Discusses negative consequences of researchers' faith in positivistic inquiry: (1) it promotes the idea that certain rationalistic ingredients are obligatory in research; (2) it leads to faith in models of the mind based on order; and (3) it leads to a notion of teaching as articulating "know what" rather than "know how." (DSK)

Reports on an ethnographic study of parents' evenings at British secondary schools as seen from the perspectives of all involved. Collects data from in-depth interviews with staff, parents, and students, and by observation. Indicates that meetings are unique interactional events that create problematic interface between the power bases of home and…

Looks at the premises on which peer education is founded and considers whether the approach is the panacea that many claim. Also, describes how positive views of peer education have spread in the absence of any assessment of its premises, and evaluates each of the claims made for peer education. (DSK)

Argues that realist researchers regard serendipitous events in research with suspicion, resulting in the lack of analysis of the role of serendipity in the generation of research ideas. Analyzes the significance and impact of serendipity in the process of a case study. Deliberates the problematic nature of constructing research stories. (DSK)

Discusses Freedom Summer, the voter registration and educational program conducted in Mississippi in the summer of 1964. The importance of adult education in this civil rights effort is analyzed in parallel with the work of Paulo Freire in Brazil. (SLD)

Problems associated with the adoption of a dualist ontology in the learning and motivational domains are discussed. From a Deweyan perspective, the current focus on self-regulation is problematic because it legitimates dualist distinctions between and within these two domains. (SLD)

The extent to which variables from a previous study (P. Mosenthal, 1996) on document processing influenced difficulty on 165 tasks from the pose scales of five national adult literacy scales was studied. Three process variables accounted for 78% of the variance when prose task difficulty was defined using level scores. Implications for computer…

Two studies involving 160 kindergarten students investigated children's involvement in shared thinking with varying adult support and children's later performance on a categorization task. Results indicate that children benefit from working with an adult who provides some leadership in learning categorization skills. (SLD)

The role of coeducation versus single-sex schooling in the academic, socioemotional, interpersonal, and career development of adolescents is discussed, and arguments and research support for both types of schooling are reviewed. Separate-sex schooling seems to provide potential benefits for at least some students. (Author/SLD)

A review of 93 empirical studies on learning to teach were reviewed to establish what is currently known about how people learn to teach and to critique the quality of the reporting of that research. Tensions between the hopes and expectations of teacher educators and those of beginning teachers are highlighted. (SLD)

The observed effectiveness and efficacy of discovery learning in simulated environments is reviewed, along with problems learners may encounter in discovery learning. How simulations can be combined with instructional support is discussed. Successful discovery learning is related to reasoning from hypotheses, applying the discovery process, and…

The theoretical and empirical underpinnings of teacher efficacy as indicated in the research literature are examined to bring coherence to the construct and its measurement. A model of teacher efficacy is introduced that reconciles two competing conceptual strands found in the literature. Strategies are also suggested for improving the efficacy of…

Examines the writings of J. Dewey and L. Vygotsky as part of the turn-of-the-century human sciences, highlighting the way in which each functioned to bring the new democratic rationalities into the governing of individual conduct, and tracing the origins of constructivist pedagogy. Contains approximately 200 references. (SLD)

Discusses the various influences on the discourse of participation in educational reforms and the ways in which it is being promoted and implemented by diverse constituencies. Focuses on how participation becomes a way to create institutional legitimacy for current educational practices, and on the role of parent participation, and presents a…

Investigated the effects of group ability composition on group processes and outcomes in science performance assessments. Findings from 21 eighth-grade science classes (445 students) show that group ability composition has a great impact on performance and that heterogeneous groups provide more of a benefit for below-average students than a…