaching. The study found that although content teachers conduct more of the instruction and special education teachers provide more individualized assistance, both use a full range of instructional roles. Essential to the success of coteaching partnerships were collaborative school structures, equal status rules for teachers, a commitment to all students' learning, and strong content knowledge.

Opportunities to discuss literature with peers are critical to students' development of literary understanding. Despite the importance of these discourse experiences, many middle-school students are not afforded these opportunities or the necessary teacher support in their English language arts classrooms. Based on a sociocultural perspective, we set out to examine the ways that middle-grades students, particularly those with disabilities, contribute to peer-led discussions and how their participation enables them to build toward textual understanding, social understanding, and understanding of literary discourse. We conducted an in-depth analysis of a verbatim transcription of a video-taped literacy lesson in an urban classroom. Drawing on that analysis, we describe the ways students participated in the literary discourse and the teacher practices that supported students' participation in this discourse. This analysis provides evidence that students with disabilities can acquire the discourse practices needed for interpreting challenging literature with their regular education peers.

Over a three-year period, Education Development Center, Inc. selected and studied three urban middle schools that intentionally set out to serve all of their students, including those with identified disabilities, those acquiring English proficiency, and those recently immigrated to the United States. The three schools share the philosophy that all students are academically competent when they are given the tools for constructing knowledge. All three schools have strong records of progress on various measures of academic learning, including standards-based, statewide tests. Although these schools have developed different cultures around academic excellence, they share a number of common features. This paper discusses seven features of the cultures of excellence and belonging that characterize these schools, drawing on a case study of one of the schools to illustrate how the features interact and mutually support one another.

Literacy curriculum reforms in the middle grades require students to interpret challenging literature and write well-formed texts. Teachers are accountable for designing instruction that builds these high-level literacy skills with increasingly diverse groups of students. In this article we describe findings from studying a literacy approach aimed at supporting'teachers and students in meeting these demands. Based on a sociocognitive perspective, the Supported Literacy approach engages students in collaborative interpretation through a seamless integration of reading, discussing, and writing about compelling literature. Through classroom observation and outcomes assessment, we have identified features of learning opportunities that enable students with disabilities to perform similarly to their peers. We describe these instructional features and illustrate how they work together to support all students in achieving rigorous outcomes.

State frameworks emphasize literacy goals such as understanding literary concepts and understanding how to read and compose texts with varied purposes. Students with learning disabilities need to engage in instruction that addresses these goals and takes into account the special literacy challenges these students face. This article describes a study of how middle-school teachers in general education classrooms implemented a Supported Literacy approach and how students with disabilities performed in relation to their peers. Supported Literacy engages students in integrated thematic units in which they read, discuss, and write about a shared, age-appropriate text. Findings indicate that teachers provided students with disabilities access to the full range of challenging reading and writing activities in the unit. Students with disabilities performed similarly to normally achieving and honors students in one of the most challenging comprehension and writing activities, writing persuasively about their interpretation of a text. Results also indicate that all students need a fuller understanding of the process of developing a persuasive argument and that teachers need more skill in assessing students' work to determine and respond to students' levels of understanding. The article discusses implications of these findings for studying complex literacy interventions.

Research on students with disabilities has only recently begun to investigate the challenges that teachers face when they include these students in standards-based curricula and instruction focused on goals of understanding in complex domains. This article presents the mission and conceptual framework of the REACH Institute, which is engaged in a five-year program of research on teaching for understanding with students with disabilities. The institute is investigating the premise that students with disabilities will improve their understanding when they engage in instruction that reflects a rigorous application of four research-based principles of teaching for understanding: instruction designed around authentic tasks, opportunities to develop cognitive strategies, learning that is socially mediated, and engagement in constructive conversations. In addition to discussing these principles, this overview describes several common features of the institute research strands in social studies, language arts, science, and mathematics, together with emerging themes in the research findings. This overview frames the four articles that follow, each of which describes research on teaching for understanding in a major content area.

