Describes the author's research on learning and brain activity, which involved more than 5,000 students and faculty members. Explores six stages of learning: (1) preparing to learn; (2) starting to learn; (3) consolidation; (4) branching out; (5) gaining fluency; and (6) continued improving. States that merging educational research with…

Tower of Hanoi has become a popular tool in cognitive and neuropsychology to assess a set of behaviors collectively referred to as executive functions. Substantial variability in performance on the Tower of Hanoi (TOH) disk-transfer task among normally functioning young adults, and potential contributions to these individual differences, were…

The idea of metalearning was originally used by John Biggs (1985) to describe the state of 'being aware of and taking control of one's own learning'. This paper explores the concept through collaborative enquiry involving researchers and higher education teachers. An evolved conception is proposed in which metalearning is a subconcept within…

This paper reviews the research conducted in the last decade on patterns in student learning, mostly in higher education. More specifically, the review focuses on a series of studies that have in common (a) the use of the Inventory of Learning Styles (ILS), an instrument aimed at measuring several components of student learning, namely, cognitive…

A study investigated the effectiveness of using a small-group discussion as the main vehicle for the construction of an initial representation of a problem that activates previously acquired knowledge. College students (N=39) were randomly assigned to either an experimental condition or a control condition and asked to brainstorm about a presented…

The relationship between processing style (either auditory or visual) and sentence and imagery strategies was investigated with a sample of 80 second-grade children. Assignment to auditory- and visual-processor groups was based on subjects' recall of 16 pictograph sequences, four of which included visual interference and four of which included…

Written by teachers, the chapters in this book show how writing fosters learning in math, science, English, social studies, foreign language, philosophy, psychology, and art. Following an introduction by Anne Ruggles Gere, the first chapter, "Writing to Learn: The Nurse Log Classroom," by Steve Pearse, presents a comprehensive overview…

Because teachers are asking for specific suggestions to help students apply comprehension skills and read content material, a mechanism that assists students in acquiring and applying specific comprehension skills as they read content texts is being investigated. The mechanism is called marginal gloss because learning activities are placed in the…

Recent advances in cognitive psychology provide insights into thinking processes and learning behavior that can help teachers prepare students for the demands of the workplace. Studies of successful students have found that the depth of their information processing is directly related to the quality of their learning outcomes. That is, more…

Understanding the literacy process and using the child as the informant will ensure a better learning experience. Two fundamental assumptions of language learning provide a base for understanding the literacy process. Firstly, the decisions a child makes while searching for meaning in a literacy event are the same ones made by an adult, involving…

The purpose of this guide is to implement the teaching of "Critical Viewing: Stimulant to Critical Thinking," a guide for students. Part one of the guide is an overview of the organization, methodologies, and evaluation procedures used in "Critical Viewing." Suggestions and activities for teaching the six chapters in "Critical Viewing" are given…

This research examined the learning style factor of field dependence/independence and the problem solving strategies of Hmong male refugee students 17 years old and older who were attending or planning to attend post secondary education institutions in Wisconsin and Minnesota. The research was conducted from July 1986 to July 1987 to test two…

Implications of research into human ability and metacognition for adaptive instruction are examined. Traditionally, adaptive instruction has largely involved the adaptation of instruction to suit the cognitive idiosyncrasies of individual learners. Through the development of learning strategies and metacognitive abilities to manage them, this…

Reports three experiments with kindergartners and first graders which used one-trial multidimensional reasoning tasks like those of Toppino (Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, v30, p496-512, 1980). Feedback information and preliminary experience with simple forms of the task produced high performance levels, and verbal labeling in the…

The study examined the communicative competence of 30 learning disabled and 30 non-learning disabled children (ages 9 to 13) in both referential and semistructured dyadic communication tasks. The use of both instructional strategies influenced the quality of subjects' verbal communicative interactions. (Author/DB)