In the early 1990s, a restructuring of the health services system of Alberta (Canada) amalgamated public health units and hospital districts into 17 Regional Health Authorities. Many of the regions have pursued community grant initiatives in addition to their regular funding, and it seemed that there would be value in comparing the experiences of…

Predictors of novice learning in simulation environments were investigated in the domain of statistics. The first objective was to clarify the relation between intellectual ability and working method (e.g., orientation and systematical orderliness), and to determine the effects on learning of working method, independently of intellectual ability.…

Unlike less skilled writers, who are intensely writer-oriented, skilled writers of personal essays and autobiographies are reader-oriented and demonstrate a conscious concern for their external audience. Student writers can develop a sense of an external audience by analyzing parallel autobiographical text selections of skilled and unskilled…

The effectiveness of instant video replay in improving young children's understanding of the physical laws of balancing blocks on a fulcrum was investigated. A total of 128 children from 4 to 8 years of age were randomly assigned to one of four treatment conditions. In the "Predict Block" condition, children viewed a video replay that…

The case for criterion-referenced measurement is discussed versus the conventional norm-referenced grading methods. (Author/BP)

Historically, it has been generally accepted that the evaluation of teaching competencies should be conducted by an administrator or a master teacher. There is a body of literature, however, that expresses the idea that self-assessment may also be a valuable source of information despite the uncontrollable defense mechanisms that may be inherent…

A debate about qualitative versus quantitative analysis has been waged in the scientific community for several years. A different set of parameters is suggested for this debate, and a logical transformation is outlined that makes the qualitative/quantitative distinction at the epistemological level a non-problem. While the strategy of induction…

To locate matches across pairs of lists without unique identifiers it is sometimes necessary to compare strings of letters. String comparators are used in production computer matching software during the Post Enumeration Survey for the 1990 U.S. census. A string comparator metric is described that partially accounts for: (1) typographical…

In the preparation of mathematics teachers both similarities and differences exist between the United States and the USSR. The vast majority of mathematics graduates in the USSR are females, primarily because most mathematics graduates will become teachers and most males do not want to teach because of low salaries and lack of respect for…

A study examined instructional television (ITV) to determine the differences in the affect domain existing among three concurrent environments: the face-to-face environment, defined as the site from which the message originates; the on-site location, defined as a location in close proximity to the origin of the message; and the off-site location.…

Ways in which instructional design specifications for television production may be extended into a more precise domain, where forms of representation may be cataloged and culturally defined, are suggested in this study. Differences between film and television are discussed, and a distinction is made between format codes (i.e., culturally and…

Six introductory educational psychology classrooms were differentially taught. One experienced an individually competitive structure (n=39) and five other sections experienced three different cooperative goal structures: one using intergroup competition (n=29), two without intergroup competition (n=29 and n=36), and two using Sharan's Group…

Procedures for correcting for guessing and for assessing partial knowledge (correction-for-guessing, three-decision scoring, elimination/inclusion scoring, and confidence or probabilistic scoring) are discussed. Mean scores and internal consistency reliability estimates were compared across three administration and scoring procedures for…

This comparison is based on the authors' selective review of literature, observations of Montessori preschools in America and Australia, and experience in early childhood teacher education in Australia. The discussion explores general educational objectives, curricula, children's activities, instructional approaches, and teacher role in preschools…

A project involving the evaluation of microcomputer courseware being marketed for school use was conducted in the Microcomputer Resource Center at Teachers College, Columbia University, during 1982 with funding from the Exxon Education Foundation. Every courseware package was evaluated by a team which included a subject matter expert, an…