This article reports the analysis of six urban contexts in which a practical tool measuring individual skills concerning household waste recycling was tested. The tool is a structured questionnaire including a simulation task that assesses respondents' abilities to sort household waste adequately in a given context/municipality. Results indicate…

Computer-based assessment can provide new insights into behavioral processes of task completion that cannot be uncovered by paper-based instruments. Time presents a major characteristic of the task completion process. Psychologically, time on task has 2 different interpretations, suggesting opposing associations with task outcome: Spending more…

The belief that studying mathematics improves reasoning skills, known as the Theory of Formal Discipline (TFD), has been held since the time of Plato. Research evidence supports this idea, at least in the context of students who had chosen to study post-compulsory mathematics. Here we examined the development of reasoning skills in 16- to…

In manual assembly work, parts are often assembled by applying force with a simple tool or by hand. A worker thus needs control the force he or she applies in working, as an appropriate level of force is requisite for minimizing work failures and improving efficiency. The object of this study is to clarify the relationship between the level of…

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether students expected course difficulty to be reflected in grade distributions and in the amount of out-of-class effort required for success. Students from both upper and lower division classes described the amount of time they expected to spend preparing for an easy class, a difficult class, and a…

This paper analyses new methods of teaching skiing in terms of a computational paradigm for learning called increasingly complex microworlds (ICM). Examining the factors that underlie the dramatic enhancement of the learning of skiing led to the focus on the processes of simplification, debugging, and coaching. These three processes are studied in…

This report identifies generic competencies (skills necessary for success in the workplace) and foundations (skills and qualities underlying the competencies). Chapter 1 explains use of this report to help educators make high school courses more relevant to the needs of a modern work force and to help employers ensure that their employees possess…

Describes a study of the mental processes college students use in thinking about speed. Piagetian-type tasks dealing with speed, time, and distance were used in an individual interview format. Males outperformed females on tasks relating to speed, but not on the other tasks. (TW)