How people see the world, even how they research it, is influenced by beliefs. Some beliefs are conscious and the result of research, or at least amenable to research. Others are largely invisible. They may feel like "common knowledge" (though myth, not knowledge), unrecognized premises that are part of the surrounding culture. As we…

To explore whether different balances of fiction/non-fiction reading and challenge might help explain differences in reading achievement between genders, data on 45,670 pupils who independently read over 3 million books were analysed. Moderate (rather than high or low) levels of challenge were positively associated with achievement gain, but…

Turner's (1980) visual literacy test for high school students and adults was adapted for use with eighth grade students. The new version was limited to questions dealing with motion media, and a half-hour "M.A.S.H." narrative television program was chosen for the focus on television production techniques and the narrative elements of the…

The learning of a list of 20 Blissymbols and comparable American Sign Language signs by 121 nonhandicapped undergraduate psychology students was compared. Blissymbols were learned significantly faster than manual signs, particularly in early learning trials. Results are discussed in terms of the memory requirements of the two systems. (Author/JDD)

Thirty-two hearing-impaired adolescents were assessed on comprehension of three anaphoric forms within conjoined sentences: repeated noun, personal pronouns, and null form. The null form anaphora in a semantically acceptable environment, in which some hearing-impaired students apply a deviant object-subject deletion rule, was significantly more…

The purpose of the study was to determine whether particular aspects of movement control influenced the performance of 2-year-old children on a standard developmental test, and thus influenced assessments of intellectual progress based on that test. Six cerebral-palsied (CP) children were compared with six children not suffering motor system…

This paper focuses on the questions which arise as test practitioners monitor score scales derived from latent trait theory. Large scale assessment programs are dynamic and constantly challenge the assumptions and limits of latent trait models. Even though testing programs evolve, test scores must remain reliable indicators of progress.…

Item analysis data were collected for the Bender Visual Motor Gestalt Test and Goodenough-Harris Drawing Test, from urban and rural Alberta (Canada) youngsters and Inuit youngsters from the Northwest Territories (Canada). Both tests were inadequate in individual item difficulty levels, suggesting the necessity of revising scoring systems and…

The first (exploratory) phase of the Learning in Science Project focused on science teaching/learning in the Form 1 to 4 level (ages 10 to 14) and sought to identify problems and difficulties in several areas. Provided in this paper are comments obtained during structured/unstructured interviews (from students, ex-students, teachers, headmasters,…