The 21st century marks the beginning of digital age with the extensive use of digital media, mobile devices, and Internet resources. Recent studies found that this digital era has expanded the landscape of student experiences, and educational technologies as well as increased the educator's awareness on embracing technologies to promote effective…

Education policy in the United States centers K-12 assessment efforts primarily on standardized tests. However, such tests may not provide an accurate and reliable representation of what students understand about the complexity of science. Research indicates that students tend to pass science tests, even if they do not understand the concepts…

This study developed an analytic framework consisting of four patterns of talk and writing that can support students' engagement in construction and critique: "Talk only," "writing only," "use of talk and writing in sequence," and "use of talk and writing simultaneously." This study aimed to examine how each…

Despite increasing enrollment percentages from earlier years, online courses continue to show receding student retention rates. To reduce attrition and ensure continual growth in online courses, it is important to continue to review current and updated literature to understand the changing behaviors of online learners and faculty in the 21st…

To better understand the role that ways of reasoning play in students' success on integer addition and subtraction problems, we examined the relationship between students' flexible use of ways of reasoning and their performance on integers open number sentences. Within groups of students in 3 participant groups--39 2nd and 4th graders who had…

In an effort to keep up with today's advanced students, methods and strategies used in modern classrooms are ever-changing. In this manuscript, one method is discussed. Whole brain teaching has recently come to the forefront of education research. How does the brain affect learning? How can teachers ensure that students are actively engaged in the…

This research shows that people can unconsciously initiate and follow arithmetic rules (e.g., addition). Participants were asked to detect whether a symbol was a digit. This symbol was preceded by 2 digits and a subliminal instruction: "add" or a control instruction. Participants were faster at identifying a symbol as a number when the…

The sensorimotor contributions to memory for prior occurrence were investigated. Previous research has shown that both implicit memory and familiarity draw on gains in stimulus-related processing fluency for old, compared with novel, stimuli, but recollection does not. Recently, it has been demonstrated that processing fluency itself resides in…

The present studies examined whether implied tactile properties during language comprehension influence subsequent direct tactile perception, and the specificity of any such effects. Participants read sentences that implicitly conveyed information regarding tactile properties (e.g., "Grace tried on a pair of thick corduroy pants while…

The contents of working memory (WM) have predominantly been viewed as necessarily conscious. However, recent findings suggest otherwise. Here we investigate whether visual WM can represent subliminal stimuli, such that the positions of an invisible moving object can be extrapolated or learned about in terms of their task-relevant predictive power.…

The uncanny valley--the unnerving nature of humanlike robots--is an intriguing idea, but both its existence and its underlying cause are debated. We propose that humanlike robots are not only unnerving, but are so because their appearance prompts attributions of mind. In particular, we suggest that machines become unnerving when people ascribe to…

To account for the findings obtained in voluntary task switching, this article describes and tests the chain-retrieval model. This model postulates that voluntary task selection involves retrieval of task information from long-term memory, which is then used to guide task selection and task execution. The model assumes that the retrieved…

A major source of errors in rational number tasks is the inappropriate application of natural number rules. We hypothesized that this is an instance of intuitive reasoning and thus can persist in adults, even when they respond correctly. This was tested by means of a reaction time method, relying on a dual process perspective that differentiates…

Over the last several decades, researchers have studied many and varied aspects of rater cognition. Those interested in pursuing basic research have focused on gaining an understanding of raters' thought processes as they score different types of performances and products, striving to understand how raters' mental representations and the cognitive…

This paper presents the results of a study that aimed at increasing students' problem-solving skills. Polya's (1985) heuristic for problem solving was used and students were required to articulate their thought processes through the use of a structured diary. The diary prompted students to answer questions designed to engage them in the phases of…