Word: partiality
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...second-graders are part of a program adopted three years ago by Virginia's Fairfax County to introduce elementary school children to foreign languages in a new way. With a small amount of federal funding, the county instituted "partial-immersion" language programs in eight schools in Japanese, Spanish and French. Similar experiments in partial immersion can be spotted around the country in such cities as Eugene and Portland, Ore., and Anchorage. The idea is that children's minds are stretched and their skills enhanced when they are introduced to any foreign language. By being taught math and science in Japanese...
Such findings should be of special interest to school districts that are struggling to allocate precious resources. Only 17% of U.S. elementary schools offer foreign-language programs, and nearly all of them teach their students the old-fashioned way. Yet results from partial-immersion programs suggest that students gain more than language skills and a taste for a foreign culture. The mental muscles they build from concentrating hard in their Japanese-taught classes make them stronger in other subjects as well. Some of the most enthusiastic proponents are the English-language teachers exposed to the Japanese-taught students. Says Great...
...teachers are quick to note other factors that could account for the students' successes. Second-language students may be especially motivated, more willing to take chances and accept challenges. In most partial-immersion schools, half the day is taught in English and half in Japanese. This means that students study math and science in Japanese and other subjects in English. The high verbal concentration required for Japanese clearly has a beneficial spillover effect in the English subjects...
...PARTIAL lifting of the gag rule might seem like a significant step. The problem is that it does not go far enough. Many of the limitations on the kind of medical treatment a doctor can advise in a federal clinic are still in place...
...University of Rochester, he compared the amount of the isotope in the midden urine with contemporary values, and concluded that cosmic-ray bombardment was 41% more intense 21,000 years ago than it is now. This suggests that the earth's magnetic field, which acts as a partial barrier to cosmic rays, was then considerably weaker. One implication: terrestrial life had been -- and could someday again be -- exposed to higher doses of dangerous radiation from space...