Discourse markers have been described as "nervous tics, fillers, or signs of hesitation", and are frequently dismissed as features of lazy or inarticulate speech. Yet in fact they have a number of crucial functions in spoken interaction, such as buying time, managing turn taking, linking utterances, introducing a new topic and indicating…

The emergence of dynamic visualizations of three-dimensional (3D) models in anatomy curricula may be an adequate solution for spatial difficulties encountered with traditional static learning, as they provide direct visualization of change throughout the viewpoints. However, little research has explored the interplay between learning material…

Adolescent newcomer students bring a wealth of linguistic and cultural resources to their learning environments--resources that become even more dynamic when combined with those of their peers. While a significant body of research has explored students' deployment of multilingual resources through translanguaging, most of this work does not…

Visual presentations may assist students with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) to access instruction, and they may be more engaged when interacting with screen media in particular. Interactive whiteboards (IWBs) are large electronic screens that are used for instruction in many classrooms. An alternating treatment design was used to compare the…

Learning whether English nouns are countable or not is a source of great difficulty for many ESL/EFL learners. In the present study, a grammaticality judgement task comprised of a range of nouns representative of the different facets of the countability system in English was distributed to 82 native speakers of English (NSs) and 98 non-native…

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…

This study is part of a more extensive research project that addresses the understanding of the derivative concept in university students with prior instruction in differential calculus. In particular, we focus on the analysis of students' responses to a sequence of tasks that require a high level of understanding of the concept, and complement…

Metaphors reflect the way people think and know the world. When they are considered within teaching profession, they can be strong agents revealing teachers? beliefs about their profession. They may also explore the meaning that teachers attach to themselves. Despite their strength to shed light on how teachers conceptualize themselves, metaphor…

This study examined to what extent English-speaking learners of Arabic demonstrated varied metalinguistic knowledge of a salient feature (head-direction) vs. an unsalient feature (definiteness) in the Arabic construct state. In addition, it examined whether this knowledge was utilized in form-focused task performance. In the target construction,…

Assessment is a critical part of teaching and learning so it is important that students are encouraged to engage positively with it. The Institution-Wide Language Programme (IWLP) at the University of Leeds redesigned its model of assessment for modules at upper-intermediate and advanced levels, broadly equivalent to the Common European Framework…

Learning a language in a formal context is not the same as learning a language in a natural setting, in that the goal of one of the participants in the communicative events that occur in the classroom, the teacher, is to teach a language. For this reason, the majority of the actions undertaken by the participants are directed at achieving that…

Focusing on the science knowledge and pedagogical content knowledge that teachers need to realize the vision of the "Next Generation Science Standards" (NGSS) in their classrooms, this study presents findings from efforts to (1) adapt existing criteria and design heuristics for educative features of curriculum materials to the needs of…

The aim of the research was to identify how Slovenian primary and secondary school students of various age groups explain the particulate nature of the states of matter of water and air. The qualitative research included five 12, 14, and 16 year old students. A semi-structured interview including four computer-displayed tasks was used for the data…

Jeremy Thomas and Russell McBride are social studies teachers in North Carolina and, until recently, were colleagues at a charter school outside of Raleigh, serving students in grades 6-12. After learning about the Inquiry Design Model (IDM), both teachers implemented it into their classrooms and immediately saw how the blueprint helped deepen…

The concept of variability is central to statistics. In this research report, we review mathematics education research on variability and, based on that review and on feedback from an expert panel, propose a learning progression (LP) for variability. The structure of the proposed LP consists of 5 levels of sophistication in understanding…