Students with learning disabilities often perform poorly on multiple-choice tests that emphasize recall and factual knowledge. This study compared the effect of two alternative assessmentsa constructed diagram test and a written questionnaireon fourth-grade learning disabled (LD) and non-learning disabled (Non-LD) students' learning. As part of a larger investigation of different approaches to hands-on science learning, 172 students (including 33 LD students) in six urban and two suburban classrooms participated in the study. Results indicate that students' assessment outcomes are a function of learner status (LD, low, average and high achieving) and level of domain specific knowledge after instruction. After controlling for domain specific knowledge, students with LD, and low and average achieving students obtained higher scores on the constructed diagram test than on the questionnaire. High achieving students were not sensitive to format differences, performing comparably on the two measures. The facilitative effect of the diagram format may have been due to differences in the primary symbol systems (graphic vs. text) and the openness of the response format (constrained vs. open) of the constructed diagram and questionnaire, respectively.

Word processing offers promising support far students with learning disabilities (LD). We compared fourth‐grade students' writing quality over a 7‐month period in computer‐supported versus paper‐and‐pencil writing‐process classrooms. LD and non‐ID students improved the quality of their imaginative stories over time, regardless of the writing tool, with one exception. Students who carried out long‐term writing assignments with paper and pencil demonstrated a negative growth rate in writing quality. LD students in particular may be impeded by paper‐and‐pencil tools during extended writing assignments that call for sustained engagement and revision.

This study examines the value of a computer spelling checker as an editing tool for learning disabled writers with spelling difficulties. Two fourth-grade boys with spelling problems but different learner profiles and writing abilities learned to use the Bank Street Writer III word processing and spelling checker program to edit spelling errors—first with practice exercises and then in their own writing. Both boys learned to manage the spelling-checking process, increased the spelling accuracy of their edited texts, and enjoyed using a spelling checker. There were differences in their learning process and use of the tool, and limitations in the current technology influenced their editing performance (eg, neither student corrected any of the errors “missed” by the spelling checker; both students relied on a collaborative peer to help generate alternative spellings when the spelling checker did not offer the correction).

Science education professionals generally agree that hands-on, inquiry-based science potentially benefits all students, yet there are few specific guidelines for helping students with learning disabilities (LD) achieve success in general education science classrooms. This study compared the effects of two approaches to hands-on science–-supported inquiry science (SIS) and activity-based science–-in six urban and two suburban fourth-grade general education classrooms. Participants included 172 students, 33 of whom had learning disabilities. The study found that students with and without LD demonstrated greater concept learning in the SIS classrooms, which focused on eliciting and reworking students' misconceptions and co-constructing knowledge under the guidance of a teachercoach.

Everyday conversation between parents and toddlers provides a rich context for the child's acquisition of conceptual skills and communication abilities. While earlier studies generally have analyzed the utterances of either parent or child, this analysis of conversations of one mother and 22‐month old child focuses on the interaction of the two. The paper describes the sequences the pair uses in clarifying one another's focus of attention and in instructing and learning about concepts and motor skills. Mother and child adapt clarification and instruction patterns to the constraints of three play situations: free play, reading aloud, and parallel activity. The child adopts a “clarification” and the mother an “interpreter” role during free play, where the mother supports the child's focus. They reverse roles and communication strategies in the parallel context, where the child attempts to draw the mother into collaborative play. Further studies of mother‐toddler discourse should focus on variations across m...

This article describes the EDC/TERC Middle School Technology Integration Project, which is investigating how technology is integrated into language arts and mathematics curricula, and its impact on mainstreamed mildly handicapped students. Over 3 years, EDC/TERC will build a model of technology integration by holistically studying four diverse school districts as they expand computer use Based on assumptions that technology integration is evolutionary and dynamic and studying it requires outside intervention, EDC/TERC has adopted a naturalistic perspective. The research approach includes 10 features: natural setting, grounded theory, emergent design, interactive researchers, intervention/analysis, qualitative procedures, case study method, triangulation of data, negotiation of results, and multiple reporting modes. The resulting model will encompass relationships between critical variables emerging from the diverse sites, the different pathways schools follow to integrate technology, and interim outcomes reflecting stages within the process.

This paper addresses the need for models for assessing multicultural programs in the community college, the most culturally and socioeconomically diverse educational institutions in the country. A three-dimensional framework presents faculty, student, and curriculum variables critical to the implementation and outcomes of multicultural programs. The framework emerged from the formative evaluation of a new interdisciplinary social science curriculum and guided the design of the national field test of that curriculum in 30 community college classrooms. Three kinds of results are reported: implementation patterns; appropriateness to faculty members' teaching goals; and impact on reading behavior, interest, overall learning, and political efficacy of students with diverse ages, ethnic and sociocultural backgrounds, and political positions. Political efficacy gains of older students and students with lower socioeconomic backgrounds are discussed. The importance of such a framework in documenting the interaction between a curriculum and its sociocultural context is stressed.

