Linda Leonard Lamme

Integrating Reading into Middle School Science: What we did, found and learned

Recent calls for border crossing between reading and science have heightened the need to support science teachers in integrating reading into science and to verify the robustness of this approach in the context of inquiry‐based science. In this paper, we share what we did, found, and learned in a collaborative project in which a team of university‐based reading educators and school‐based science teachers worked together to infuse reading strategy instruction and quality science trade books into inquiry‐based sixth‐grade science classrooms. We suggest that infusing reading into middle school science enhances science teaching and learning, but is a complex, multifaceted undertaking.

Selected Demographics, Attitudes, and Beliefs About Diversity of Preservice Teachers

In this study, preservice teachers’ demographic variables such as race, innercity program experiences, religious affiliation, and cross-cultural friendships are examined to see if they influence the preservice teachers’ beliefs on issues of diversity. The data are from a Personal Beliefs About Diversity Scale and a Professional Beliefs About Diversity Scale. Analyses of the data indicate that religious denomination and cross-cultural friendship involvement as demographic variables significantly predicted scores on all the surveys. Another important finding of these analyses is a closing gap between students who had lower scores and higher scores on the presurveys by the end of the course.

Prosocial Behaviors of Five-Year-Old Children in Sixteen Learning/Activity Centers.

Abstract Prosocial behaviors that occurred when five-year-olds interacted within different learning/activity centers in a multi-age preschool setting were investigated. Using field observations and interviews, researchers examined the prosocial behaviors of nine target five-year-old children. The children and their 20 younger classmates were observed for a total of 45 hours. The 415 observed prosocial behaviors occurred in 16 learning/activity centers. There were significantly more proximity seeking, helping, and sharing behaviors than other kinds of prosocial behaviors in the centers. The children were most prosocial in the creating type centers. The authors share reasons for the findings and implications for classrooms.

Guidelines for portfolio preparation: Implications from an analysis of teaching portfolios at the University of Florida

An analysis of 73 portfolios, prepared by University of Florida faculty as part of the Teaching Improvement Program competition, revealed tremendous variability in the quantity, quality, and coherence of the evidence presented to support claims of excellence in teaching. By analyzing portfolios prepared by faculty members representing different colleges and different types of teaching assignments, the researchers developed seven common guidelines for portfolio construction.

Learning to Share: How Literature Can Help.

(1983). Learning to Share: How Literature Can Help. Childhood Education: Vol. 59, No. 3, pp. 188-192.

Helping Kindergarten Writers Move toward Independence.

Two kindergarten teachers examine the strategies they use to help their students become more accomplished and independent writers.

A Comfortable Start for Everyone: The First Week of School in Three Multi-Age (K-2) Classrooms

This article describes the start of the school year in three multi-age classrooms where 8 new kindergarten children join 16 returning first and second graders. The authors (professor/observers and teachers) describe what happens during the first week of school in this setting where the students remain with their teachers for 3 years. They explain what the start of the year is like for the returning students (first and second graders), the new students (kindergartners), the parents, and the teachers.

Turkish Preservice Teachers' Perceptions of Children's Picture Books Reflecting LGBT-Related Issues.

ABSTRACT This research study focuses on Turkish preservice teachers’ perceptions of childrens picture books containing lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender issues to lend support to encouraging diversity in teacher education programs and elementary school classrooms. The authors proposed that reading, listening, and responding to diverse childrens picture books within reader response theories and critical literacy have the potential to help preservice teachers develop a deeper understanding of themselves and of others. In the written responses, the authors examined teacher education students’ responses to 2 childrens picture books: And Tango Makes Three and Mollys Family.

African American History as Depicted in Recently Published Children's Books.

xciting stories about African E Americans in recently published historical fiction books for children concern Pea Island Life-Station, a private school for African American girls, a biracial slave, a black woman who homesteads for land in 1889, and an orphan who travels on his own to Flint, Michigan, during the Depression. Much of this history never appeared in the white history books that most teachers and future teachers read when they were in school. Davis (2001) noted that in the

Project friends: A multi-age learning community

Project Friends is a learning community based on our confidence in the multi-age classroom as a valuable and viable vehicle for teaching young children. Our three multi-age classrooms of kinder-garten, first- and second-grade children were the served as the setting for Project Friends. In this article, we share our beginnings, significant features and outcomes of the learning community, and our reflections on a year ended in Project Friends. Our experiences and the experiences of the children in the multi-age classrooms continue to provide rich contexts for teaching and learning in the elementary school.