Presents standards-based activities that include learning about an electronic card catalog by playing card games; learning to count and to recognize numerical sets by identifying real-life sets (e.g., items in the building or on the playground); and learning about estimation and spatial sense using students and a digital camera. (SM)

A classroom activity analyzes the mathematics found in Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World, the true story of Ernest Shackleton and the 27-man crew who all survived a shipwreck at the South Pole. (Contains 3 figures.)

Many common objects can provide numerous opportunities for students to develop mathematical concepts and skills. The lesson described in this article provided an excellent opportunity for middle school students to discover how real-life situations do not always present obvious "right" answers. As students explored a question related to the…

This article describes a unit of instruction designed to promote a conceptual understanding of area in sixth-grade students. Students used benchmarks to estimate the areas of real houses and calculated the areas of houses based on building plans. (Contains 7 figures.)

This article describes an innovative lesson that uses the biography "Barbara McClintock: Alone in her Field" (Heiligman, 1994) to integrate genetics, literature, and mathematics as a context for students to investigate patterns on Indian corn. This two-day lesson requires students to estimate, collect data, identify and describe patterns,…

This article discusses relationships between the development of an understanding of algorithms and algebraic thinking. It also provides some sample activities for middle school teachers of mathematics to help promote students' algebraic thinking. (Contains 11 figures.)

Eighty college students read textbook passages that either included marginal inserts to signal key concepts or did not include these inserts. Signaling key concepts enhanced performance on content quizzes overall and on subsets of items assessing signaled material. Performance was not affected on subsets of items for nonsignaled content. Students…

This study investigates item parameter recovery, standard error estimates, and fit statistics yielded by the WINSTEPS program under the Rasch model and the rating scale model through Monte Carlo simulations. The independent variables were item response model, test length, and sample size. WINSTEPS yielded practically unbiased estimates for the…

Computer algebra methods based on results of commutative algebra like Groebner bases of ideals and elimination of variables make it possible to solve complex, elementary and non elementary problems of geometry, which are difficult to solve using a classical approach. Computer algebra methods permit the proof of geometric theorems, automatic…

The paper's aim is to note a remarkable (and apparently unknown) relation for right triangles, its generalisation to arbitrary triangles and the possibility to derive these and some related relations by elimination using Groebner basis computations with a modern computer algebra system. (Contains 9 figures.)

Objective: First, to provide information about best practices in handling missing data so that readers can judge the quality of research studies. Second, to provide more detailed information about missing data analysis techniques and software on the Journal's Web site at www.jaacap.com. Method: We focus our review of techniques on those that are…

Preference orderings among a set of options may depend on the elicitation method (e.g., choice or pricing); these preference reversals challenge traditional decision theories. Previous attempts to explain these reversals have relied on allowing utility of the options to change across elicitation methods by changing the decision weights, the…

Model-based equating was compared to empirical equating of an Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) test form. The model-based equating was done using item pretest data to derive item response theory (IRT) item parameter estimates for those items that were retained in the final version of the test. The analysis of an ASVAB test form…

Computation can have a profound intellectual impact, like the alphabet thousands of years ago. Using computation, people can begin to outline cognitive structures that will revolutionize the way they learn, although, especially at universities, the dreams must sometimes lag behind their potential due to limited funding. Ultimately, however, the…

As part of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation, many states are using confidence intervals to determine a range of scores for evaluating a school system. More specifically, the states are employing confidence intervals to help minimize measurement error in determining a school system's performance. The methodology and techniques employed in…