A questionnaire was administered to 313 teacher education students of the National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore to examine their conceptions about teaching and learning. Two dimensions were identified, viz. traditional and constructivist conceptions about teaching and learning. While both conceptions were…

"Talking Stones" is an interview technique that is designed to support self advocacy, particularly for groups of disaffected school students whose views may be difficult to elicit. It has been developed and refined to incorporate a view of learners as active agents in their own learning and is compatible with reflective practice and a…

The goal of the family literacy workshop "Reading Theatre, Parents as Actors: Movie production in a Family Literacy Workshop" is to empower and motivate parents to learn various storytelling strategies through theatrical production experiences and apply them at home. This is a theory-based family literacy practice supported by McClelland's…

In this article we present and discuss an integrated system of continuous assessment (ISCA) in higher education, designed to collect multiple evidences of students' knowledge and abilities, and to facilitate monitoring and support of their learning processes. Inspired by a socio-constructivist approach, which assumes a close relation between…

This is a study of a science teacher's beliefs concerning how a professional development program affect both the teaching strategies used and the beliefs professed influence classroom instruction after participating in the Iowa Chautauqua Professional Development program. The results of the study indicate that teachers often have problems with…

In this study, social constructionism provided a theoretical framework for investigating how students' struggles with reading are socially constructed in school literacy contexts, curriculum, and relationships. The study also sought to discover how "struggling reader" is a socially constructed subjectivity or identity that begins in the early…

The term scientific literacy is defined differently in different contexts. The term literacy simply refers to the ability for one to read and write, but recent studies in language literacy have extended this definition. New literacy research seeks a redefinition in terms of how skills are used rather than how they are learned. Contemporary…

This book tells the stories of teachers who, guided by evolving understandings of constructivist mathematics learning, are meeting the challenge of reconstructing their teaching practice. Although the stories all reflect the experiences of a single in-service program, SummerMath for Teachers, each exemplifies an aspect of the change process…

This paper presents a model of adult reasoning that is consistent with a set of related psychological theories of learning known collectively as constructivism. Three general factors comprise the model: (1) personal epistemology (defined as beliefs about learning, dispositions toward thinking, and assumptions about knowledge itself); (2) sustained…

Teaching is a profession where aspiring practitioners enter the field with preconceived beliefs and conceptions about teaching and learning acquired during the 12 years or more they spent within the educational system. The purpose of the study was to examine the influence of an educational reform environment on the development and retention of…

One of the most pressing issues in education is the importance of creating learning contexts and communities that are based on children's thinking in science and enhancing their understanding of pertinent concepts. In this research study, fifth grade students (N=20) were asked to design a game teaching younger students about the ocean environment.…

This paper reports on a pilot study that is designed to become an element of a larger research endeavor. The larger study will explore relationships between how teachers teach in the classroom, those teachers' perceptions of their own pedagogical practice, and the beliefs of those teachers about the roles of the student and the teacher in the…

Although counselors have implicitly understood and used a number of its tenets, an action-theoretical approach is a relatively recent development in career counseling. This digest analyzes the tenets of this approach. An action approach to career counseling sees clients as agents who steer and direct their activities. It represents an integration…

This computer software is a tool designed to help teachers help children in grades 1 through 7 construct their own knowledge of whole numbers and fractions. This software is the first in a series of new, dynamic computer microworlds that allow teachers to interact with students and students to interact with each other as they engage in…

The awakening of public interest in curriculum has come at a time when, within the education profession, the conventional wisdom about teaching and learning has itself undergone a major transformation. New Constructivist theories of knowing have emphasized the social nature of the construction of knowledge: students learn by "putting it into…