Achieving the educational standards we need

This article is based on remarks presented by Donald M. Stewart at the Open Forum on National Standards held at the Second National Conference on School/College Collaboration, cosponsored by the American Association for Higher Education and the College Board in Atlanta, Georgia, on July 26, 1991.     

Using Internet delivered video cases,to support pre-service teachers' understanding of effective early literacy instruction: An exploratory study

This preliminary study explores the effects ofusing CTELL (Case Technologies EnhancingLiteracy Learning) cases on preserviceteachers' learning. Students participated inone of three instructional treatments:traditional, traditional plus video, andtraditional plus CTELL cases. A pre-postconcept web, describing students' understandingof effective reading instruction, served as themajor outcome measure. This was supplementedwith a unidimensional confidence measure,journal entries, and student interviews. Nosignificant differences were found for any ofthe three treatment conditions on the conceptmapping task or the confidence measure.However, the journal entries and interview datahighlight important issues, challenges andbenefits, with respect to the use of multimediacases. Implications for teacher education areexplored.     

QUALITY INDICES FOR FACULTY EVALUATION

This paper investigates procedures and criteria for the evaluation of faculty in higher education. It first surveys the different indices currently in use for evaluating research, teaching and service activities. It then discusses the use of these criteria in view of the shifting framework of evaluation in the university from that based on promotion and tenure decisions to one which is based on institutional review. Finally, conditions for the success of faculty evaluation are outlined. These include evaluation procedures that are consultative in nature, the specification of criteria and standards, and an emphasis on the critical role of faculty in evaluation and in becoming evaluators themselves.     

Coordination of reading and spelling in early literacy development: An examination of the discrepancy hypothesis

The Discrepancy Hypothesis posits that childrenearly in the acquisition process read visually(holistically) and spell phonologically. Thisclaim was examined and rejected. Weinvestigated reading and spelling in Grade 1and Grade 2 children using controlled nonwordand word materials with a variety oforthographic patterns. While reading andspelling were strongly correlated even amongthe younger readers, discrepancies betweenperformance levels occurred in both directions. Children's responses were affected by wordcharacteristics and whether or not theyreceived school phonics instruction. Phonologically complex words, such as thosecontaining consonant clusters, wereparticularly difficult for Grade 1 children toread, while words that were difficult to spellcorrectly but not to read tended to havemultivalent mappings from sound to spelling.The generation of reading responses tospecially selected nonwords was affected byboth implicit and explicit phonological sourcesof knowledge. Orthographic knowledge gained inspelling did not always transfer to reading,and vice versa.