This article describes a model to assist teachers in solving academic or behavioral problems of students with learning disabilities. The model uses the word PINPOINT as a mnemonic technique to address Problem identification, Importance rating, Noting the behaviors to develop, Possible solutions, Optimal options for the student, Ideal interventions…

Resurgence of scholarly interest and major economic and political considerations are putting development of a new, regional level of government back on the public agenda. New metropolitan governing structures in rapidly expanding urban regions may be an appropriate means to address issues requiring a broader base for cooperation and collaboration…

Evaluates the use of drama to assess children's knowledge of scientific concepts. Describes a case study of 7-year-olds and the study of magnetism. By taking science concepts out of the context of practical science activities, teachers could assess student knowledge without simply seeing what was expected, and students could explore ideas and…

Describes a study in which Australian children aged 5-8 years old (N=70) were presented with a range of measurement tasks to determine the strategies and devices that they would choose to use to measure length. Results are in conflict with the normal curriculum sequence. Contains 30 references. (DDR)

Presents an activity that requires middle level students to use mathematics and measurement skills to estimate the mass of an extinct dinosaur using museum-quality models. (JRH)

Describes students' initial thinking strategies and investigates the influence of learning environments on progress, transfer, and retention of students' thinking strategies. Results indicate that students do not use scientific reasoning when first encountering the problem, but interaction with the learning environment increases the rate of…

Describes a course that uses current environmental quandaries to teach students how to think, analyze, research, question, argue, evaluate, write, and solve problems. Develops skills required for active, project-oriented learning and covers principles of critical thinking and rudimentary risk literacy. (JRH)

Students play the role of members serving on a Wisconsin school forest advisory committee. Through these roles students begin to explore and understand the complex considerations that influence the management of an imaginary school forest, including both educational and forest management needs. Analytical, problem-solving, and consensus-building…

Explains the Big6 model of information problem solving as a conceptual framework for learning and teaching information and technology skills. Highlights include information skills; examples of integrating technology in Big6 contexts; and the Big6 and the Internet, including email, listservs, chat, Web browsers, search engines, portals, Web…

Presents weekly activities that focus on strategies derived from generalizations and patterns found in explorations using hundreds charts, manipulatives, and other models. (KHR)

Compared tutoring episodes where tutoring did and did not cause learning in university physics students to inform design of intelligent tutoring systems. Found that when students were not at an impasse, learning was uncommon regardless of the tutorial explanations employed. When students were at an impasse, tutorial explanations were sometimes…

Asked eight adults to instruct third- and fourth-graders individually in a math problem. Found that the adults offered more variable instruction to children who produced gesture-speech mismatches than to children with no mismatches--more types of instructional strategies and more instructions that contained two different strategies, one in speech…

Explains that Year 5 students in ten British schools took a mathematics division test twice in the school year. The test involved context and bare problems to identify changes in approach as the standard algorithm was introduced. Reports that 52 percent of students gained a higher score on the second test. (CMK)

Uses the notion of focusing phenomena to explain how a teacher's actions were connected to her students' interpretations of a linear equation. Conducts interviews and analyzes a high-school classroom that emphasized dependency relationships in real-world situations. Describes how the teacher directed attention away from functional relationships…

Presents a typical cost-allocation problem with possible solutions, including geometric and combinatoric ones. Provides students with a real-life application of the mathematics that they know. (KHR)