Current issues in educational communications and technology are addressed in this collection of 31 papers, in which research reports predominate. Topics discussed include factors related to the learner, e.g., aptitude, recall, computer anxiety, field dependence/independence, reading ability, learning strategies, and cognitive style. Presentation…

Although evidence is accumulating that the major reading difficulty dyslexics experience involves decoding and recognizing printed words, it is not clear that all dyslexics read poorly for the same reasons. A study investigated dyslexic children between 7 and 14 years of age to see if their reading errors and patterns of performance would enable…

It is generally accepted that mathematical reasoning, like language acquisition, is part of normal cognitive development. This paper proposes that other variables must be considered when explaining the differences in the acquisition of mathematical reasoning skills in young children. Considered is some of the evidence that suggests that certain…

This paper provides an overview of past research on training employees for computer-mediated work. Recent literature is reviewed and critically analyzed using a four-part framework of individual differences and skill acquisition: sociodemographic factors, abilities and motivation, task constraints, and the man-technology interface. Furthermore, a…

Prior research on the information-seeking process, conducted by Kuhlthau in the school library setting, led to the identification of a six-stage model of the search process, describing cognitive and affective symptoms commonly experienced by library users. The present study was designed to determine whether that model is generalizable to other…

This paper is a transcription from memory of a short talk that used overhead projector slides, with musical examples played on an Apple Macintosh computer and a Yamaha CX5 synthesizer. The slides appear in the text as reduced "icons" at the point where they would have been used in the talk. The paper concerns ways in which artificial intelligence…

This booklet presents strategies developed by six adult basic education (ABE) staff members for helping students with specific learning problems. The strategies were devised through reading, talking with experts in the field, attending a workshop, and experimenting with modified teaching strategies. The guide addresses 36 specific learning…

The ways in which sensory information, music in particular, is managed by the mental processing system of differentially gifted students were studied. A total of 138 right-handed adolescents and young adults (aged 14 to 22 years), who were gifted in music, mathematics, or dance, were tested on two tasks of music and one task of speech perception.…

In order to build robust natural language processing systems that can detect and recover from miscommunication, the investigation of how people communicate and how they recover from problems in communication described in this artificial intelligence report focused on reference problems which a listener may have in determining what or whom a…

This article discusses the assessment of self-regulated learning processes as students acquire cognitive skills in specific academic domains. Domain-specific assessment is useful for understanding student learning and for planning instructional activities that help to promote it. Although much psychological research has used general measures of…

A study of the child's experience in learning a second language as it is embedded in his experience of kindergarten looks at two classes of unilingual (English-speaking) Canadian children in a half-day French immersion program. The immersion experience for the children is described in these terms: what "French" means to them; what and how they…

A series of studies are underway at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Audience Research Facility to examine the impact of interactivity on informational and entertainment based television viewing. In order to examine the learning of spatial skills from videogames, the first study compared the learning of spatial content from interactive…

The United States-Japan Cooperative Science Program was initiated for the purpose of conducting research and exchanging ideas for the improvement of science education. A seminar was held in Honolulu in 1986 to discuss efforts and future directions of this cooperative program. This paper reviews the outcomes of the seminar in three areas. These…

This paper discusses higher-order cognitive skills, provides examples of appropriate test item content in various subject areas, and describes higher-level cognitive skills which might be tested by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). Higher-order cognitive skills are said to be more difficult to measure than simpler skills;…

A study of code-switching in a group of 35 Spanish-English bilingual third-graders is reported. The students' diary journal entries and writing assignments based on previous classwork are examined. Retelling of stories previously told by the teacher and the journal entries helped identify the kind of language used by students, the code-switching…