Education & Pedagogy

Analyzes the Adey Report on National Standards and Guidelines for Initial Teacher Education regarding its potential contribution to Australia's teacher education reform, identifying the logic of its arguments and the context in which it places itself, discussing how it constructs graduates, exploring its goal of preparing a profession, and identifying external factors that challenge the goal of professionalization. (SM)

Compares changing patterns in educational finance in Russia and China, drawing on the literature concerning educational change in societies moving from socialism to market economies. Discusses economic and political contexts in the two countries, public and private educational expenditures, decentralization of financial responsibilities, increased regional differences in expenditures, and introduction of multichannel funding of education. (Contains 77 references.) (Author/SV)

For decades, Lester B. Pearson College (British Columbia) has been involved with Race Rocks--islands in San Juan de Fuca Strait. The college is steward for the Provincial Ecological Reserve and has partnered with public agencies, businesses, and First Nations to create educational television programs and an interactive Web site on island ecology, produced by college students for secondary students. (SV)

An Appalachian college professor describes his efforts to merge political activism, scholarship, and teaching, and offers some thoughts on transformative education that prepares students for their role in a democratic society. An important approach to transformative education is service learning programs that incorporate local issues and politics and thereby provide an experiential base for critical thinking. (TD)

Children's rights, as described in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, are increasingly being taught in Canadian schools. Children's rights curricula yield positive results for teachers and students, including increased self-esteem, improved classroom environments, and improved student behavior, especially when democratic teaching styles are used. Implications for teacher education are discussed. (TD)

This article reports on a collaborative program at the University of Wisconsin among secondary level science, mathematics, and special educators. The program emphasizes coordinated courses and fieldwork experiences to students across disciplines delivered by an interdisciplinary cohort of instructors. Evaluation of program outcomes finds increased enrollments and graduates' anecdotal data supporting the program. (Contains references.) (DB)

A review of the literature on special education and school discipline in light of the 1997 Amendments to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act finds little evidence to support student suspension and expulsion. Support is offered for a unified system of discipline that preserves both a free and appropriate public education and a safe school environment for all students. (Contains references.) (Author/DB)

Describes an arts-based approach to the study of multicultural education that challenges pre-service students to address various relevant topics while enabling an aesthetic understanding of the issues. Examines how the creation of artwork serves as a personal act of meaning-making for students, allowing them to create a vision for a project of social transformation for themselves, their own students, and society. (SM)

The engineering workforce is overwhelmingly male and White. To attract and retain American Indian and other minority-group students, engineering programs must offer practical, hands-on, team activities; show that engineering is beneficial to society and Indian communities; use inclusive textbooks; offer distance-learning opportunities; and cooperate with tribal colleges. Examples of college programs pursuing these strategies are offered. (SV)

Discusses the Aberdare Committee created to remedy shortcomings arising from a non-intervention policy in Welsh secondary education, eminating from the 1881 Report of the Committee on Intermedicate and Higher Education (Wales). Focuses on three commissions: the Caredon, Taunton, and Devonshire. Discusses the committee outcomes regarding English and Welsh education system comparisons. (KDR)

Research literature in environmental education has grown in volume and diverse directions over the past three decades, and the task of reviewing or synthesizing it is difficult and problematic. Suggests that this task is better undertaken by teams of researchers rather than one individual working alone. Makes recommendations for future reviews and syntheses of environmental education literature. (Contains 117 references.) (Author/NB)

Investigates Hong Kong secondary school integrated science teachers' perceptions of environmental education. Both questionnaire surveys and interviews were used. Finds that teachers tended to teach more environmental education if they held more favorable attitudes toward environmental educa-tion, had more skills in teaching environmental education, and believed more in the relevance of Integrated Science to environmental education. (Author/SOE)

Traces the development, by foundations faculty, of a Master of Education program, based in social foundations content and knowledge, discussing successes, tensions, and dilemmas they faced and explaining how foundational perspectives shaped the content of the curriculum they developed and how their perspectives illuminated the processes by which they made their decisions within the institutional context. (SM)

Describes one elementary school's experience utilizing undergraduate nursing students as an alternative resource for providing health education. Nursing students observed in the classroom, prepared teaching plans, and presented topics. Participants reported that the experience was effective in relation to the levels of achievement attained by children and the degree of experience, satisfaction, and success for nursing students. (SM)

Examines associations between the level of teacher preparation in environmental education (EE) and the level of implementation of EE in elementary school classrooms in Wisconsin and Ohio. Measures elementary school teachers' attitudes toward EE. Findings indicate that Wisconsin elementary teachers received more preservice EE preparation than Ohio teachers. (Author/SAH)