This article provides detailed analysis, from a radical constructivist perspective, of a sequence of letter-writing exchanges between a preservice secondary mathematics teacher and a high school student. This analysis shows the ways in which the preservice teacher gained understanding of the high school student's mathematics and attempted to pose…

This article describes the Hill-Climb project of a second level Computer-Aided Drafting and Design (CADD) class. The author primarily designed the activity to increase student understanding of the assembly drawing process and its components. The emphasis on problem solving adds a dimension that can aid students in their other classes as well. By…

This research explores the process of asynchronous problem-solving-based discussion activities and aims to understand limitations likely to arise during learners' problem-solving discussions. The research has combined lag-sequential analysis and quantitative content analysis, and expects to use such analyzing methods to further understand the…

Measurement is a mathematics skill students encounter often in their daily lives. The act of measuring involves the use of concrete, hands-on materials that students find engaging and appealing. According to Martinie (2004), the best way to teach measurement "is to find or create situations in which students need to measure and let them…

Focuses on connections between mathematics and environmental concerns. Activities were designed to make students aware of, and increase their knowledge of, the various materials people ordinarily use and discard and ways to use materials more conservatively. Each activity includes data gathering, graphing, and interpreting data. Activity sheets…

This 9-week curriculum unit on trees is designed for gifted students in grades 1-5. The lessons are designed for 40-minute classes meeting two or three times a week and stress the development of creative thinking skills, creative problem solving and decision making skills, and critical and logical thinking skills. Each of the 12 lesson plans…

Second and third grade students used the creative problem solving strategy developed by Sidney Parnes and Alex Osborn in their social studies classes. The second graders, finding few biographies written for students reading on a first or second grade level, interviewed community members, collected photographs of them, and wrote their biographies,…

This teaching unit is part of the final report of the Household Hazardous Waste Disposal Project. It consists of activities presented in an introduction and three sections. The introduction contains an activity for students in grades 4-12 which defines terms and concepts for understanding household hazardous wastes. Section I provides activities…

Providing teacher background on the concepts of productivity and capital goods, this document presents 3 teaching units about these ideas for different grade levels. The grade K-2 unit, "How Do They Do It?," is designed to provide students with an understanding of how physical capital goods add to productivity. Activities include a field trip to…

This document includes an introduction to the role of government in the production of public goods and services and 3 brief teaching units. The introduction describes the nature of a mixed economy and points out why most people identify the production of goods and services with private enterprise rather than government. It develops a rationale for…

This document consists of two major parts. The first, titled Initial Comments, discusses the motivation for creating this material, provides a list of minimal characteristics in calculators for various educational levels, notes a number of basic assumptions on calculator use, and discusses curriculum concerns regarding effects of calculators. The…

This economics simulation game complements the third grade Gold Mining Unit developed by Project Social Studies at the University of Minnesota. The simulation is designed for three purposes: 1) to reinforce the prior learning which occurs in the gold mining camp unit; 2) to involve eight-year-olds in the process of solving simulated economic…

Offers perspectives and specific ways of developing and nurturing critical and creative problem-solving skills with engineering students. Provides examples of exercises and approaches that aim in stimulating creativity and in providing understanding of course material. (ML)

Elements of communicative language instruction theories that can be realized with computers are identified; limitations are discussed; and the place and acceptability of computerized exercises within a communicative language learning environment are examined. (MSE)

This study examines the use of question prompts and peer interactions as scaffolding strategies to help undergraduate students with their problem-solving processes on an ill-structured task. The mixed research method, combining both experimental and comparative multiple-case studies, was used to study the outcomes as well as the processes of…