This case study describes how a high school language arts teacher in a poor border community in southern New Mexico combined technology-based teaching strategies with multicultural elements to ensure learning and equitable access to technology for her minority students. Discusses bilingual and bicultural students, constructivist classrooms, and…

Explores the central pragmatist and feminist philosophical assumption that knowers cannot be separated from what is known, that there is a dialectical relationship between social beings and ideas. Argues for embracing pluralistic and democratic commitments on epistemological and moral grounds. (KS)

This article describes the Cognitive Strategy in Writing program (originally intended for elementary-age students), and adaptation and application of the social constructivist approach with seven junior high and high school students with learning disabilities. Pretest-posttest assessment indicated dramatic improvements in overall quality and…

Examines constructivism in online learning, suggesting that part of the cause of the gap that exists between educational theorists and science instructors about how subjects can be taught appears to be due to different beliefs about what it is possible to learn. Illustrates a scientist's approach through examples of an online course designed by…

Assesses the potential of multimedia authoring as a learning tool using the software ASTOUND. Investigates the knowledge acquisition caused by a multimedia program among 32 grade 12 students on a multi-disciplinary environmental unit about earthquakes. Provides basic background about earthquakes via laboratory experiments and field trips to…

Students in a grade 2-3, two-way bilingual classroom increased their understanding of scientific practice through a model-based methodology for science instruction. Students collaborated with peers and teachers to create computer models, construct physical models, and talk about their models in the classroom. Aspects of second language usage in…

Responds to the article "Opportunities Lost: Teachers Learning about the New York State Social Studies Framework" by S. G. Grant. States that Grant loses an opportunity to provide the type of social analysis needed to extricate teacher educators from their complicity in New York State's regulation of teaching by misconstruing…

Calls for social science researchers to make the leap from understanding to action. Explains action and why it must replace classical disinterestedness and objectivity. Discusses the new criteria for educational research and the new methods for interpretive researchers. Addresses the implications for higher education. (CMK)

The project approach to learning engages students' natural bent for discovery through observation, play, hands-on tasks, and real-world challenges. Project-based learning complements systematic instruction in basic skills by making discrete bits of information relevant. Teachers must design projects that provide enough latitude for student…

These four articles discuss constructivist practices for social studies in middle schools and high schools. Highlights include simulations; collaboration between teachers and librarians; the use of HyperStudio for collaborative interdisciplinary projects; using online primary source materials; and Web resources that help provide background…

Framed by theoretical and empirical research on cognitive and intelligent tutoring systems (ITSs), this commentary explores two areas. The first focuses on lack of conceptual clarity of the proposed constructivist stance and its related constructs. The second deals with similarities between the proposed stance and existing approaches documented in…

Highlights points that guide the Reggio Emilia approach to early childhood education: the learner is a social being who possesses rights and is an active constructor of knowledge; the instructors' role is one of collaborator and co-learner, guiding and facilitating, as well as researching; and knowledge is socially constructed, encompassing…

Determined expert and student physical education teachers' constructivist views of pedagogical content knowledge and their practices while teaching educational games based on the movement approach. Found that both groups of teachers demonstrated an adequate constructivist view of pedagogical content knowledge and that student teachers did not use…

Provides recommendations for the implementation of the communication, constructivism, and transference of knowledge (CCT) model in the education of English language learners (ELLS). Describes how the CCT model is identified in research studies and suggests specific recommendations to facilitate the implementation of the model in the education of…

Community-oriented pedagogy, or place-based schooling, uses schools as a source of community renewal, not community disintegration; allows students to construct their own understandings through interaction with the community environment; creates creative and critical thinkers who can also meet academic standards; and addresses our society's…