Drawing from basic assumptions about learning and critical thinking skills, this paper suggests a teaching method for helping community college students to use their critical thinking capacity in their college courses. First, a series of assumptions commonly held by teachers about the nature of learning are presented, and contrasted with…

This study compared the process skill achievement of students (N=107) completing traditional laboratory exercises with students (N=127) not only completing the same exercises but also receiving instruction in such integrated process skills as identifying variables and stating hypotheses. The relationships among process skill achievement, cognitive…

The conferencee discussions and papers presented in this volume reflect the opinions and research of 20 authorities in the field of communication development. These authorities offer new perspectives on nonverbal communication, speech reception and production, and the development of language and thought. To provide a better understanding of…

The development of children's understanding of the learning process and factors that affect learning was explored with a sample of 18 children from 6 to 13 years of age. Subjects were interviewed, and three levels of their reasoning were identified. The 6- to 7-year-old subjects viewed learning as "doing" and reasoned that…

This study tested the hypothesis that category naming is more difficult than instance naming because it requires suppression of readily available instance names. In experiment 1, junior kindergarten and grade one children named pictures of single objects under two conditions: "own" name (i.e., instance or basic level) or…

Two studies examined the effects of different types of imaginal elaborations on recall. In Experiment 1, 6-year-olds, 9-year-olds, and college adults were given 20 word pairs embedded in one of four types of sentences: short plausible, bizarre, personalized, or self-generated. With no mention of a memory test, subjects were asked to use the…

Goals of this study were to: (1) assess mothers' perceptions of their role in fostering their preschooler's cognitive learning; (2) examine attributions used by mothers to explain why they experience ease or difficulty helping their preschooler learn; and (3) relate maternal perceived level of ease/difficulty to attributions for the reasons…

This paper reports on a study which was designed to teach language skills and concepts to kindergarten children who had entered school with serious language deficiencies. The study's objectives were to: (1) provide the opportunity for interaction between child and adult; (2) encourage the development of concepts through concrete experiences,…

The papers in this report present selected findings from one phase of a five-year study on how to enhance higher order thinking skills in high school social studies classes. The study's purposes were to determine why it is difficult to emphasize these skills in social studies curriculums, what the barriers are, and how to overcome them. Five…

Teacher education students' cognitive and psychosocial development renders current practice as it manifests itself in courses and teaching strategies useless and irrelevant. Cognitive and psychosocial development are the theoretical framework upon which innovation and intervention for teacher education may begin. The basic premise upon which this…

A group of clinically depressed mothers and their infants were studied to ascertain effects of mothers' emotional condition on children's behavior and development. Participants in the study were 29 families with an infant believed to be at psychiatric risk. Maternal depression was assessed at the time of family intake with the Center for…

This document presents the Secretary of Education's personal concept of a sound secondary school core curriculum. It is called "James Madison High School" in honor of President James Madison and his strong views that the people, in order to govern properly, must arm themselves with knowledge. The theoretical curriculum consists of four…

A study investigated whether children expect color similarity to be less important than form similarity in object label extensions. Twenty 2-year-olds and 20 3-year-olds were asked to sort objects similar in either color or form in two different situations: (1) the "No Label" condition where children were asked to help the puppet put objects that…

In an effort to look at factors moderating the negative effects of preterm low birthweight and perinatal illness, the study followed up (at 7 and 12 months of age) 50 preterm infants whose cumulative morbidity score was greater than 100 and/or who had a life threatening complication. Home visits provided ratings of maternal sensitivity, the…

Research on the comparative cognition and cognitive functioning of bilinguals is reviewed for insight into research needed to facilitate the development of reasoning skills in language minority students. Studies of formal reasoning among persons with limited schooling in Central Asia, West Africa, and Mexico are noted and discussed in the context…