A Lexicon of Learning

What Educators Mean When They Say...

A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H  I  L  M  N  O  P  Q  R  S  T  U  V  W  Y  Z   |   Table of Contents

B

basal reader

Textbooks and anthologies (collections of stories or other writings) used to teach beginning reading. Many basal readers used to have mostly stories written especially for teaching (only certain words were used, as in the Dick and Jane stories), but many now contain a wider variety of children's literature.

basic skills

The fundamental skills needed to succeed in school and eventually in life. Most people think of basic skills as the ability to read, write, and compute. Others, however, would broaden the term to include such skills as the ability to use a computer, the ability to work cooperatively with others, or even the temperament to cope with continuous change.

behavior modification

Use of an approach based on behavioral science to change a person's way of doing things—specifically, systematic use of rewards, and sometimes punishments, to shape students' classroom deportment. Such systems usually involve explicit objectives, elaborate record keeping, and visible tracking of progress.

Used especially in special education classes for behaviorally disturbed students, behavior modification is controversial. Opponents say it is impersonal and mechanistic, makes students dependent rather than independent (at least at first), and borders on cruelty. Advocates see it as scientifically based and effective.

benchmark

A standard for judging a performance. Just as a carpenter might use marks on his workbench to measure how long a part should be, teachers and students can use benchmarks to determine the quality of a student's work. Some schools develop benchmarks to tell what students should know by a particular stage of their schooling; for example, "by the end of sixth grade, students should be able to locate major cities and other geographical features on each of the continents."

bilingual education

The use of two or more languages for instruction. In the United States, students in most bilingual classes or programs are those who have not acquired full use of the English language, so they are taught academic content in their native language (usually Spanish) while continuing to learn English.

Bilingual education is controversial, having been outlawed in California and severely criticized in other places. Opponents say it is expensive, impractical, and prevents students from learning English rapidly and efficiently. Advocates say it gives language learning students access to the same academic curriculum as other students and that it allows limited English proficient (LEP) parents to remain involved in their children's studies. They claim that maintaining students' native language does not interfere with their learning of English and that research shows that bilingual instruction is effective.

block grant

The result of combining funding for several separate government programs (usually federal) into a larger program with one set of requirements. A positive feature of such a grant is greater flexibility. When federal funds are released to states in the form of block grants, the individual states have more discretion in allocating the funds. Advocates believe that states can define and serve their own areas of need better than the federal government can. A negative aspect of block grants is that the total amount provided is often less than it would otherwise have been.

block scheduling

A way of organizing the school day, usually in secondary schools, into blocks of time longer than the typical 50-minute class period. Students take as many courses as before (sometimes more), but the courses do not run the entire school year. One block schedule used in some secondary schools, known as 4 × 4 (four by four), has four 90-minute classes a day with course changes every 45 days (four times a school year). Students and teachers have fewer classes to prepare for and experience fewer interruptions in the school day. Longer blocks of time allow for more complex learning activities, such as complicated science experiments.

Bloom's taxonomy

A classification of educational objectives developed in the 1950s by a group of researchers headed by Benjamin Bloom of the University of Chicago. Commonly refers to the objectives for the cognitive domain, which range from knowledge and comprehension (lowest) to synthesis and evaluation (highest). The taxonomy has been widely used by teachers to determine the focus of their instruction and is probably the original reference of the term higher-order thinking.

brain-based teaching

Approaches to schooling that educators believe are in accord with recent research on the brain and human learning. Advocates say the human brain is constantly searching for meaning and seeking patterns and connections. Authentic learning situations increase the brain's ability to make connections and retain new information. A relaxed, nonthreatening environment that reduces students' fear of failure is considered by some to enhance learning. Research also documents brain plasticity, which is the brain's ability to grow and adapt in response to external stimuli.

Brown v. Board of Education

The case heard by the United States Supreme Court in 1954 in which racial segregation in public schools was held to be unconstitutional.

This document contains some material that was previously published in The Language of Learning: A Guide to Educational Terms, edited by J. Lynn McBrien and Ronald Brandt, 1997, ASCD.