This contribution deals with the adoption and interpretation of the monitorial system of education in Colombia between 1821 and 1844, a period during which this pedagogical method was almost mandatory for all the country's elementary schools. The analysis focuses on the differences between "local necessities" and "local semantic…

This paper is an essay on the discursive politics of education. Data from a small study, combined with a review of the related literature, suggest that the overarching concept "community" lacks coherence when used in online education. At least three contrasting forms of connection can be discerned: communion among participants, exchange…

This study investigates the critical thinking skills of 50 students currently enrolled in the Master's TEFL Programme at Yarmouk University, Jordan. The Cornell Critical Thinking Test, Level Z is utilised to test the students' use, or lack thereof, of the critical thinking skills of deduction, semantics, credibility, induction, definition and…

In this article, the author contends that the shift in the way public literacy instruction is talked about and enacted is not merely a semantic one designed to conceal liberal motives from the students--or at least it should not be. Rather, it aims to honor the ways that personal, private interests can construct and reconstruct the public sphere.…

The 12th iteration of the International Conference on Educational Data Mining (EDM 2019) is organized under the auspices of the International Educational Data Mining Society in Montreal, Canada. The theme of this year's conference is EDM in Open-Ended Domains. As EDM has matured it has increasingly been applied to open-ended and ill-defined tasks…

An analysis of perfect verb forms in African American Vernacular English (AAVE) looks at the distribution of forms by semantic function and co-occurrence patterns in Samana English and ex-slave recordings. Results suggest that despite the overall rarity of this category in the general realm of past time, the most frequent forms used to mark it…

This collection of working papers in syntax includes: "Null Objects in Mandarin Chinese" (Christie Block); "Toward a Linearization-Based Approach to Word Order Variation in Japanese" (Mike Calcagno); "A Lexical Approach to Inalienable Possession Constructions in Korean" (Chung, Chan); "Chinese NP Structure"…

This article describes the results of a three-month experiment in the use of computer-based semantic networks for curriculum development. A team of doctoral and master's degree students developed a 1200-item computer database representing a tentative "domain of competency" for a proposed MA degree in Workforce Education and Lifelong…

Sentence comprehension is more than a syntactically autonomous issue and relies on the clues that are not part of the grammar. This paper considers "world knowledge," in this case prior knowledge of the story being read, as one such clue. In section 1, "reversibility" of sentences is discussed. "Sentence ambiguity" is discussed in section 2.…

Research has demonstrated that second language learners benefit considerably from form-focused instruction within the context of a communicative language program. Thus, it is suggested that second language teachers should provide guided, form-based instruction in a meaningful context. Instructional strategies based on three dimensions of…

This individualized inservice packet on vocabulary development in the content areas is intended to enable teachers to help students expand word meaning, using the technical vocabulary of their content areas. It is one of a nine-part series of booklets--Teaching Teen Reading--in self-instructional format intended as a practical resource for…

By comparing Alfred Korzybski's and Richard Paul's approach to critical thinking, this paper presents a procedural example of how an individual can learn and develop expertise in human communicating. The paper offers various exercises beginning with select Korzybski general semantics communication theories and moving into critical thinking…

This paper presents a technique for applying the Rule Space Model of cognitive diagnosis (Tatsuoka, 1983) to assessment in a semantically rich domain. Responses of 122 architects to 22 architecture test items developed to assess a range of architectural knowledge were analyzed using Rule Space. Verbal protocol analysis guided the construction of a…

A study examining the initial stages in the acquisition of the conditional system is reported. The objective was to discover how morphological productivity is related to the child's comprehension of the semantics of individual conditional types. Schachter's model of reality and unreality conditionals was used as a framework. Eight middle class,…

The results of a newly developed Haitian-Creole oral proficiency test are presented. The test is administered in Haitian-Creole to Creole-speaking and limited-speaking Haitian-origin children at two educational levels: grades kindergarten through 3 and grades 4-6. The test is designed to assess the child's language proficiency in three linguistic…