A category system for organizing six thinking skills and methods for teaching these skills, using the concept of time, are provided. Representing a proposed sequential order of development, the six thinking skills are: (1) imaging--the creating of an internal mental representation of an external thing and the labeling of that representation, (2)…

This paper examines research studies that have concluded that elementary school children can learn more difficult and abstract social studies concepts than are taught in the traditional social studies curriculum. Research studies that focus on constraints on cognition, the use of embedded concepts, and understanding knowledge restructuring and…

This study compared the effects of cooperative learning groups to traditional instruction in remediating students' misconceptions about temperature. Students from grades 3, 4, and 5 in two rural elementary schools participated in the study. Students completed a pretest, a cognitive conflict laboratory activity and a posttest that measured…

Three purposes of this study were to: (1) propose some organizing theoretical and observational definitions of the anchor construct; (2) present some initial findings from a diagnostic test designed to uncover anchors for high school physics instruction; and (3) provoke an initial discussion of the new methodological issues that arise in this…

Two studies were conducted to compare the advance organizer and concept elaboration models of instruction with a task analysis approach. It was hypothesized that the concept elaboration group would achieve significantly higher than either the advance organizer group or the task analysis group on concept learning and principle learning. A pilot…

The estimation processes used by fifth through eighth grade students as they responded to computational estimation test items were examined. Interview-based process descriptions were cross-validated using large group test data from an open-ended test and a multiple choice test. Five question formats were used to test different estimation…

The process of conceptual change, in learners and in scientific knowledge, indicates that: (1) change involves complex and varied commitments to methods of investigation, aims and goals of investigation, and prior knowledge; (2) change leads to consensus forming or dissensus forming activities; (3) knowledge claims and procedures for testing…