Classrooms around the world are becoming more multilingual and teachers in all subject areas are faced with new challenges in enabling learners' academic language development without losing focus on content. These challenges require new ways of conceptualizing the relationship between language and content as well as new pedagogies that…

One of the most important questions I ask as both a cultural anthropologist and a university teacher is: How do people come to know what they think they know? In this article, I adopt a narrative approach to processes of learning and discovery in two very different locales, an indigenous society in the South Pacific, and a senior seminar on…

In the Education Commission Report #4 of Hong Kong, three dimensions of learning are noted: cognitive, interpersonal, and aesthetic. In most Hong Kong schools, teaching focuses on the cognitive dimension and to some extent on the interpersonal. The aesthetic dimension is largely ignored, except for the ubiquitous class reader and a handful of…

The educational activities using school telecommunications that are detailed in this document emanate from two participants in the EduTex Project, which has been carried out for almost four years by the Institut Romand de Recherches et de Documentation Pedagogiques (IRDP) at the mandatory schooling level. For several years these two teachers have…

This report discusses how three major strains of educational research are converging on a compelling new concept: critical thinking is not a set of skills to be taught, but a natural capacity, involving creating and revising patterns of information to be exercised and strengthened. Thus, according to the report, the appropriate classroom practice…

The role of block building in children's learning was studied by a student teacher who observed a teacher's block building curriculum in a combined first and second grade class. The purpose was to clarify the linkage between thinking and doing, spoken intention and actual consequences, and planning and spontaneity in the curriculum. The cycle of…

This article explores some of the challenges that young children face when they begin formalised literacy learning in the classroom, in particular learning to write. The challenges are discussed in terms of the transitions children are faced with when moving from family and community literacy practices to more explicit and formal school learning…

Comparisons of expert and novice problem solving in physics have helped characterize some of the key features of expert behavior. There is considerable debate, however, as to whether these characteristics are specific to the field of expertise (physics) or exportable to other fields. While the question seems difficult to answer in general, at…

This paper examines research studies that have concluded that elementary school children can learn more difficult and abstract social studies concepts than are taught in the traditional social studies curriculum. Research studies that focus on constraints on cognition, the use of embedded concepts, and understanding knowledge restructuring and…

A social learning theory approach to counselor supervision is conceptualized as a teaching-learning situation, in which counseling is viewed as a specific, trainable set of skills. In light of this approach, a four quarter graduate counselor education program, focusing specifically on the training of social learning therapists, is proposed. The…

A secondary school curriculum which includes a significant focus on individual developmental goals is proposed. Emphasis is placed on students' intellectual development, self-management, and interpersonal and small group involvement. The basic content of the developmental curriculum is summarized to include acquisition of the knowledge to: (1)…

Cognitive psychologists have recently alluded to the role analogies might play in learning unfamiliar topics. However, since the use of analogies in science teaching has not been adequately addressed, analogies mean different things to different people. Therefore, a model for the teaching of scientific analogies is proposed. A theoretical…

At the heart of all human learning is the person seeking to grow, develop, and realize something of value in and through another person. Learning is essentially dependent on the relationships between student and teacher, and between the students themselves. In that all knowledge is value-based and developed to achieve something of personal…

Designed for workshop, teacher inservice, and classroom use, this monograph pulls together theory, research findings, and descriptions of successful classroom practices to improve instruction in listening skills. Chapter 1 discusses the importance of listening instruction, providing general background information on the nature of listening. The…

The main thrust of American education has been cognitively oriented. Recent research on the human brain suggests that such orientation is a general function of only one hemisphere of the brain, the left. Because of the close relationships among speech, language, thinking, reasoning, and the higher mental functions, the left brain hemisphere…