JOURNAL OF EDUCATION
Year:2007 | Volume:22 | Issue:4 (88)|Papers Count:6

The theory of Multiple Intelligence (Gardner, 1983) has opened a new window toward educators by dismissing the then dominant theory of intelligence that emphasized on the unidimensionality of intelligence and hence, paving the way for the analysis of the impact that the individual differences have on both the process and products of education. Although this theory and its implications for curricula and teaching have been discussed more or less extensively, a different analysis of the theory's implications for these arenas theory is attempted here in. It is the author's belief that the extent of the impact made by the individual differences has gone beyond the increase in the number of teaching-learning methods within identical curricula and has included an increase in the number of goals or objectives within the curriculum. Such interpretation is not observed in the current literature.

The present research was conducted to determine the relation between math achievement and student characteristics alongside of the family socioeconomic status, using the TIMMSS2003 data on Iranian students and the method of path analysis. The results show that the Iranian students' math self-concept has a significant positive correlation with math achievement and a negative significant correlation with attitude toward math. Furthermore, the family socio-economic status showed a positive and significant correlation with both math self-concept and attitude toward math variables. The attitude variable was significantly correlated with math achievement while the case was reversed between it and the gender variable.Other possible correlations were not significant. The scores obtained by Iranian boys and girls were also compared using a t-test only to the two groups in attitude toward math.

Based on the theory of human capital any improvement in health, skills, and motivation of the work force brings about improvement in the force's productivity. Hence, education by improving the qualities of individuals figures prominently in economic growth. In this article, using Solo's Generalized Development of the Fars province during the period of 1976-2000 is studies. Toward this goal a number of qualitative and quantitative educational indices are utilized as indices of production investment. The findings indicate that the registration rates at different educational levels, the student-teacher ratio at these levels, and the literacy rate in the province impact productivity significantly. Considering these finding, further promotion of literacy within the province and for different gender and age groups is recommended. Perhaps if participation in training courses was compulsory and the accepted standards of curriculum planning were observed in these courses, productivity could improve in the province. In other words both qualitative and quantities changes in education can lead to improvement in productivity.

In a survey of 40 high schools in Isfahan province views of 80 principals and 40 teachers, selected through cluster sampling, on the way that elective courses are offered and the problems there in were gathered. The instruments used were a checklist and a questionnaire.The major findings were that the way elective courses were offered was in general according to the given guidelines, however exceptions were observed in placing students, maintaining minimum and maximum number of attendances, giving workbooks to the students, etc. As for the problems in offering the courses, all respondents agreed that there were major ones such as lack of supervisors and teachers, lack of familiarity with the guidelines, and the unavailability of adequate instruments for determining students' needs and potentials. The major suggested approaches to the improvement of the program included forcing school to offer elective courses based on need assessments, writing syllabi for all courses, familiarizing all involved with the elective course program, implementing appropriate mechanisms of incorporating students' need into the courses content, and a more rigorous evaluation procedure.

In order to determine the extent to which the objectives of the experimental project on descriptive evaluations were reached, an evaluation study was conducted. Out of the 240 elementary school being covered by the project in 26 provinces a sample of 9651 students, 294 teachers, 77 principals, and 1236 parents were selected randomly through a systematic stratified sampling method.Instruments used included a semi structured questionnaire, achievement tests, observational checklists, an attitude scale, and content analysis instruments.The collected data were analyzed using the Mann Whitney's V-test, a two way ANOVA, and the Smironoff test. Findings show that the project has only been partially successful in reaching its objectives and has actually failed on many of them. One objective that has been reached is the improvement of the mental health level at the teaching learning environments.However, other objectives have not been reached, such as improvement of students' attitude toward learning, increase in mental preservation, attention to higher level cognitive functions, deepening learning, increasing Parental involvement in teaching/learning, desensitizing parents toward grade, creating opportunities for both teachers and students to improve their teaching/learning, utilizing procedural feedbacks to improve learning, and utilizing different measurement instruments. It is here in suggested that project be extended for two more years and cover both fourth and fifth graders.

The purpose of the present research has been to determine the extent of research findings' utilization within the central Administrative departments of the educational system. The study has been of the descriptive type and its sample has included administrators, assistants, and experts in the central head quarters of the MOE. Four questionnaires were used to gather the needed data on the extent of use, methods of research and obtaining findings, identifying the hurdles and the findings of research are utilized more extensively in the administrative department of the ministry than the central department. Major reasons for the low level of research findings utility were found to be inadequate approaches to their dissemination, low quality of the research published, and...