The act of creating meaning with texts is complex, and this complexity creates unclear views of instruction in schools and even greater perplexity in knowing how to instruct students who may be struggling in this area of their schoolwork. Comprehension is often measured in schools as a product and an outcome, making it difficult to understand why…

This study introduces an innovative instructional method, called "pseudo peer diagram" (PPD), where students employ executive skills to compare and contrast their work with others' as a formative feedback mechanism. The focus of this study is how students compare and contrast their own diagrams with the pseudo peer diagrams as a stimulus…

Students who harbor misconceptions often find chemistry difficult to understand. To improve teaching about the dissolving process, first semester introductory chemistry students were asked to complete a free-response questionnaire on writing balanced equations for dissolving ionic compounds in water. To corroborate errors and misconceptions…

Despite the recognized need to increase interdisciplinary collaboration, there are few information resources available to provide researchers with an overview of scientific communities--topics under investigation by various groups, and patterns of collaboration among groups. The tools that are available are designed for expert social network…

This dissertation presents an innovative approach to the development and empirical evaluation of Automated Writing Evaluation (AWE) technology used for teaching and learning. It introduces IADE (Intelligent Academic Discourse Evaluator), a new web-based AWE program that analyzes research article Introduction sections and generates immediate,…