Reports misconceptions identified in students with respect to the topic of parallel lines and the teaching strategies found to be useful in challenging those misconceptions. (11 references) (MDH)

Traditional methods of teaching addition include algorithms that involve right-to-left procedures. This article describes efficient procedures for left-to-right addition and subtraction involving computation and computational estimation that reflect children's natural behaviors observed during activities with unifix cubes. (MDH)

Describes three activities that the teacher can employ to help students develop thinking skills through mathematics instruction: (1) memorization using the technique of chunking; (2) higher order thinking with magic squares; and (3) predicting games. Identifies eight facets of the teacher's role in promoting thinking skills. (MDH)

Describes one teacher's reflection concerning the quest to develop an understanding of school mathematics that promotes and sustains students' opportunities for exploration and conjecture. Recounts that a particular student's exploration of the features of parabolas eventually led to an understanding of the quadratic formula precisely because of…

Three learning activities--story generation, reasoning from historical information, and computer modeling--that are designed to help students move toward a more coherent understanding of biological mechanisms are described. A method used to measure a student's level of understanding and their progress during instruction is also described. Ways to…

Presented is a review of the research on the benefits of using writing to evaluate students' understanding of mathematics. Results indicate that student writing provides a rich resource for assessing student understanding, can have a direct influence in teachers' instructional practices, and can positively influence student-teacher interaction…

This study compared the effectiveness of teaching multidigit addition of whole numbers without regrouping prior to teaching it with regrouping to teaching multidigit addition with and without regrouping simultaneously. Pretest/posttest-delayed posttest results of second grade students (n=151) from seven randomly assigned classrooms indicated no…

Substantial disagreement exists in the literature regarding which educational technology results in the highest cognitive gain for learners. In an attempt to resolve this dispute, we conducted a meta-analysis to decipher which teaching method, games and interactive simulations or traditional, truly dominates and under what circumstances. It was…

The original project, the foundation for all subsequent work, was set up in 1981 by Michael Shayer, with Philip Adey and Carolyn Yates, and became known as CASE @ KS3 (Adey and Shayer, 1994). CASE stands for Cognitive Acceleration through Science Education. The original CASE project drew on Piaget's work on the stage theory of cognitive…

This paper presents a study on thinking and learning processes of mathematics and science in teaching through a foreign language, in Finland. The entity of thinking and content learning processes is, in this study, considered as cognitional development. Teaching through a foreign language is here called Content and Language Integrated Learning or…

A preschool program in rural Bangladesh was evaluated in terms of cognitive and social outcomes of children. The preschools provided a half-day program, 6 days a week, with free play, stories, and instruction in literacy and math. Four hundred children between 4.5 and 6.5 years were assessed, half in preschools and half in villages where there…

This research study examined the role of instructional design knowledge in the development of teaching expertise for university teaching assistants (TAs). ID theoretically supports the development of systematic and meaningful patterns of cognitive organization that characterize teaching expertise. Therefore, it should support TAs in developing…

Despite a growing interest in children's drawing, there are few meaningful frameworks for examining what it is that children are doing when they draw. In this paper particular aspects of Vygotsky's sociocultural theories are re-examined in relation to young children's drawing processes. Using one kindergarten child's drawings of the growth and…

The three major educational sectors in which learning occurs are often taken to be the formal education sector (schools, colleges, universities and so on), the workplace, and the free-choice learning sector (Falk, 2002). This review is concerned with science on television, understood as a significant component of the free-choice learning sector.…

This paper has two purposes: (1) to explain briefly in terms of Piaget's theory why relationships are fundamental for constructivist teachers; and (2) to show how constructivist teachers can think about relationships in classroom activities. In a nutshell, the message is that the process by which children are constructing their intelligence,…