Provides examples of if-then and combinatorial reasoning situations that have proved successful with college students and can be used with secondary school students. Proposes that practice with these problem solving processes can eliminate the need to memorize formulas that students may not understand. (ML)

Four methods of solutions and 12 calculative strategies were found from introspective reports of 15 skilled and 15 unskilled students in grades 11 and 12 doing mental multiplication. Unskilled students used strategies more suited to written than mental computation, while skilled students used strategies based on number properties. (MNS)

The author describes a course at Lincoln (Nebraska) Southeast High School designed to help students master thinking and decision-making skills. The course features cooperative learning and questioning strategies; it has three major strengths: (1) developing thinking and deciding skills, (2) using simulations, and (3) using older persons as role…

Reviews an investigation of the effects of problem format and the number of independent variables on the responses of students to a control of variables reasoning task. Results indicate that adding independent variables to a control of variables reasoning problem leads to an overload of working memory which affects performance. (ML)

Interrelationships among metamemory, intelligence, attributional beliefs, self-concept, and strategy use were investigated in 102 German and 91 American children. Some were trained to use a cluster-rehearsal strategy on a Sort Recall task. Post-training assessments tested maintenance, near-transfer, and task-related metamemorial knowledge.…

The theory of information integration was used to predict that in first impression situations, clothing/physical appearance cues have differential importance depending upon the type of judgment elicited. Female college students (N=104) viewed and responded to slides of colored line drawings of female stimulus persons. Multiple regression of data…

Offers a review of various veins of thought related to writing instruction such as traditional grammar and rhetoric, discourse processes and cognitive science, and discourse form and sociolinguistics. (SRT)

How children perceive doubling and halving numbers is discussed, with many examples. The use of calculators is integrated. The tendency to avoid division if other ways of solving a problem can be found was noted. (MNS)

The purpose of this study was to assess the ability of students in grades 6 and 7 to order rational numbers in both decimal and fraction form, including the identification of their thinking strategies. Implications for instruction are included. (MNS)

The authors argue that the current teacher education program model, featuring apprenticeship, inhibits the self-directed growth of student teachers and fails to promote their full professional development. They describe an alternative model used at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, that promotes reflective teaching, teacher autonomy, and…

Women in different phases of the menstrual cycle were compared to men in their responses to a social interaction stimulus: a videotape depicting a female nurse interacting with a hospitalized patient. Sex differences and cycle-phase differences were found for both affective and cognitive dimensions. Premenstrual women differed from other women,…

Describes materials mastery and symbolic development as two discrete but related processes that preschool children learn. Uses the preschool setting to identify the developmental stages of construction play. (AS)

Over 600 pupils in grades five, seven, and nine in Italian schools were asked to choose the operation needed to solve 26 multiplication and division word problems. The findings seemed to confirm the impact of the repeated addition model on multiplication and of the partitive model on division. (MNS)

Described are activities for thinking through patterns using toothpicks, paper strips, wooden cubes, and people patterns; thinking with attribute items such as geocards, namestrips, and treasures; and thinking with geometric materials such as geoboards and dot paper, cubes, and simple puzzle pieces. (MNS)

How children can be guided to see and feel the power of thinking with and about mathematical symbols is discussed. A strategy to help them bridge the gap between manipulative models and symbols is detailed. (MNS)