Purpose: Huntington's Disease (HD) is a fatal, hereditary neurodegenerative disorder that is characterized by a triad of motor, cognitive and psychiatric symptoms that impact on both communicative effectiveness and the treatment techniques used to maximize communicative participation. The purpose of this article is to describe the application of…

A 2008 experiment suggests that a summer books program, when combined with teacher scaffolding lessons and parent support, can significantly improve the reading achievement of low-income children. However, just giving student books to read did not improve achievement. By having teachers provide end-of-year lessons in reading comprehension and…

Movie clips can provide data for content-rich problem solving, show students exotic phenomena, allow them to apply science concepts in a new setting, and foster connections between science and the humanities. Though the latest release will have the advantage of pop-culture currency, films old enough to be released on DVD give teachers more…

The architect for the Mauritius Auditorium project sat in his office at Larsen & Toubro's headquarters in Chennai, India, pondering the phone call he had just received from the vice president, Mr. K.P. Raghavan. The polyvalent hall of the conference center was about to be used to host its first rock concert in February 2005, but during a…

Tiny prisms in reflective road signs and safety vests have interesting geometrical properties that can be discussed at any level of high school mathematics. At the beginning of the school year, the author teaches a unit on these reflective materials in her precalculus class so that students can review and strengthen their geometry and trigonometry…

"Classroom number talks," five- to fifteen-minute conversations around purposefully crafted computation problems, are a productive tool that can be incorporated into classroom instruction to combine the essential processes and habits of mind of doing math. During number talks, students are asked to communicate their thinking when presenting and…

This paper discusses a chemistry lesson plan based on the use of ethanol as an alternative and renewable energy source. The lessons were developed by participatory action research and follow a socio-critical and problem-oriented approach to chemistry teaching. This approach specifically focuses on the handling of scientific and technological…

Social capital has been extensively discussed in the literature as building blocks that individuals and communities utilize to leverage system resources. Similarly, some families also create capital, which can enable members of the family, such as children, to successfully negotiate the outside world. Families in poverty confront serious…

The mathematical topic of inverse functions is an important element of algebra courses at the high school and college levels. The inverse function concept is best understood by students when it is presented in a familiar, real-world context. In this article, the authors discuss some misconceptions about inverse functions and suggest some…

Nonroutine function tasks are more challenging than most typical high school mathematics tasks. Nonroutine tasks encourage students to expand their thinking about functions and their approaches to problem solving. As a result, they gain greater appreciation for the power of multiple representations and a richer understanding of functions. This…

As mathematics becomes more complex and abstract in the higher grades, helping students find purpose and meaning for doing it becomes more important. Juvenile literature can serve as a powerfully motivating force for students in intermediate elementary school grades to learn mathematics, often providing an intrinsically interesting, real-world…

Understanding geospatial technologies (GSTs) and spatial thinking is increasingly vital to contemporary life including common activities and hobbies; learning in science, mathematics, and social science; and employment within fields as diverse as engineering, health, business, and planning. As such, there is a need for a stand-alone K-12…

Students with mild and moderate disabilities need to be skillful at problem solving. This article provides an overview of a problem-solving intervention designed to teach students with mild and moderate disabilities the skills of problem solving. An explanation of the assessments, materials, instructional outline, and methods is presented.…

Mass-volume relationships are a useful tool emphasized for problem solving in many geo-science and engineering applications. These relationships also have useful applications in soil science. Developing soils students' ability to utilize mass-volume relationships through schematic diagrams of soil phases (i.e., air, water, and solid) can help to…

This note presents a method for the numerical approximation of simple zeros of a non-linear equation in one variable. In order to do so, the method uses an ellipse rather than a tangent approach. The main advantage of our method is that it does not fail even if the derivative of the function is either zero or very small in the vicinity of the…