Argues for the significance of "personal theories" in teaching. Profiles first year teaching of four teachers who had completed program of self-inquiry and reflection about their own developing conceptions of education. Describes their personal theories of teaching before employment and the nature and impact of their teaching…

Proposes that conceptual change is constrained by the child's conceptual structures and the structures inherent in problem-solving tasks. Uses a microgenetic case study and group data to examine how interaction between strategies children bring to a task and the detailed task structure redirect children's attention and create the possibility of…

Maintains that young children learn to think when they act on objects, thus developing what Piaget refers to as physical and logico-mathematical knowledge. Teachers can encourage thinking/mental action by creating situations that are personally meaningful to the children, by providing decision-making opportunities, and by providing opportunities…

Argues that the dichotomy between domain-specific and general theories of cognitive development addressed in the "Merrill-Palmer Quarterly" special issue is unproductive. Suggests that polarities of generality and specificity exist in creative tension as seen through developmental processes. (Author/BB)

Traces change in conception of gravity in a boy from kindergarten until second grade, focusing on the process by which persons restructure ideas that differ from accepted scientific understandings, and acquire scientific ideas. Provides criteria for defining an alternative conception; suggests how conditions in the initial interview may have…

This book is the result of the accumulated research of five researchers from the United States and Australia on a school in Coastal Australia. The research team shared a constructivist epistemology and interpreted the qualitative and quantitative data collected over a 10-week period in two classrooms from that perspective. Each chapter discusses…

Epistemological perspectives are the ways students interpret or make meaning of their educational experience. Research has stressed the need to develop strategies to counter traditional mathematics pedagogy and epistemology because they have alienated many girls and women. An integrated framework of two cognitive developmental models describe…