Students' judgements of their own learning often exceed their knowledge on a given topic. One source of this pervasive overconfidence is fluency, the perceived ease with which information is acquired. Though effects of fluency on metacognitive judgments have been explored by manipulating relatively simple stimuli such as font style, few studies…

In this article we present a didactic proposal for teaching linear algebra based on two compatible theoretical models: emergent models and mathematical modelling. This proposal begins with a problematic situation related to the creation and use of secure passwords, which leads students toward the construction of the concepts of spanning set and…

That the interplay of random and deterministic processes may result in both the limited predictability of nonlinear systems and the formation of structures seems to be a most valuable general insight into the nature of science. This study investigates the possibility of teaching and learning the interplay of chance and determinism in nonlinear…

This article focuses on the learning that is enabled while a primary school child makes a story using multimodal software. This child is diagnosed with autism. The aim is to use a cultural-historical framework to carry out an in-depth analysis of a process of learning with action as a unit of analysis. The article is based on a collaborative…

Comparative studies of forward and backward chaining have led some to suggest that sensitivity to each teaching procedure may be idiosyncratic across learners and tasks. The purposes of the current study were threefold. First, we assessed differential sensitivity to each chaining procedure within children when presented with multiple learning…

Sequential control over routine action is widely assumed to be controlled by stable, highly practiced representations. Our findings demonstrate that the processes controlling routine actions in the domain of skilled typing can be flexibly manipulated by memory processes coding recent experience with typing particular words and letters. In two…

Explaining new ideas to oneself can promote learning and transfer, but questions remain about how to maximize the pedagogical value of self-explanations. This study investigated how type of instruction affected self-explanation quality and subsequent learning outcomes for second- through fifth-grade children learning to solve mathematical…

The author responds to the recent work of Kaminski, Sloutsky, and Heckler (2008) and advances two major concerns about their research and its applicability to learning mathematics: a confounding variable that arises from the mathematical differences between the generic examples and concrete examples poses a threat to the construct validity of the…

Development in any domain is often characterized by increasingly abstract representations. Recent evidence in the domain of shape recognition provides one example; between 18 and 24 months children appear to build increasingly abstract representations of object shape [Smith, L. B. (2003). Learning to recognize objects. "Psychological…

There is growing recognition that models play a fundamental role in the comprehension of science concepts. This paper aims at enhancing students' understanding and thinking by model construction. Seventh grade middle school students from an urban public school participated in this study as a part of their weekly science club that met after the…

The purpose of this paper was to explore the concept of interest, one of the critical positive emotions in learning contexts and to investigate the effects of different types of visual illustrations on learning interest, achievement, and motivation in multimedia learning. The concept of interest was explored in light of positive emotion; an…

This study presents an application of a measure of learner involvement developed by Paas, Tuovinen, van Merrienboer, and Darabi (2005). These authors combined learners' performance scores with their perceived mental effort invested in instruction and used it to assess learner involvement in instructional conditions. The present study examines the…

How students develop forms for self-regulating learning is explored. It is suggested that they experiment, bootstrapping newer forms of self-regulated learning from prior forms. Obstacles are obtaining sufficient practice, remembering how learning was enacted, and reasoning about factors that affect learning. (SLD)

Explains that understanding of science is vital to effective changes in science education. Discusses Thomas Kuhn's writings on the physical sciences and argues that Kuhn provides a better understanding of science education than do earlier models of science, although Kuhn's model fails to connect science with other social processes and interests.…

Examines the role of computers in investigating teaching and learning processes and concludes that computer based experiments can be effective if they meet the same requirements that must be met by direct instruction techniques. (Author/DB)