This study investigated the spontaneous use of verbal mediators in discrimination learning, the transfer of mediators to a free recall task, and the effects of a pretraining task on performance. The discrimination tasks required nursery school children (80) to: (1) sort three instances each of two different concepts in a conceptually consistent…

Elementary school (kindergarten through sixth grade) deaf children were exposed to varied thinking activities based on J. Piaget's principle of action rooted intelligence to determine if thinking might be successfully encouraged in the classroom through activities which were not highly dependent on verbal performance. Each class of approximately…

This study of concept learning was intended to supply data concerning the interaction of different values of three variables with each other. These three variables which may influence concept learning are augmentive information, method of presentation, and instance difficulty. Three types of specific review (total, partial, and none) were used,…

AN INVESTIGATION WAS UNDERTAKEN TO EXPLORE THE INSTRUCTIONAL IMPLICATIONS OF JEAN PIAGET'S POSITION ON EQUILIBRATION. ONE PURPOSE WAS TO TEST THE GENERAL HYPOTHESIS THAT THE MISCONCEPTIONS OF CHILDREN, WHEN DISPLACED BY EVIDENCE CONTRARY TO THE MISCONCEPTIONS, GIVE RISE TO COGNITIVE CONFLICTS. THE RESULTS, IN GENERAL, CONFIRM THIS HYPOTHESIS. A…

MIDDLE-CLASS, FIRST-GRADE STUDENTS (100) WERE TESTED INDIVIDUALLY ON 4 ITEMS OF CONCEPT OF ADDITION AND CONSERVATION OF NUMBER. THE TEST ITEMS WERE IDENTICAL EXCEPT FOR THE NUMBER OF OBJECTS INVOLVED. FOR EACH ITEM, TWO PILES OF CANDY WERE PLACED BEFORE EACH CHILD AND THEN MOVED TOGETHER. THE STUDY SHOWED NO MAJOR DIFFERENCE IN THE MEAN…

College students, in three experiments, learned to recite a counting pattern in the base three number system. Although all subjects learned to a criterion of two errorless trials, learning with different rule systems resulted in different levels of understanding and performance on transfer tasks. (GDC)

The popular arts in music, advertising, television, and movies reflect American culture as it is today, and the impact they make upon students can be an important factor in arousing aesthetic appreciation for art in all of its forms. (JD)

Describes three studies that examined how young children distinguish between the real, physical world and the mental world; between objects and thoughts; and between doing something and imagining it. (HOD)

Presents conversations of a group of fifth graders collaborating on a social studies task to illustrate how childen use language to learn. Focuses on one student whose oral language was rapid and chaotic but who demonstrated extremely sophisticated and complex structuring of knowledge to understand a particular social studies concept. (HTH)

Presented is a review of research regarding student understanding of fundamental mechanical concepts in physics. (SL)

This book introduces journal-writing prompts in mathematics for Algebra I. Content prompts, attitudinal or affective prompts, and process prompts are presented. Each of the content prompts relates or connects topics within and outside of mathematics, targeting important or meaningful concepts and skills. The content prompts also provide situations…

This book introduces journal-writing prompts in mathematics for geometry. Content prompts, attitudinal or affective prompts, and process prompts are presented. Each of the content prompts relates or connects topics within and outside of mathematics, targeting important or meaningful concepts and skills. The content prompts also provide situations…

Demonstrated is a covariance principle that causes the observer to assume that if one aspect of a two-dimensional figure (its perimeter or its area) is conserved, the other aspect must also be conserved (pseudo-conservation). Mentally retarded individuals, assuming no such fixed relationship, correctly judged the changed state of the nonconserved…

Considers the role of evolution and natural selection in the functioning of the modern human brain. Natural selection equipped humans with a mental toolbox of intuitive theories about the world which were used to master rocks, tools, plants, animals, and one another. The same toolbox is used today to master the intellectual challenges of modern…

Discusses the consensus among language teachers that the teaching of grammar helps second language learners develop linguistic competence as part of communicative competence. The article argues that pedagogical grammar can be made less formal by keeping metalinguistic terms, concepts, and analysis at a minimal level. (45 references) (Author/CK)