Teaching students to use and interpret different representational tools is critically important if they are to be scientifically literate, to understand how scientific ideas and concepts are represented and to appreciate how scientists think and act. Moreover, students not only need to be competent at using and explaining representations and…

The present study builds on research that indicates that teachers play a key role in promoting those interactional behaviours that challenge children's thinking and scaffold their learning. It does this by seeking to determine whether teachers who implement cooperative learning and receive training in explicit strategic questioning strategies…

Teaching students to use and interpret representations in science is critically important if they are to become scientifically literate and learn how to communicate their understandings and learning in science. This study involved 248 students (119 boys and 129 girls) from 26 grade 6 teachers' classes in nine primary schools in Brisbane,…

Teaching students to ask and answer questions is critically important if they are to engage in reasoned argumentation, problem-solving, and learning. This study involved 35 groups of grade 6 children from 18 classrooms in three conditions (cognitive questioning condition, community of inquiry condition, and the comparison condition) who were…

The study reports on the types of questioning strategies teachers use to promote thinking, problem-solving and reasoning during small group discussions. The study also reports on the types of discourses students use to problem-solve and reason during their small group discussions. An audiotape of one class lesson from the three teachers included…

Teaching children to ask and answer questions is critically important if they are to engage in reasoned argumentation, problem-solving and learning. This study describes how teachers can be taught to challenge children's cognitive and metacognitive thinking during cooperative learning and the affect this has on children's discourse and follow-up…

The study investigated the effects of structured and unstructured cooperating groups on students' behaviors, discourse and learning in junior high school. One hundred and sixty-four grade 9 students participated in the study. The students were videotaped as they worked in three to four person, mixed-gender and ability groups on a science-based…

Although cooperative learning is widely endorsed as a pedagogical practice that promotes learning and socialization among students, teachers still struggle with how to introduce it into their classrooms. This text highlights the strategies teachers can use to challenge student thinking and scaffold their learning as well as the strategies students…

This paper outlines the types of verbal interactions teachers engage in to challenge children's thinking and problem-solving during cooperative learning. The paper also provides examples of how children model many of the verbal interactions they have seen demonstrated in their discourse with each other. It appears that when teachers are explicit…