This report enumerates the activities of the Educational Technology Center (ETC) during 1987. The guide's theme for the year was Teaching with Technology. The report includes brief descriptions of five different types of research projects by area. In science education, the projects concerned with weight and density, heat and temperature, and the…

This document presents four research papers related to the role of inconsistent ideas in learning mathematics and a discussion paper related to the same issue. The titles of the papers are: (1) "Cognitive Conflict in Procedure Applications" (Merlyn Behr and Guershon Harel); (2) "Inconsistencies in Preservice Elementary Teachers'…

This book is a collection of 21 articles by mathematics teacher Ernest Ranucci (1912-1976) grouped into five categories: (1) "Patterns" (for developing inductive reasoning skills); (2) "Mathematics in the World Around Us"; (3) "Spatial Visualization"; (4) "Inventiveness in Geometry"; and (5) "Games to Learn By", which demonstrates that mathematics…

It is a concern of many educators and researchers that females are underrepresented in the field of mathematics and careers that require mathematics. This study begins with a review of the literature that examines the sex-related differences in mathematics. Three major categories involving the relationship between females and mathematics are then…

The purpose of this study was to review the research on sex-related differences in mathematics achievement to determine the extent of the inequalities and the factors which cause them. The first section concentrates on differences in mathematics achievement between males and females. The second section describes the sex differences in mathematics…

The implementation of the program used in this study, TPIXIE, was predicated on the assumption that acquiring the skill to diagnose student errors was important for teacher trainees. The TPIXIE system (part of the PIXIE family of intelligent tutoring systems) was designed to present users with a series of task-student-answer pairs (where the…

The papers and conference proceedings recorded in this monograph are from a conference on effective mathematics teaching. In addition to acknowledgements, foreword, introduction and participant list, the following articles are included: (1) "Teaching for Higher-Order Thinking in Mathematics: The Challenge for the Next Decade"; (2)…

Higher order thinking skills are inevitably developed or exercised relative to some discipline. The discipline may be formal or informal, may or may not be represented in a school curriculum, or relate to a wide variety of domains. Moreover, the development or exercise of thinking skills may take place at differing levels of generality. This paper…

This is a narrative review of research in mathematics education reported during 1987. The purpose of this review is to extract from research reports ideas that may prove useful to school practitioners. Major sections are: (1) "Planning for Instruction" (relating historical developments, aides and grades, teaching approaches, problem…

This report describes a computer-based instructional system, the Story Problem Solver (SPS). SPS provides students with instruction about the semantic structure of story problems. It was developed to test a specific schema theory of knowledge organization in long-term memory. For this reason SPS depends explicitly upon a theory of the relationship…

In response to the urgent national need to revitalize mathematics and science education, the National Research Council (NRC) has undertaken an examination of mathematics education from kindergarten through graduate study. This is a summary of a report outlining the seriousness of the situation and emphasizing how critical mathematics is for…

In response to the shortage of mathematics and science teachers in Washington, this state's legislature developed a program to provide loans for students preparing to teach secondary-level mathematics or science in Washington public schools. The rationale was that these loans would encourage students majoring in mathematics or science to prepare…

A 1986 global survey revealed that mathematics and science are firmly in place in school curricula worldwide, but teaching of technology has a much more tentative hold. All of the countries that responded taught science and mathematics at most levels but technology was taught in only a few countries. In an effort to probe more deeply into the…

At a time when many are concerned with the shortage of qualified science and mathematics teachers in public schools, a recent survey was conducted by the National Executive Service Corps (NESC) into the availability of technical professionals nearing retirement who have expressed a willingness to teach. The results of the 9-month study indicates…

The current reform of general secondary education and vocational training in the USSR is aimed at further improving quality and meeting social demands. This document is an addendum to "Science and Mathematics Education in the General Secondary School in the Soviet Union," published in July 1986. It discusses some of the new reform…