As students learn physics, they are often required to reason about the behavior of macroscopic and microscopic phenomena, and to synthesize prior knowledge from several different areas of physics to construct understanding of new ideas. This can be a tremendously difficult cognitive task for novice students, especially when the unfamiliar…

Courses: Public speaking. Objective: This activity introduces and activates Monroe's Motivated Sequence.

Even though many educators are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math), science often does not receive the attention in elementary school that it should. One way to ensure that elementary school children have the science experiences they need and deserve is to use it as a context to teach…

This teaching tip highlights three writing minilessons that help students construct vivid sensory detail (textual detail related to the five senses) in their fiction and creative nonfiction writing. Learning to show, not tell, is a difficult task for novice writers. The author explores reasons why this is the case and provides directions for the…

Over the last few years, the use of mobile technologies has brought the formulation of location-based learning approaches shaping new or enhanced educational activities. Involving teachers in the design of these activities is important because the designs need to be aligned with the requirements of the specific educational settings. Yet analysing…

This article suggests an activity, called the epsilon-strip activity, as an instructional method for conceptualization of the rigorous definition of the limit of a sequence via visualization. The article also describes the learning objectives of each instructional step of the activity, and then provides detailed instructional methods to guide…

Concepts in mathematics are often universally applicable to other fields. A critical aspect for success in high school or college is the ability to transfer content knowledge from one discipline to another. This is especially true for material learned in the sciences and mathematics. Several studies have suggested that strong mathematical skills…

One way that people learn, remember and communicate is visually. We combine past experiences with new visual information to construct meaning. In this study, elementary teachers introduced their students to the peoples and places of the ancient silk routes using illustrations from two children's picture books, "Marco Polo," written by…

The universities and faculties which educate teachers of mathematics for teaching pupils/students of any age group from pre-school age to higher education carefully monitor and compare valuable results of this research, detect the areas in which the mathematical achievements of pupils should be improved at the national level and propose the ways…

According to the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) (1989, 2000), students at all levels should be exposed to geometry and measurement topics. Standards documents have identified the importance of primary school students selecting appropriate units for measurements in one- and two-dimensional space (NCTM 1989, 2000). This paper…

Presents a series of classroom exercises and activities that stimulate children's creativity through the use of visualization. Discusses procedures for guided imagery and offers some examples of "trips" to imaginary places. Proposes visualization as a warm-up exercise before art lessons. (DR)

This series of activities on spatial relationships was designed to help users acquire the skills of spatial visualization and orientation and to improve their effectiveness in applying those skills. The series contains an introduction to spatial orientation with several self-directed activities to help improve that skill. It also contains seven…

A classroom activity to facilitate the process of forming images in the mind (seeing) while writing is described in detail. The activity, called the Where Exercise, consists of the instructor naming a series of locations and the students writing down three objects which they "see" in each of those locations. It is emphasized that the…

Presents methods for teaching two mathematical concepts that utilize visualization. The first illustrates a visual approach to developing the formula for the sum of the terms of an arithmetic sequence. The second develops the relationship between the slopes of perpendicular lines by performing a rotation of the coordinate axes and examining the…

Presents activities focusing on the use of visual perspectivity. Includes reproducible student worksheets. (MKR)