The evaluation profession is profoundly critical of its own failure to have more impact on educational programs. Discussions of the need for evaluation theory and improved evaluator training largely focus on improving summative evaluation of program impact (Weiss 1972a, 1972b; Cohen 1975). Until recently, much less attention has been given to clarifying and strengthening the role and methods of formative evaluation, which assists in early program development and revision. While there is a general acceptance of the idea of formative evaluation, the profession has only begun to clarify how early evaluation research can influence the quality of the program (Fisher 1974; Sanders and Cunningham 1974; Dick 1977; Miree 1977).1 The question of how formative and summative evaluation may be linked has been almost entirely neglected. The current formative/summative distinction in evaluation research

A small but growing body of research on word processing for children suggests that computers are promising writing tools, particularly for learning disabled children, who struggle daily with the process of writing (Deloach et al., 1981; Deno, Marston, & Mirkin, 1982; Poteet, 1979). Word processors enable the children to manage mechanics by erasing and replacing words easily (Daiute, 1985) and can stimulate collaborative activities among children (Levin et al, in press). They can give children with impaired social communication a channel for expressing ideas and strengthening their selfimage (Weir, in press). Education Development Center, Inc., is currently conducting research on the ways word processors can assist in improving writing skills of learning disabled fourth graders. During the first year of the two-year study the work was carried out in resource rooms, substantially separate classrooms and tutorial settings, with five remedial teachers and 14 students with moderate writing problems. Intensive observations were carried out over an eight month period. The resulting raw data consisted of 85 observations, including verbatim transcripts of teacher-child conversations and students' vocalizations as they worked at the keyboard. The writing activities observed ranged from 15 to 45 minutes. Writing samples were gathered from students for baseline assessment purposes, using procedures and stimuli provided by the National Assessment of Education Progress. Over the eight months, students were observed writing with paper and pencil and at the computer, making possible some comparison of writing with the different tools. The objective of the first year of research was to document the varied approaches teachers naturally bring to integrating word processors into their teaching of writing. The first year of exploratory, hypothesis-generating research was grounded in the assumption that to understand both the power and the drawbacks of word processing for children with substantial writing needs, we need to focus on the character of the instructional environment in which the computer is used. Consistent with that assumption, we found out in our first year that word processors are not necessarily engaging tools. When teachers have their students use word processors for composing, children stay highly involved in writing and produce rich first drafts. When students use them to practice isolated skills or focus on editing during the composing of early drafts, they tend to become disengaged from the content of their writing (Morocco & Neuman, 1985; Neuman & Morocco, 1985). In analyzing interactions between the three "actors" in the word processor writing process, the student, the computer, and the teacher, we find that the impact of the word processor occurs at two levels. Certain features of the tool, the ease of entering and erasing text, facilitate the actual motoric writing process of the child. Other features, particularly the "public" character of word processing and the readability of print, facilitate teaching techniques which are highly beneficial for the anxious, low-writing child. Many of these techniques appear to be unique to the word processing environment and would rarely occur when children are writing with pencil. We would argue, in fact, that the most useful aspect of the word processor for learning disabled students lies not so much on the student's writing as in the access it gives the teachers to the child's writing process. This example illustrates this "accessibil i ty" feature of word processing. As a way to have her fourth grade learning disabled students begin to use the word processors, the teacher typed a series of simple sentences directly on her students' discs then asked them to expand them by adding a pre-positional phrase. Sam complied with this exercise but sighed and acted very bored, resting his head on his left hand and typing slowly with his right. Noticing his lack of involvement his teacher reached her hands over his shoulders to the keyboard and typed "Sam will be rested in class by." Surprised, Sam sat up straight, read what she had written, and energetically completed the sentence by typing "by sleeping on the job." He folded his arms across his chest, dramatizing satisfaction. The teacher again extended and put her hands on the keyboard and typed "Sam is trying to get the teacher's goat by." When Sam said he didn't understand what she meant by "goat," she erased that word and typed "attention." Sam laughed and quickly added "sleeping." She typed a third sentence, "Sam will get the teacher's approval by" and Sam completed it with "working all day like always," smiling broadly and now fully engaged in the activity. It is difficult to imagine a teacher taking a child's pencil from his or her hand and writing on the child's paper, without being intrusive. The more public character of the word processor, created by an upright, visi