This study examined the relationship between end-of-year grades and the academic, behavioral, and social characteristics of rural African American youth. Participants included 392 7th and 8th grade students from 2 rural middle schools in the south. Participants were African American and were from 2 communities that have child poverty rates…

Measuring the quality of service in higher education is increasingly important, particularly as fees introduce a more consumerist ethic amongst students. This paper aims to test and compare the relative efficacy of three measuring instruments of service quality (namely HEdPERF, SERVPERF and the moderating scale of HEdPERF-SERVPERF ) within a…

The increase in litigation by students who are dissatisfied with their assessment, and to a lesser extent the time and monetary costs of student appeals makes it imperative that institutions adopt a robust assessment strategy. The concern of consumers with respect to professional services offered by students after graduation is also an issue. This…

This paper reconsiders long-term, national or socially contextualized trends in a number of important education areas commonly addressed by policy interventions. These include widening participation, teacher training, school performance, the use of targets, and student assessment. In each case, it is very difficult to sustain an argument that…

This paper describes a research tool which aims to gather data about pupils' views of learning and teaching, with a particular focus on their thinking about their learning (metacognition). The approach has proved to be an adaptable and effective technique to examine different learning contexts from the pupils' perspective, while also acting as an…

This paper considers the contemporary use of focus groups as a method of data collection within qualitative research settings. The authors draw upon their own experiences of using focus groups in educational and "community" user-group environments in order to provide an overview of recent issues and debates surrounding the deployment of focus…

This work is about the ethics of education, and about philosophy as a discipline that can help us to help children look at ethics afresh. The study and practice of ethics is about morals and uncertainties and, as such, poses problems for the research community. The philosopher Ricoeur challenges research as only one way to find meaning in the…

This paper considers some of the decisions that researchers take and raises issues around researcher reflexivity, identity, values and ethics. It focuses attention on researchers and reflects on how the research they do, the topics they investigate, the methodologies they espouse, the methods they use and the writing/reporting styles they adopt,…

This study linked gender, family help, and grade level to 5 features of homework management reported by 238 rural middle school students. The 5 features studied were setting an appropriate work environment; managing time; and controlling attention, motivation, and potentially interfering emotions. No significant differences were found across grade…

Eighty-two Head Start preschoolers were assessed with a peer rating measure of sociometric status, the Social Skills Rating System for Teachers (Gresham & Elliott, 1990), an Overt Aggression scale culled from items from the Aggressive Behavior subscale of the CBCL-TRF (Achenbach, 1997), and teacher ratings of relational aggression (Crick, Casas, &…

Early Head Start services are typically offered through home- or center-based delivery models. A formative evaluation of an example of each service delivery model was conducted. The purpose was to examine the issues involved in the implementation of these two service delivery models relative to the content of services, intensity of services,…

Analyses of the peak and predominant toy play of 17 preschool children with mental retardation and 17 preschool children without mental retardation are presented. Groups were matched on developmental age and sex and observed during both a home-based independent play situation and classroom-based free play. Results are presented for 1) a comparison…

Individualized family service plans (IFSPs) should reflect the concerns and priorities of the families for which the plan is written. Families with low incomes that live in rural areas may have unique concerns and priorities due to their financial circumstances and where they live. In this study, qualitative methods were used to examine the…

Educators have continually sought to achieve a balance between a phonics-based, code-emphasis program and a more holistic, meaning-based approach to emergent literacy instruction. This article describes an integrated phonics and literature-based approach to developing children's emergent literacy skills. These skills included alphabet knowledge,…

This study examines the classroom experiences of 192 children followed longitudinally from kindergarten to 1st grade. Time-sampled observations of children were conducted to compare learning formats, teaching activities, and children's engagement in activities between kindergarten and 1st grade. Classroom observations also were conducted to…