A group math intervention: The modification of cover,copy, and compare for group application

A drill and practice intervention was applied in a small-group setting to improve students' fluency (accuracy and speed) with basic math facts. The Cover, Copy, and Compare intervention (Skinner, Turco, Beatty, & Rasavage, 1989) was modified and implemented with a small, middle school Chapter I math class. Data are presented showing digits correct per minute (DCPM) using a multiple baseline design across sets of division facts. Component parts of DCPM, speed and accuracy, are further discussed. Results of this study provide the scientist-practitioner with ideas about implementing group interventions using drill for math facts. Ways to refine the intervention based on baseline data are discussed.     

Levels of social complexity and dimensions of peer experiences in youth sport

We assessed young adolescent female soccer players' perceptions of their peer group experiences. Data were collected via interviews with 34 girls from two youth soccer teams (M age = 13.0 years). Following inductive discovery analysis, data were subjected to an interpretive theoretical analysis guided by a model of peer experiences (Rubin, Bukowski, & Parker, 2006). Five categories of peer experiences were identified across three levels of social complexity. At the interaction level players integrated new members into the team and learned to interact with different types of people. At the relationship level players learned about managing peer conflict. At the group level a structure of leadership emerged and players learned to work together. Findings demonstrated interfaces between peer interactions, relationships, and group processes while also simplifying some apparently complex systems that characterized peer experiences on the teams studied.     

The lady goes to court: Paperbacks and censorship

Arguing that the First Amendment does not allow for the suppression of ideas, constitutional scholars and historians have long been concerned about legal attempts to censor books in the United States. In this article Kenneth C. Davis explores the complex relationship between pivotal court cases on censorship, congressional committees, various movements, and secular and religious organizations in attempts to curtail the publication and distribution of certain types of books in this nation. Davis's trenchant analyses enrich our understanding of censorship and the history of the book in the United States. Most of the publishers engaged in this sordid competition operate in the field of cheap reprints selling [for] from 10 to 75 cents. —Reports of the Select Committee on Current Pornographic Materials (1952)It is not so much the publisher's right to publish that needs protection as the reader's right to read. —Douglas M. Black, President, American Book Publishers Council (1952) Kenneth C. Davis is the author of the definitiveTwo-Bit Culture: The Paperbacking of America in which this article originally appeared.     

Book Review

Book reviewed in this article:
Educational Measurement, Third Edition R. L. Linn (Ed.)