As faculty continue to become generations removed from production agriculture, it may be difficult for some instructors to determine the production experience of students in their classrooms. This presents a unique issue in the broader field of agriculture education across disciplines in areas such as curriculum development and teaching…

Agricultural education is defined by a best practice three-component model of instruction that includes a classroom experience, leadership development and FFA involvement, and an experience-based activity through a Supervised Agricultural Experience program (SAE). Based on program of activities award criteria, each year state FFA associations…

The beliefs and mental images that teachers have about agriculture likely influence what and how they integrate agriculture into their instruction. The purpose of this action research study was to explore the beliefs and needs of elementary and junior high school teachers in regard to integrating agriculture into their classrooms. The sample…

Some of the author's most valuable experiences as a library media specialist (LMS) were not in a school library. Rather, they were on the streets of Chicago, in community gardens, and on the rooftops of buildings in Humboldt Park, where she was hired by the University of Illinois Community Informatics Initiative as a graduate assistant and LMS in…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to identify the perceptions that extension educators in the North Central region of the United States hold regarding selected educational strategies pertaining to livestock waste management education. Livestock waste management education has been recognized as one of extension's major initiatives in the…

This curriculum guide, the first part of a core curriculum for a rural agriculture program, consists of materials for use in presenting the first seven units of a nine-unit course for high school vocational agriculture students living in rural areas. Addressed in the individual units of the guide are the following topics: educational and…

This core curriculum guide consists of materials for use in presenting a 13-unit vocational agriculture course geared toward high school students living in metropolitan areas. Addressed in the individual units of the course are the following topics: employment in agricultural occupations, supervised occupational experience, leadership in…

Selected titles among the 39 presentations are as follows: "Historical Study of Turnover among Cooperative Extension System Directors and Administrators" (Clark et al.); "Educational Orientation and Job Satisfaction of Extension Field Staff in Michigan" (Suvedi); "Teaching Styles and Teaching Effectiveness" (Barrett);…

The following are among the 42 papers and 8 poster sessions included: "Association of Methodology and Student Learning Style on Student Perception of a Collegiate Leadership Course" (McNulty, Townsend); "Learning Styles and Cognitive Performance of Secondary School Pupils" (Cox, Connors); "Effect of Style-Specific…

This curriculum guide, the second part of a core curriculum for a rural agriculture program, consists of materials for use in presenting the final two units in a nine-unit course for high school vocational agriculture students living in rural areas. Addressed in the first unit are the following aspects of agricultural mechanics: selecting and…

This curriculum guide includes teaching packets for nine problem areas of study to be included in a core curriculum for 11th-grade or third-year students enrolled in rural agricultural programs in Illinois. Each problem area includes some or all of the following components: suggestions to the teacher, a teacher guide, a competency inventory, an…

This curriculum guide includes teaching packets for 12 areas of study to be included in a core curriculum for 11th-grade or third-year students enrolled in rural agricultural programs in Illinois. Each problem area includes some or all of the following components: suggestions to the teacher, teacher guide, competency inventory, information sheet,…

One group of Illinois secondary agriculture students was taught using a problem-solving approach (PSA), the other with a subject-matter approach (SMA). A problem-solving posttest and Group Embedded Figures Test showed significantly higher problem-solving ability in the PSA group. Field independent learners in the PSA group significantly increased…

This report of a regional conference on Competency Based Teacher Education (CBTE) held to allow the six States in Region V (Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, and Wisconsin) to share information about vocational personnel development activities and programs, consists primarily of 12 conference papers: (1) Personnel Development in…

Environmental issues can serve as a marvelous framework for high-level student analysis of critical scientific and social concerns. We describe a series of activities and discussions that motivate students to explore environmentalism, sustainable development, carbon offsets, and related ideas with an engaged learning format that helps students to…