Elementary education students enrolled in an experimental mathematics course participated in this study. The course is taught using a social constructivist approach and is designed to improve students' mathematical problem-solving ability and deepen their understanding of mathematics. The research question for the present study is as follows: In…

This study examined the effects of response time and message content on the growth patterns of discussion threads in computer-supported collaborative argumentation. Event sequence analysis was used to measure response times between threaded messages and responses containing arguments, evidence, critiques, evaluations, and other comments from…

To examine young people's reactions to and understanding of HIV prevention messages developed for MTV's global HIV prevention campaign Staying Alive, videotaped campaign materials were shown to focus group discussion (FGD) participants living in urban areas of Brazil, Kenya, Nepal, and Senegal. Responses related to "personal involvement"…

Effective group programs with challenging youth need to be grounded in a clear understanding of core principles that guide effective practice. This article examines the operating philosophy of an established outdoor education and therapy program which combines the Re-ED philosophy of Nicholas Hobbs (1994) with adventure education developed by…

According to a growing body of research, discussion-based instruction, in the context of high academic demands, significantly enhances student achievement in reading. The effects apply to below- as well as above-average-ability students. These findings confirm what secondary English teachers have believed all along about the value of discussion.…

The 10th International Conference on Educational Data Mining (EDM 2017) is held under the auspices of the International Educational Data Mining Society at the Optics Velley Kingdom Plaza Hotel, Wuhan, Hubei Province, in China. This years conference features two invited talks by: Dr. Jie Tang, Associate Professor with the Department of Computer…

This study investigated the effects of attendance at a panel featuring gay and lesbian speakers on self-reported measures of individual homophobia. A total of 200 female and 120 male college students enrolled in human sexuality classes were randomly assigned to pretest or no pretest conditions and completed surveys before, after, and one month…

Understanding the potential power of questions to promote thoughtful examination is at the heart of classroom teaching. If classroom discussions are to bear fruit, with students examining issues intelligently, teachers must develop an awareness of and be sensitive to how questions are framed. Good questions follow an interactive rhythm that…

This guide is designed as a tool to help members of the education sector involve community members in discussions about their local schools and learn how to become involved in the process of improving education in their community. The first half of the guide presents basic material for conducting a four- to seven-session discussion program based…

A step-by-step model for training peer counselors forms the basis of the trainer's manual and accompanying exercises for trainees which are organized into two books for effective skill building. Designed for peer counseling trainees, this document presents the second of these two exercise books. The book begins with a brief introduction to…

This paper describes a teacher education effort that developed conditions for teachers to be more effective learners about teaching and encouraged teachers' development of a personal understanding of educational issues. A group of teachers in one school established the Project To Enhance Effective Learning (PEEL) as an approach to encourage more…

While teams in the business environment are highly structured with clearly defined roles, unstructured project teams in the educational environment suffer from communication and coordination problems. This study at East Carolina University (North Carolina) demonstrated the impact of this lack of structure by providing distinct roles and…

Internet Relay Chat (IRC) is an electronic medium that combines orthographic form with real time, synchronous transmission in an unregulated global multi-user environment. The orthographic letters mediate the interaction in that users can only access the IRC session through reading and writing; they have no access to any visual representations at…

Major areas of inquiry found in this paper pertain to: (1) the current status of critical thinking in curriculums; (2) critical thinking as working with knowledge that is open to question and creative response; (3) descriptions of situations where critical thinking is enacted through classroom discourse techniques; (4) the need to wean students…

This paper describes a coding system devised to analyze conversations of graduate students in applied linguistics at Edinburgh University. The system was devised to test the hypothesis that as shared knowledge among conversation participants grows, the textual density of in-group members has more cues than that of strangers. The informal…