Describes three activities that the teacher can employ to help students develop thinking skills through mathematics instruction: (1) memorization using the technique of chunking; (2) higher order thinking with magic squares; and (3) predicting games. Identifies eight facets of the teacher's role in promoting thinking skills. (MDH)

Three learning activities--story generation, reasoning from historical information, and computer modeling--that are designed to help students move toward a more coherent understanding of biological mechanisms are described. A method used to measure a student's level of understanding and their progress during instruction is also described. Ways to…

What kind of developmental potential is present in elementary schoolchildren but hindered by the traditional type of education? Half a century ago Daniel El'konin and Vasili Davydov, the leaders of Russian Vygotskian educational psychology started answering this question. They suggested that reflection is a basic human ability and it can be…

The purposes of the first two parts of this literature review are to clarify the concept of active learning and discuss the use and value of active learning models. In Part I, the perspectives of five historical proponents of active learning, Rousseau, Pestalozzi, Dewey, Kilpatrick, and Piaget, are discussed. The views of four contemporary…

This paper reviewed literature on cognition to help art teachers understand what they can learn from the huge body of literature that has been generated by cognitive psychologists. It is argued that, in this information society, teaching memorization skills is not enough; students must learn problem-solving skills. A long list of specific thinking…

Progress is reported on research conducted in school settings to investigate methods to help students--especially at-risk students--to acquire and use knowledge to solve problems. The methods incorporate principles of learning and instruction derived from basic research on cognition. Specifically, the research involves using microcomputer and…

Abstracts of 11 mathematics education research studies are provided. Each abstract is accompanied by the abstractor's analysis of or comments about the study. Studies reported include: "The Importance of Spatial Visualization and Cognitive Development for Geometry Learning in Preservice Elementary Teachers"; "Classroom Ratio of High…

This paper examines sixth-grade children's thinking related to solving ratio and proportion problems before these children had received any instruction in the domain. It explores unitizing and norming, one of the processes identified by both content analyses (Behr, Harel, Post, & Lesh, 1990); Harel, Behr, Post & Lesh, 1990) and research in…

The objective of this study was to provide data related to learning styles and to learning environments, to identify appropriate experiences for the non-major biology student. Investigated was whether congruence existed between a measured amount of cognitive process or analytical skill and the resultant answer on a test question which required…

This practicum was designed to solve a problem related to the provision of a computer training component for students enrolled in an early childhood education teacher training program. Increasing pressures on graduates of the training program to integrate computers and educational software into programs for young children as well as the students'…

Problem solving is often identified as a goal of science education. What is considered problem solving varies from teacher to teacher. The ultimate goal of problem-solving education has been identified as a means of helping students develop higher-order thinking skills. This ERIC digest focuses on problem solving in secondary school science as…

An analysis of children's narrative composition and art revealed concurrent development at both a general structural level and at a fine-grained detail level. A three-part study investigated whether this general cognitive pattern would be maintained across a different range of tasks: literary composition, scientific reasoning, and working memory.…

This paper examines problems involved in designing an integrated system to teach and assess critical thinking skills in the classroom, and describes the Monitor Achievement in Pittsburgh (MAP) Critical Thinking Project, an attempt to draw upon research from diverse disciplines in developing an effective pilot project in the Pittsburgh public…

One of 10 reports in a longitudinal study of Project Head Start submitted by NTS Research Corporation to the Administration for Children, Youth and Families, this document presents the individual testing battery used for the fall 1979 cohort. The first chapter identifies the skill areas to be tested in an analysis of Project Head Start's…

This handbook is based on a field tested training model directed toward preparing regular and special education teachers to teach children in a mainstreamed classroom. There are four components: knowing, diagnosing, developing, and bridging. Seven modules contain the following sections: the major theme, introduction, goals, objectives,…