Addresses metaphysical questions concerning the ultimate structure of reality and discusses scientific nature. Suggests that the world cannot afford to neglect the role of conceptual analysis in thinking critically about the possibilities that science fiction claims to describe. (Author/KHR)

Describes three levels of understanding science: the phenomena (macroscopic), the particle (microscopic), and the symbolic. Suggests that the objective of science instruction at all levels is conceptual understanding of scientific inquiry. Discusses effective instructional strategies, including analogy, collaborative learning, concept mapping,…

Examined conceptualizations of 11 experienced and 12 novice counselors, with respect to general counseling process and specific client concerns by means of a two-part conceptual mapping task (CMT). Found an interaction effect of counselor experience and generality of conceptual task on extensiveness of counselor conceptualizations. (ABL)

Infants of 14 months of age demonstrated significantly improved understanding of containment as a result of a training intervention in which they played with cans and tubes in their homes for a month. After training, their test scores were similar to those of untrained 20-month-old children. (RH)

Investigates the patterns of students' conceptual restructuring within the theoretical framework of biologic evolution. Results indicate that many conceptions in this content are closely interwoven, so that a change in one conception requires a change in many others. Reports four patterns of conceptual change: cascade, wholesale, incremental, and…

Deceptive box experiments showed that when children see the expected contents before the boxes are changed, it is easier to report their own and a puppet's initial true belief, but also a puppet's current false belief. Results support the "reality masking hypothesis," that facilitation is due to the belief option being linked with a…

Describes an approach to the initial teaching of composite functions that relies primarily on mapping representations. (MKR)

The concept of ecosystem signifies the study of living species and their physical environment as an integrated whole. Traces the historical development of the concept in Great Britain and America. (Contains 38 references.) (MDH)

A theory is presented to explain the perception of partially occluded objects and illusory figures, from both static and kinematic information, in a unified framework. This detailed theory of unit formation accounts for most cases of boundary perception in the absence of local physical specification. (SLD)

Interviews with 20 novice and expert nurses showed that novice learning in practice was contingent upon concept formation and assimilation, framed by feelings. Experts use constructivist processes of active concept integration and self-initiated strategies. Experts identified systemic issues affecting learning; novices focus on individual issues.…

The learning organization is a vital strategy for organizational survival and development, not a quick-fix solution. It can help create sustainable knowledge and make organizations more productive, profitable, and humane places. (SK)

Reports that learners' alternative ideas in science may be coherent, stable, and theory-like. Studies how a learner can simultaneously hold several alternative explanatory schemes, each of which is persistent over time and applied coherently across a wide range of overlapping contexts. Concludes that the manifold nature of learners' conceptions…

Analysis of conversations in adult vocational education demonstrates how learner, teacher, and text interact to reproduce social practices as learning outcomes. Judgment of whether learning has occurred is based on a match between learners' new discourse practices and those of the evaluator. (SK)

Argues that a confusion of craft and technology is responsible for the erosion and splintering of the discipline of educational technology. Describes the positive and negative qualities of craft and technology and gives examples of the consequences of emphasizing one over the other and recommends a greater blending of the two approaches. (PEN)

Analyzes key concepts of the conceptual change model: intelligibility, plausibility, and fruitfulness, together with conceptions of learning as conceptual change and the nature of conceptual change teaching. Organizes representations of these around a framework developed for representing scientific conceptions in terms of verbal and symbolic…