Reports on the procedure and results of the trial of support materials that were developed for primary teacher mentors to help trainee teachers improve their medium-term and individual lesson plans. Concludes that trainees' practice in science improved in subsequent unmentored lessons, but good practice was not transferred to other subjects.…

Provides a conception of critical thinking and the critical thinker, who is characterized by five intellectual resources: background knowledge, operational knowledge of good thinking, knowledge of critical concepts, effective heuristics, and habits of mind. Explains, with examples, each intellectual resource. Discusses the task of teaching…

A total of 270 children from 3 ethnic groups were tested for understanding of concepts of heating and cooling. A strong horizontal decalage effect was seen, with children of all ethnic groups using more sophisticated explanations at earlier ages for heating than cooling. Implications for developmental theory are discussed. (SLD)

Describes a teaching model aimed at promoting conceptual change concerning heat and temperature. The model is used with teachers (n=2) and students (n=92) to explore its use as a professional development tool as well as a teaching strategy. Results indicate that the teaching model is effective in changing students' ideas and the approach resulted…

Questions whether student teachers' beliefs influence their images of good primary science teaching and whether completion of an initial degree had an impact on their conceptions of effective practice. Interviews Canadian preservice primary teachers (n=12) and compares the findings with a similar Australian longitudinal study. Discusses influences…

A study examined whether exemplar-specific or prototype representations were primarily used by 28 children (ages 10-12) with mild mental retardation in a categorization task consisting of two groups of make-believe animals whose features were ill-defined. Results indicated the children were able to acquire and use both types of representations.…

Presents traditional and kinesthetic activities for teaching the following relative position concepts to young children: above, below, between, near, and far. Outlines reasons for more kinesthetic activities in early childhood settings. (KB)

Presents some useful information in regard to the issue of lead shot as well as its most common replacement, steel. Takes a holistic viewpoint and introduces hands-on activities that can be used across grade levels. Contains 55 references. (DDR)

Contrary to assumptions about aversive effects of competition on achievement motivation, in this study young people saw academic contests as fair. When participants completed structural interviews on fair ways to organize science contests and on differentiation of skill and luck, age-related trends in their conceptions of procedural justice were…

Discusses student and teacher perceptions of a new development in the use of the predict-observe-explain (POE) strategy. This development involves the incorporation of POE tasks into a multimedia computer program that uses real-life, digital video clips of difficult, expensive, time consuming, or dangerous scenarios as stimuli for these tasks.…

Describes the provenance of the data used in this issue. Includes design of the instructional sequence, instructional activities, classroom structure, and classroom episodes. (Author/MM)

Examines both theoretical and practical perspectives on conceptual exchange--exchanging a student's entrenched view on a scientific topic for one based on actual scientific perspective. Endorses the conceptual-mediation model based on interference theory for changing an established view. (AIM)

Presents hands-on activities that give students a head start in learning the vocabulary and basic theory involved in understanding atomic structure. Uses beads to represent protons, neutrons, and electrons and string to represent orbitals. (DDR)

Demonstrates how social constructivism has affected conceptual change research, and draws implications for reading and writing instruction from conceptual change research using social constructivism as a theoretical framework. Discuss why conceptual change researchers turned to social constructivism as a theoretical framework for their research.…

Explores the concept of aims in music education through investigating the ideas of four philosophers: Wolfgang Brezinka, Richard S. Peters, Bennett Reimer, and David Elliott. Inquires into the empirical and logical aspects of aims and clarifies the relationships between "musical behaviors." Concludes by discussing the relevance of conceptual…