This report summarizes a number of exploratory and pilot studies undertaken to investigate the relationship of individual differences among college mathematics students to discovery and expository instruction, and to Personalized Systems of Instruction (PSI). Research in education has often attempted to demonstrate the superiority of one type of…

A review of studies of four vocabulary teaching methods--context learning, imagery, cognitive style, and natural word learning--resulted in several generalizations about their effectiveness. The generalizations are limited by problems such as the difficulty of defining when a word is "known" and the lack of a way to test permanence of word…

It is hypothesized in this study that given an understanding of the educational value levels of students, instructors could modify their teaching methods to accommodate various levels reflected in their classes. Six value systems for both teachers and students are identified: (1) tradition oriented; (2) individualistic; (3) structured; (4)…

Research on selective attention in learning disabled (LD) children is reviewed, and a study comparing the selective attention performance of 60 7-and 12-year-old LD and normal children to visual and auditory stimuli is reported. Each S was tested for focal and incidental memory individually in either the auditory or visual mode of stimulus…

This study investigates the strategies people use to acquire knowledge from maps. Among the questions examined were (1) what distinguishes poor learners from good learners, and (2) how do the learning strategies of map-using experts differ from those of nonexpert learners? Eight subjects participated in the study. Five were undergraduate students…

Cognitive mapping is a way to determine cognitive style. Based on the "Hill Educational Sciences Model," cognitive mapping is generally applicable in education at any level and in any area, but it has particular applications in communications courses. The simplest method of applying the cognitive style mapping procedure is to have…

A sample of college students was used to determine whether there was a correlation between Lowenfeld's visual-haptic continuum and Piaget's concrete-formal continuum. Three instruments were administered--a questionnaire, the Successive Perception Test I (Gibson) which identified an individual's location on the visual-haptic continuum, and the…

People sometimes forget a name or a word, and are plagued by the feeling that the sought-for word is somewhere in memory but not immediately available. The frequent description of this tip-of-the-tongue (TOT) phenomenon as subthreshold memory traces is challenged by data showing that TOT genesis and TOT recovery are distinct processes. In a verbal…

A method of examining individual variation in responses to Inhelder-Piaget formal reasoning tasks is proposed as a means of identifying cognitive style components of formal reason and as a means of generating more complete descriptions of observable manifestations of formal reasoning. The method is one used by human ethologists and consists of…

Students in grades 1-4 who had used the "Science--A Process Approach" were tested by individually administering the tasks of the "Science Process Instrument." Tasks to assess the level of the same skills in social studies, fine arts, and language arts were then administered. Data analysis showed that there was a similar…

Approximately 1,000 articles and books relating to traditional approaches and new directions in the assessment of the behavior of children are listed. The references are grouped under the following 14 headings: (a) methodological issues; (b) interviewing and informal assessment techniques; (c) rating scales; (d) personality questionnaires and…

The purpose of this study was to compare performances by Japanese and American children on the Matching Familiar Figures Test, the primary measure of cognitive tempo. Data on more than 3400 Japanese and American children (approximately half male, half female) were used. Factorial analyses of variance revealed significant age x nationality…

Shows how third graders' error patterns on a reading test related to their cognitive styles. Suggests corrective teaching strategies to follow such categorization and analysis. (RL)

Florida's individualized competency-based vocational education program stresses variety in learning experiences to accommodate individual student differences in learning. The author describes sequence of instruction and techniques to help the teacher facilitate learning. (MF)

In the education of American Indian children, two contrasting learning styles are involved, that of the school and that of the community. The native teacher emerges as a critical factor in synthesizing the different culturally based styles. (JD)