The notion that the classroom can, indeed must, be a safe space to promote student engagement and enhance academic outcomes is pervasive in the teaching and learning literature. Despite the prevalence of this claim, there is a dearth of empirical evidence documenting the effectiveness of safe space classrooms in achieving these goals. The purpose…

Parents and teachers help children develop their intelligence by mediating their learning experiences. When children seek such mediation by asking questions, parents and teachers can use one of seven responses. The single most helpful response is to take children's questions seriously and turn them into golden thinking and learning opportunities.…

A three-year program at Bethel College (Minnesota) has introduced faculty to various models of college student development, including the reflective judgment model of intellectual development, and their instructional applications. Knowledge of student development, now common to faculty and staff, has had a profound impact on teaching, learning,…

Egalitarianism in public education must mean students have not only equal opportunity to attend school but also equal intellectual opportunities. Some solutions include a redefined mission for public education, new techniques for teaching rigorous academic subjects to non-elite students, improved school environments, and a national testing system…

Despite some concerns about its limitations, one college English teacher has found the reflective judgment model (1) very useful in a first-year course on the Vietnam War for understanding students' processes of deliberation, (2) supportive of undergraduate teaching approaches that emphasize critical inquiry, and (3) helpful in guiding responses…

Several college teachers formed a writing circle to talk about their writing, improve writing skills, and develop articles for publication. An unanticipated outcome was improvement of instruction through adoption of new teaching methods, increased empathy with students as writers, and ability to reach students at different stages of intellectual…

This guide for language teachers offers a developmental approach to curriculum design for second language learning. The approach suggests a progression of tasks at various difficulty levels, geared to the gradual development of language knowledge, concepts, skills, and attitudes. Ten levels of attainment, or stages of learner development, are…