Describes the biological basis of learning and individuality. Presents an overview of recent discoveries that suggest learning engages a simple set of rules that modify the strength of connection between neurons in the brain. The changes are cited as playing an important role in making each individual unique. (MCO)

Reviews research on the development of academic skills in arithmetic and early reading, emphasizing the individual cognitive processes occurring during learning. Offers implications for the development of new methods of assessment that stress processes, rather than just products. Suggests that researchers in cognitive development and assessment…

Addresses one aspect of individual differences and how socially learned cues may radically influence the verbal learning tasks performed by university students taking a foreign language. The nonuniversity studies reviewed provide the backdrop for a more in-depth study on four memorization modes and how these strategies are largely dependent on…

Learning styles represent a type of aptitude-treatment interaction suggesting that a person's distinctive characteristics (aptitudes) can be matched to a specific treatment (instructional method) yielding a more effective outcome than could otherwise have been achieved. Special education research does not support categorizing youngsters or using…

This three-part volume provides a summary, for use by practitioners, of a project concerned with how novices learn to become creative educational computer users. The first chapter examines techniques for increasing the novice's understanding of computers and computer programming, and specifically analyzes the potential usefulness of five…

Memory has been defined as traces left behind by past information processing. One approach to the study of everyday memory is to isolate reliable differences between individuals in the ways in which they process information when preparing for test events. The Inventory of Learning Processes, consisting of four scales, i.e., Deep Processing,…

The elusive phenomenon of individual learning differences was probed via the concepts of transfer and practice at different stages of the learning process. Order of presentation of two films covering different subjects provided the transfer task. Practice was introduced by five repetitions of the films, interspersed among six repetitions of an…

This study tested certain implied predictions regarding conceptual learning at each of four sequential levels of development: concrete level, identity level, classificatory level, and formal level. For this purpose, scaled batteries to assess the level of conceptual development of children, kindergarten through high school, were constructed and a…

Every human being is always open to some degree; for example, open for learning, experience, change, improvement, or further degradation by his own standards or those of others. Every experience alters an individual's learning capacity. Therefore, to say a child is naturally of high or low intelligence with unlimited or limited learning power is…

One of the basic problems in relating learning theories to instructional strategies is that traditionally learning theory has researched the micro unit whereas the instructional environment studies the macro unit. Traditionally, instructional strategy research and development takes the learner as he comes, an integrated organism. In learning…

The effects of elaboration instructions and imagery characteristics of verbal material on learning of Malay--English word pairs were investigated, as well as the moderating effects of individual differences. Results reflect aptitude X treatment interactions and the importance of individual differences in planning instructional methods. (Author/JAC)

Considers the hypothesis that the open classroom is less threatening than other role postures of the teacher, with the outcome being that the child will come to direct his own learning experiences and will learn more fully and with less trauma than in other settings. (Author/RK)

The experiments reviewed in this paper give strong reasons for concluding that the order in which things are learned, the range of exemplification of structural principles, and the introduction of a carefully judged amount of conflict may be critical to reaching an appropriate kind and level of learning. (Author/SJL)

Discusses the problems involved in matching differences between learners and differences between different types of media to improve the learning process. Thirty-eight references are cited. (CHC)

Three variables: subject area, day of the week, and academic activity, were examined to determine whether pupil involvement in academic learning activities is an indicator of pupil learning. Differences were found in each variable, implying that more effective use of allocated instruction time will increase academic achievement. (JD)