Curricular concerns and issues are suggested that encourage prospective teachers to think about the social, political, and institutional context of schooling. Specific issues are considered related to the substantive concerns of (1) teachers' work; (2) achievement of minority students; and (3) gender dynamics and teaching. (SLD)

The relationship between a teacher's knowledge of mathematics and instructional practice was investigated by videotaping an experienced fifth grade teacher giving a lesson on functions and graphing. A subject-matter knowledge interview and card sort task were used with the teacher and a mathematics educator, indicating areas of weakness. (SLD)

A guided reciprocal peer-questioning procedure (GRPQP) was used by 65 college students (in 2 experiments) for learning expository material presented in classroom lectures. Results support the feasibility of using the GRPQP in real classroom settings, because it promotes peer interaction and learning in cooperative groups. (SLD)

The knowledge that 35 fifth graders and 37 sixth graders had about a historical period was characterized by focusing on the fifth graders before they studied the Revolutionary War, and sixth graders 1 year after they studied the topic. Students' knowledge before and after instruction included simple associations and lacked connected structures.…

In an open-ended questionnaire examination of school politics from a teacher's viewpoint, 276 teachers described the control-oriented and protective political strategies of principals. The use of control-manipulative political behaviors by some principals had serious negative effects on teacher involvement and performance and undermined…

Small group instruction was assessed in a naturalistic study involving 206 observations of mathematics periods in 33 classrooms of grades 4, 5, and 6 in 21 schools. Six types of group instruction were identified, and teachers' use of such groups was explored. (SLD)

The costs, effects, and utility of mathematics instruction assisted by microcomputer presentations were compared with those of conventional classroom approaches, using 79 students in grades 3 and 5. Results indicate that grouping students for instruction on microcomputers in classrooms is cost effective. (SLD)

Coursework-mastery test scores for all middle school students in a school district were used to test the narrowly meritocratic hypothesis that course-grade differentials for gender, ethnicity, and poverty groups can be accounted for by the differential coursework mastery of these groups. Samples ranged from 1,124 to 8,381 seventh graders and…

Results are presented from two intervention studies which investigate whether encouraging elementary students to generate drawings of arithmetic word problems facilitates problem-solving performance. Findings indicate that fifth graders (N=50) generated many drawings of word problems and improved problem solutions after the intervention, whereas…

This article presents a meta-analysis of studies of the effects of special homogeneous classes versus regular heterogeneous classes on achievement and nonachievement outcomes of gifted students. The principal findings indicate that the gifted students in special classes achieved more than their gifted counterparts in regular classes. (Author/IAH)

This study analyzes the relationship among teacher work orientation, organizational commitment, and job satisfaction of public school teachers (N=133). Results indicated that work orientation was related to the degree of job satisfaction among teachers. Apparently, organizational commitment was not related to teachers' work orientation.…

Results are reported from a study which sought to identify the particular experiences, from preschool through high school, that constitute a press (a special pattern of experiences) for reading development. The study also sought to determine which of these experiences are related to adult reading ability. (IAH)

This study attempts to detect the presence of either of 2 different categories of large-scale bias in 4 widely used mathematics achievement tests: induced bias and norming bias. Subjects were 407 eighth graders. (IAH)

Eighth graders (N=85) participated in a study that manipulated the content and form of students' lecture notes. Matrix notes were found to be relatively effective for learning concepts. Girls recorded a greater number of notes than boys on tests involving recall and recognition of factual items. (IAH)

Three rationales that have been offered for denying disciplinary status to legal writing as a component of law school curricula are analyzed. It is argued that legal writing deserves such status. Ways in which increased diversity in inquiry modes support the development of legal writing instructional theory are illustrated. (SLD)