Attempted cognitive training of Raven's Progressive Matrices using guided self-discovery, but without directly providing strategies. Thirty-six older and 36 younger adults were pretested, underwent training, and were posttested. Found no significant difference in improvement between younger and older adults. Failed to find evidence for successful…

Aims to raise interest in the application of problem-solving appraisal to the career planning process, through organizing and presenting relevant findings from the literature. Presents challenges for future researchers. (CH)

Understanding both process and context is essential to resolving problems. This paper articulates the decision seminar model, a rational problem-solving technique, and uses a hypothetical policy problem to show how various stages of the model might be applied to school issues. Process facilitates problem definition, inhibits fragmentation, and…

Provides a simple routine which allows first-year physics students to use programmable calculators to solve otherwise complex electrostatic problems. These problems involve finding electrostatic potential and electric field on the axis of a uniformly charged ring. Modest programing skills are required of students. (DH)

"Solve a simpler problem" is the strategy illustrated, with suggestions on other strategies included. (MNS)

The study assessed a program involving distinctive-feature prompts for teaching four educable mentally retarded children (ages 7-9) to use appropriate arithmetical operations with multicomponent pictorial problems. Results indicated the program was effective with all subjects. (Author/DB)

The study attemped to link cognitive and social problems seen in girls with Turner syndrome by assessing the girls' ability to process affective cues. Seventeen 9- to 17-year-old girls diagnosed with Turner syndrome were compared to a matched control group on a task which required interpretation of affective intention from facial expression.…

Concrete problems were significantly less difficult than abstract problems at both junior and senior high school levels, as previously observed at elementary school level. Factual problems were significantly less difficult than hypothetical problems at junior and senior high school levels, in contrast to elementary school results. (MNS)

Adolescents' understanding of societal conflict and of compromise resolution in the context of peer and authority relations was investigated. Six conflict stories were prepared for three social issues, and adolescents were asked to develop dialogues from the stories. Responses were categorized on a three-point scale. (Author/LMO)

Ten functions of program theory are reviewed: contributing to social science knowledge; assisting policymakers, discriminating between theory failure and program failure, identifying the problem and target group, providing program implementation description, uncovering unintended effects, specifying intervening variables, improving formative use…

Quality circle training has been adapted from Japan, but United States training needs are very different. A survey of quality circle members indicated they perceived human relations skills to be significantly more important than problem-analysis skills. (CH)

A problem-solving approach to teaching language rules to language-disordered children is described through an analogy with baseball. (CB)

Explores third and sixth grade children's acquisition and analogical transfer of the base of a relatively complex problem. One group at each grade level received two analogs of a scheduling problem; other groups received only one analog or a transfer task. After criterial performance, all children were transferred to an isomorphic analog and…

Discusses the Japanese management system, particularly the Theory Z emphasis on employee incentives, cooperation, trust, and focus on people. Reviews the American adaptation called "quality circles" and "team management" and shows how synergistic management techniques can be applied to building- and district-level school…

If schools are to succeed in teaching critical thinking, educators must have a clear idea of what it is. Critical thinking is skillful, responsible thinking that relies upon criteria, is self-correcting, and is sensitive to context. (TE)