The Comprehensive Approach to Restructuring a School was designed as a framework for improving the academic achievement and reducing the dropout rate of poor African American students. The major elements of the Comprehensive Approach are as follows: (1) leadership must have vision and commitment; (2) communication processes, developed by a school-based restructuring team, are essential for success; (3) the planning phase must develop goals, expected outcomes, and priorities based on a needs assessment, must codify these into a program design, and must then identify and allocate resources; (4) the restructuring team must closely monitor the implementation of the program design; (5) the monitoring, assessment, and accountability aspects of the program design must go on continuously, based on a planned program of statistical data and information gathering; and (6) teaching must be based on the preferred learning styles of African American children. The following implications for classroom teaching are outlined: (1) the curriculum must be activity-based; (2) the creative arts are prime activities for developing concepts and skills; (3) one-to-one tutoring, small groups, peer tutoring, and cooperative learning are very successful; (4) personal contact with the teacher and the subject is important; (5) teaching must take into account that African American perceptual modalities tend to be developmentally multisensory; and (6) student confidence must be encouraged with explanations, demonstrations, assistance, and assurances. A point-by-point comparison between the preferred learning styles of the Comprehensive Approach and "low-yield" teaching styles are included. Six transparency charts of statistical data and a list of 35 references are appended. (FMW)