Fluctuations in cognitive task performance in older individuals have been reported. To examine intraindividual variability as a function of practice, 34 younger and 34 older female participants, aged 20-30 years and 70-82 years, respectively, performed a reading span task 16 times over four sessions. Each individual's recall accuracy was analyzed…

This paper explains Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences (MI) and discusses questions raised about MI theory in regard to validity, assessment, and implications for instructional activities. MI theory asserts that human cognitive competence is best described in terms of a set of abilities, talents, and mental skills that each child…

This paper examines several questions about reflective thinking and its application in education as a way of extending the applications of the concept. An early section offers background on reflection from dictionary definitions and from philosophers such as John Locke and John Dewey. The next section examines educational practice and reflective…

This paper discusses a mental model of learning based on the processes of attention, perception, processing, and application. The learning process starts with attention, such as curiosity, excitement, expectation, or fear; in pedagogy this is called motivation. New impressions are dependent on and interpreted against the background of previous…

Two related studies are reported about the (lack of) activation of real-world knowledge in elementary school students' understanding and solution of school arithmetic word problems. In the first study a set of word problems was collectively administered to 75 fifth-graders during a typical mathematics lesson. Half of the problems were standard…

The interest in the application of large-scale computerized adaptive testing has served to focus attention on issues that arise when theoretical advances are made operational. Some of these issues stem less from changes in testing conditions and more from changes in testing paradigms. One such issue is that of the order in which questions are…

Students better understand problem solving when the basis for the problems are real-life situations. This book, geared for grades 4-8, offers multi-step, real-life problems to encourage students to think flexibly, creatively, and analytically about problem solving. It includes ideas for setting up a problem-solving classroom and assessment…

Scanator is an extremely valuable tool in the functional analysis of qualitative stability in text building behavior during writing. Scanator also allows for a detailed investigation of subtle changes emerging in the structural relations of emergent novelties. This study focused on the extension of the application of Scanator to one pair of…

In response to the difficulties of many masters degree students, this on-going project aimed, first, to identify cognitive and metacognitive skills needed for masters level study; second, to develop an instrument to determine students' readiness for masters level work; and, third, to design bridge courses to prepare prospective students. An…

Processes involved in the acquisition of cognitive skills were studied through an investigation of the efficacy of initially encoding knowledge of a cognitive skill in either declarative or procedural form. Subjects were 80 university students. The cognitive skill, learning the steps to program a simulated video cassette recorder (VCR), was taught…

It is not surprising that a broad array of treatment programs have been developed to reduce test anxiety, since the consequences can be serious. The contributions in this volume review and evaluate the theory of test anxiety, its measurement, its manifestations, and possible treatments and their outcomes. The following chapters are included: (1)…

Today's literature on the psychology of learning points out that intelligent learning is the formation of concept structures communicated and manipulated by means of symbols. The study presented in this paper examines the learning of biology by means of unguided viewing of television using two different television symbol systems: story animation…

This paper presents findings of a national survey that asked principals to identify qualities they found desirable in teaching candidates. A total of 271 out of 500 secondary principals returned completed questionnaires, a 54 percent response rate. A single questionnaire item, in which respondents rated a fictitious teaching candidate, elicited a…

This study examined the electrophysiological differences between baseline EEG frequencies and EEG frequencies obtained while listening to music stimuli. The experimental group comprised 22 children, ages 4 to 6 years old, who received special music instruction twice a week for 25 minutes for 7 weeks. The control group received no music…

This book is intended to give readers an observational scheme for understanding the process of organizational knowledge development at the individual and social levels. Chapter 1 examines devising a concept of organizational knowledge. In chapter 2, the place of epistemology within philosophy is discussed along with organizational, cognitivist,…