Specific teaching strategies to help hearing-impaired secondary students comprehend abstract concepts include (1) pinpointing facts and fallacies, (2) organizing information visually, (3) categorizing ideas, and (4) reinforcing new vocabulary and concepts. Figures provide examples of strategy applications. (DB)

Presents young children's concepts related to probability grouped by definite, possible, and definitely not. Discusses the teaching methods of the probability concepts. (YP)

Discusses the spatial aspects of Greeno's model of conceptual domains and applies the theory to geometry learning. Examines the relationship between mathematical and spatial thinking in light of Greeno's environmental/spatial view of learning. (Contains 16 references.) (MDH)

Describes a map skills unit used in a second grade classroom in which teachers and students engaged in activites that moved from the concrete to the abstract and from trips around the school neighborhood to a "trip" to Europe. An insert includes two map study ideas for use in intermediate grades. (SM)

The comprehensibility, interestingness, familiarity, and memorability of concrete and abstract instructional texts were studied in 4 experiments involving 221 college students. Results indicate that concreteness (ease of imagery) is the variable overwhelmingly most related to comprehensibility and recall. Dual coding theory and schema theory are…

(MDH)

Nine students (ages 7 to 11) with math disabilities were effectively taught using an instructional sequence that moved from the concrete to the semiconcrete to the abstract. Subjects needed between three and seven lessons using manipulative devices and pictures before being able to do abstract-level problems. (Author/DB)

Speculates that the prewriting technique of "clustering" can be an effective tool for multicultural college students learning sophisticated scientific concepts. Asserts that teachers must be willing to take risks and nurture students' creativity and self-confidence if such techniques are to succeed and supplant or supplement the lecture…

This study of 52 learning-disabled children, aged 8-13, found that direct feedback and practice improved metaphor interpretation. The approach was highly successful in teaching students to generalize concrete concepts to abstract ones. Further descriptive analyses indicated that grade and reading levels of subjects correlated with metaphor…

This study explored the moral reasoning and scientific argumentation of 31 Finnish adolescents gifted in science. In qualitative essays and interviews, the pupils were asked to identify moral dilemmas in science and provide solutions to them. Two illustrative cases of students' argumentation who had either average or high scores on the Defining…

An instructional program designed to help middle school students with severe learning disabilities learn about story themes, and focused on enhancing ability to generalize to themes not included in the instruction, was evaluated. Findings indicate students with learning disabilities can profit from instruction geared toward abstract higher order…

The author examined the effectiveness of training in symbolic logic for improving students' deductive reasoning. A total of 116 undergraduate students (approximately equal numbers of men and women) enrolled in 1st-year university philosophy courses in symbolic logic participated in 2 studies. In both studies, students completed booklets of…

A two-dimensional weather map is actually a physical representation of three-dimensional atmospheric conditions at a specific point in time. Abstract thinking is required to visualize this two-dimensional image in three-dimensional form. But once that visualization is accomplished, many of the meteorological concepts and processes conveyed by the…

This article introduces the central ideas of G. H. von Wright's cultural philosophy concerning the techno-scientific form of life. Georg Henrik von Wright (1916-2003) was best known for his achievements in the field of modal logic and for his association with Ludwig Wittgenstein. However, his work also included a critical analysis of science and…