Too often, the authors assert, discussion of controversial issues in high school classrooms is channeled through the teacher, rather than engaging students in discussion with one another. Teachers fear that students won't know how to talk to one another productively about issues, or that they'll end up in shouting matches. But when…

This article provides readers with details concerning the implementation of four active learning techniques used to help undergraduate students critically discuss primary literature. On the basis of undergraduate and graduate student perceptions and experiences, the authors suggest techniques to enhance the quality of dual-listed courses and…

More and more educational institutions are moving towards online distance learning. Although asynchronous online learning overcomes the constraints of time, place and pace, online distance learners feel isolated due to the lack of real-time communications. One possible solution for overcoming this sense of isolation is regulating student online…

We now understand that human intelligence, once thought to be determined almost solely by heredity, is malleable. In developed countries, average intelligence test scores have increased substantially since the tests began to be administered 100 years ago. In school settings, however, intelligence is often still treated as a fixed attribute that…

In this follow-up article, the authors explain that when technology is integrated in an equitable manner and with due regard for professional learning, the affordances of Web 2.0 technology and interactive devices allow teachers to not only promote procedural fluency but also to develop students' conceptual understanding, reasoning and…

It is known that parent involvement contributes to children's overall educational achievement as well as their literacy development. Home literacy, in particular, is critical in helping children who read below grade level. Studies also found that the quality of the interaction between the child and parent is as important as interactive…

Early in the semester, during a seemingly benign math lesson over money, one of the students in my second and third grade blended classroom halted the instruction to ask "Wait! Why are there no women on money? Is there any money with women on it?" Never one to miss an opportunity to get my students thinking critically, we took some time…

Fully online graduate education courses/programs incorporate faculty-student online discussion interactions as a mainstay component for instruction. Virtually all graduate education students are required to enroll in at least one graduate statistics course. Historically, students perceive statistics as anxiety producing, and impossible for…

To connect course material to executive MBA student workplace experiences and current events more clearly, we created an online space for students to bring up relevant workplace experiences or to post links to articles on domestic and international developments relevant to the week's course topics and materials. The activity has brought forth…

One of the guiding principles highlighted in "A Framework for K-12 Science Education" (NRC 2012) states that "children are born investigators," claiming that students construct their own understanding of the natural world even before they learn about it in formal learning settings. Even if students lack a thorough…

Purpose: Despite the well-known health benefits of physical activity (PA), disadvantaged populations usually have lower PA levels than the rest of the population. Some intra- and interpersonal factors such as different types of barriers to PA may influence PA levels, particularly among disadvantaged adult women. The first aim of this qualitative…

Mathematics educators are engaging in an online community referred to as the Math Twitter Blogosphere (MTBoS) to support their practices. Although studies indicate that educators who participate in professional online communities engage primarily in sharing and consuming resources, and in some cases also in building and maintaining professional…

The University of South Africa (UNISA) is one of the distance education universities that is shifting from open distance learning (ODL) to open distance e-learning (ODeL). UNISA started as a correspondence institution in the 1950s and it has since evolved into an ODeL university. The aim of this research was to assess and determine the maturity…

Faculty at many colleges and universities are redesigning courses to address differences in student learning preferences. In this study, the researchers surveyed students in two similar American Politics classes. In one, the instructor used a traditional large-class lecture format. In the other, lectures were supplemented with weekly small-group…

We report on one teachers' efforts to re-design an entire instructional unit as a coherent storyline about forces and motion as a part of a multiyear professional development (PD) project around the NGSS. Designing coherent storylines demands that teachers create opportunities for students to meaningfully engage in science practices in order to…