With the increase in violence over the past few decades, academic and human development practitioners have tried to better understand the dynamics of conflict and develop effective intervention and prevention strategies. There is an ever-deepening appreciation for the mediation process. The mediation process is a powerful problem-solving and…

One challenge in today's society is to teach students how to solve problems and use the general education they acquire to arrive at realistic solutions. Techniques that cut across the curriculum and can be used by any university teacher to provide realistic experiences for students are discussed. Students need the same acquired skills in…

Transitional situations, such as those experienced by work study students, may create cognitive difficulties by requiring people to simultaneously use both a learning and a use logic. To examine this phenomenon, a problem solving task (electrical schemata of a washing machine) was administered to 43 full time students and 51 work study students…

This paper describes a course taken by elementary student teachers at Central Missouri State University, with particular emphasis on the action research projects that are a part of the course requirements. The intent of the course and the action research is to foster in the student teachers reflective decision making in their own classrooms.…

Simulations and games have been used in education for decades, but most of this development has been in the areas of business and economics. Well-designed simulations and games have been shown to improve decision-making and critical thinking skills as well as teaching discipline-specific concepts. Active learning also helps students develop…

Ego development is an implicit aim of higher education and can be one of its most significant results, according to R. P. Weathersby. There are several developmental stages, each having characteristics to describe personality traits, style of behavior, conscious preoccupations, and ways of thinking. From lowest level to highest, the stages are:…

This introduction to computer simulations as an integrated learning experience reports on their use with students in grades 5 through 10 using commercial software packages such as SimCity, SimAnt, SimEarth, and Civilization. Students spent an average of 60 hours with the simulation games and reported their experiences each week in a personal log.…

An innovative teaching method used in a theories of personality class at Eastern New Mexico University is described. The objectives of this method were to foster growth in creativity among students by involving them in creative activities or experiential sessions and to test for improvement in student creativity scores. The following procedure was…

The purpose of this research was to document the relationship among student development, science achievement, and self-efficacy among middle school students. A novel survey was created to determine the self-efficacy levels of the middle school students. The middle school students were also administered two novel content quizzes in the area of…

Studied age trends in solving correlational problems involving over 2 continuous variables 100 Canadian students in grades 5, 7, 9, and 11 and a postgraduate college preparatory year; 278 seventh graders; and 120 tenth graders in 3 experiments. Correlational reasoning skills increased with age and improved through instruction. (SLD)

An instructional unit, "Coping in the World of Work: Practice in Problem Solving," designed to assist 11th and 12th grade high school students in developing the ability to solve vocational adjustment problems was developed and evaluated. Instructional goals of the unit included the following: (1) To become acquainted with the range of job…

The purpose of this research was to describe how self-efficacy affects the development and science achievement of practicing teachers after their participation in a half day long hands-on science lesson provided by the Science on Wheels project. The 42 practicing K-8 teachers were from eight different counties located in a rural mid-eastern state.…

This study examined the specific words that college faculty in different disciplines use to convey goals for students using data from 1986-87 interviews with 62 faculty members teaching introductory colleges and a 1988-89 survey of 2105 faculty which established a listing of over 6000 goal statements. Goal statements were examined in order to…

This study compared the effects of personal characteristics and teaching practices in the development of professional competencies by undergraduate engineering students. A survey completed by 480 engineering students gathered information concerning students' personal, academic, and demographic characteristics; characteristics of their current…

In an attempt to make basic social science education more responsive to the needs of students in a rapidly changing society, the authors developed and conducted an experimental course entitled "Economics and Politics in a Changing Society" (EPICS). The goals of this course include improvement in thinking ability and creativeness, progress in…