The belief that studying mathematics improves reasoning skills, known as the Theory of Formal Discipline (TFD), has been held since the time of Plato. Research evidence supports this idea, at least in the context of students who had chosen to study post-compulsory mathematics. Here we examined the development of reasoning skills in 16- to…

The Common Core State Standards, released in June 2010, offer an opportunity to shift education away from shallow, test-prep instruction and toward a focus on key cognitive skills, writes Conley. Two consortia of states are now developing common assessments to measure these standards--assessments that will be designed to capture deeper, more…

One question facing kinesiologists today is how to implement findings from research into society, in this case, physical education. In this paper I examine the role of a balanced approach to educational physical education in promoting physical activity. I argue that limiting physical education to simple tasks that encourage students to workout at…

The expansion of digital technologies and the rapid changes they undergo through time face users with new cognitive, social, and ergonomic challenges that they need to master in order to perform effectively. In recent years, following empirical reports on performance differences between different age-groups, there is a debate in the research…

A majority of studies on learning disabilities have focused on elementary grades. Although problems with learning disabilities are life-affecting only a few studies focus on deficits in adults. In this study adults with isolated mathematical disabilities (n = 101) and adults with combined mathematical and reading disabilities (n = 130) solved…

Forty students from the first, second, fourth, and sixth grades (10 from each), equally balanced for sex and representing a middle class SES, were individually administered mathematical tasks of matching, equality, cardination, and measure and Piagetian conservation task of number, length, and surface or area. (NQ)

Developmental differences in summaries of expository texts were examined for fourth and sixth grade students in two experiments. Experiment 1 used texts that had a description content structure whereas Experiment 2 texts had a thesis/evidence content structure. Manipulation of the presence or absence of the topic sentence allowed the examination…

Tested infants in their second year with a box task to determine whether they would show a hand preference in solutions involving complete differentiation of roles for the two hands. (HOD)

Studies abacus calculation to explore the development of skills and the resulting consequences. Consideration of the effects of abacus training, transfer of the skill to other tasks, and the contexts in which abacus skill develops demonstrates the multiple ways in which specific skills can contribute to cognitive development. (ETS)

Compared performance of high- and low-education adults on traditional and meaningful space and reasoning measures. Separate analyses of variance for reasoning and space revealed main effects for education and age on both abilities. Results indicated highly educated older people performed more like their younger peers. (Author/JAC)

Assessment is made of the effectiveness of teachers' ratings and of a battery of cognitive and psychometric tasks in predicting achievement in reading and arithmetic in grades 1, 2, and 3. (Author/BW)

Suggests that preinstructional evaluation in the areas of mental age, auditory memory, letter names, and the use of context-auditory clues would aid in making predictive, diagnostic judgments as to later reading achievement. (VJ)

Issues pertaining to thinking skills are discussed in an attempt to clarify what thinking skills are and their components, how they function and how they can be developed in the teaching-learning environment. Chapter 1 reviews the definitions of thinking skills. These definitions are selected from the current literature on education and…

This book shows how to increase one's power to analyze and comprehend problems. First, it outlines and illustrates the methods that good problem solvers use in attacking complex ideas. Then it gives some practice in applying these methods to a variety of questions in comprehension and reasoning. Chapters include: (1) "Test Your Mind--See How…

This paper outlines the components of initial cognitive skill acquisition and analyses features of elaborations in the instructional materials that can facilitate each component. Three basic components of skill learning are identified: (1) learning novel concepts and the functionality of novel concepts and procedures; (2) learning how to execute…