In this study, adults identified as low-readers were asked to sort 20 words into four unspecified groups. The purpose of the task was to determine ways in which learners clustered words. Subjects grouped words thematically as opposed to grammatically or hierarchically. Groups suggested stories rather than parts of speech or concept groupings.…

Because university teachers tend to be intellectually lazy and avoid sound, rigorous thought, it is emphasized that they should weigh evidence, assess arguments fairly, and take a partial stand on values and philosophies they hold. (ND)

Reports on an experiment in which performance on abstract and concrete sentences was compared in a sentence meaning classification task and in a free recall task. Results show that concrete sentences were classified significantly faster than abstract ones. (CLK)

American thought has contained a strong metaphysical bias favoring a realist interpretation of the world, and this has led to the assumption that facts possess ontological status, however, facts are segments of human experience and students must acquire conceptual tools for extracting factual data from experience. (JD)

Sixty Japanese children ranging in age from 3 years 4 months to 7 years 5 months were individually interviewed with three Piagetian tasks. Children's levels of representation were assessed by asking for a graphic representation of 4 dishes, 6 pencils, 8 small blocks etc. A conservation-of-number task was then given to assess children's level of…

This paper presents the results from a paper-and-pencil instrument designed to elicit students' thinking about the rate of change in particular situations. A scoring rubric was designed to classify students' solution strategies to algebra problems. The purpose of the study was to validate the results in different ways. First, the results from this…

The measurement and description of polygons and paths by elementary school students was studied from a constructivist point of view. A teaching experiment was devised to promote understanding of length based on the hypothesis that as children coordinate their number concept and their one-dimensional/two-dimensional spatial concepts they gain…

Research supported by grants from the National Institute of Mental Health and the National Science Foundation. (DD)

Research supported by a grant from the National Institute of Mental Health. (RS)

Analyzes concept formation in children based on the precepts of general semantics. (RB)

These results support Piaget's position that preoperational children respond to the perceptual lack of equality but not to the lack of conceptual equivalence in class-inclusion problems. (Authors)

Proposes a rhetorical theory and pedagogy which emphasize the semantic concepts of denotation and connotation; based on a paper presented at convention of National Council of Teachers of English (Washington, D.C., November 28, 1969). (RD)

This study offers one bit of evidence that quizzes written to require reasoning are more effective in attaining thinking" objectives than are recall quizzes. (Author)

This study demonstrates the general developmental progression of the increased internalization of the conditions of emotional arousal. Females show a tendency to be more dependent than males on external arousal cues. (Authors)