Vygotsky described the distinction between the "appearance and essence of things" as generating the need for science; he also discussed how this difference is responsible for the fundamental challenge faced by science teachers, as it often requires them to have to build bridges between students' ideas and those of science. Those bridges are often…

For students, writing is too frequently a matter of going through the motions, perhaps no truer than with the traditional academic essay. Although there are many culprits for this disengagement, one is surely an over-emphasis on form--and particularly set form--to the detriment of content. When form becomes formula, planning is stultified, losing…

Locker rooms, hallways, and other school locales not populated by teachers are often places where bullies emerge, places where the pecking order is established by targeting any difference or idiosyncrasy. Given that bullying happens mostly in the presence of other youth and often stops when objections are raised, there is growing evidence that…

Women Reading for Education, Affinity & Development (WREAD), a reading discussion group geared toward African American female adult-literacy students with self-defined histories of trauma, was an outgrowth of research identifying links between trauma, women's struggles with literacy, and the need to be conscious of emotional health…

Based on the theory of transformational learning, the purpose of this study was to conduct survey research with women graduates of two community-based leadership development programs to determine what characteristics describe transformational learning among women participants and to identify what learning activities and experiences may foster…

This dissertation aims at investigating the speech act of disagreement as it is carried out linguistically in an English-language asynchronous online forum between unacquainted Americans and Thais (TEFL and TESL). The analysis and interpretation of the data are based on both "emic" and "etic" perspectives, in the framework of…

The popularity of poker (and in particular online poker) has increasingly grown worldwide in recent years. This increase in the popularity of poker has led to the increased incidence of the "professional poker player". However, very little empirical research has been carried out into this relatively new group of gamblers. The aim was to determine…

Race is a difficult topic to discuss openly within college and university settings. Postsecondary educators who wish to facilitate dialogues about race and racism among students must take necessary steps to prepare for these discussions. Using data from a qualitative case study, this article discusses the strategies that educators employed to…

In this article, the author shares her experience attending a panel discussion during a Council of Outdoor Educators of Ontario (COEO) conference. It was her research of an integrated curriculum program (ICP) that initially brought the author to COEO and her ongoing research of that program and other programs that, at least in part, brought her…

An emerging group of leaders in Canadian education has attracted thousands of followers. They've made Twitter an extension of their lives, delivering twenty or more tweets a day that can include, for example, links to media articles, research, new ideas from education bloggers, or to their own, or simply a personal thought. At their best,…

This theoretical study is an attempt to explore the potential of the dynamic and interactive mathematics learning environments (DIMLE) in relation to the technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK) framework. DIMLE are developed with intent to support learning mathematics through free exploration in a less constrained environment. A…

Families have long been recognized for the contributions they make to their members and to society. Yet families are seldom substantively incorporated into the normal course of policy and program development, implementation, and evaluation. We propose the family impact lens as one way to shift the rhetoric from appreciating families to…

This pilot study aimed to address persistent gaps in the research regarding effective professional development models associated with reading comprehension pedagogy in content area classrooms (science). An appropriate instructional model was developed, ("Do-Read-Do") which attempts to embed the explicit teaching of reading comprehension strategies…

For many artists, visual representation begins with the creative exploration of real and personal experiences. The primary challenge in creating such introspective works is maintaining the ability to connect with a broader audience. For high school students specifically, tremendous pride manifests in the creation of artistic works that represent…

This study reports on the implementation of an intermediate algebra curriculum centered on a framework of student-centered questions designed to investigate algebraic procedures. Instructional activities were designed to build discourse in the small-group discussion meetings of the course. Students were assigned writing prompts to emphasize the…