Introduction: Academic writing for publication is competitive and demanding for researchers. For the novice English-as-a-second-language (ESL) researcher, the pressure to publish compounds the difficulties of mastering the English language. Very few studies have used ESL graduate and post-graduate students as academic writing research subjects.…

Science educators face constant tradeoffs between allocating time to important topics and including more topics in the curriculum. We study 3,000 students experiencing 4 increasingly streamlined versions of a computer-enhanced middle school thermodynamics curriculum to investigate the impact of instructional time on knowledge integration.…

The present study investigated the effects of question prompts in scaffolding novice instructional designers solving ill-structured, instructional design problems in a Web-based learning environment. The effects of question prompts were studied under different prompting conditions (Question-Elaboration vs. Question-Guidance), taking into…

This study considered true beginners and false beginners in first-semester university French and Spanish classes to: (a) determine whether true beginners and false beginners differ in anxiety, grades, and plans to continue language study; and (b) identify classroom factors that foster anxiety or comfort. Students completed a questionnaire that…

This paper describes a two-week cross-cultural immersion experience in the United States for preservice teachers attending a small liberal arts college in the Southeast. This immersion occurs early in their teacher training and is designed to positively affect preservice teachers' attitudes toward Latino students who do not speak English well. As…

As children make the transition to school, many things may change for them. Among these are the ways they interact with curriculum areas such as mathematics. This paper explores some of these changes by considering examples of children's mathematical experiences in prior-to-school and school settings and analysing them in terms of the mathematical…

An important challenge in the introductory communication networks course in electrical and computer engineering curricula is to integrate emerging topics, such as wireless Internet access and network security, into the already content-intensive course. At the same time it is essential to provide students with experiences in online collaboration,…

The aims of this paper are to examine the measurement properties of the Reflection-in-Learning Scale (RLS) and to identify whether there are relationships between RLS scores early in the medical program and outcomes of the students' academic activity later on. The 14-item RLS was administered to second-year students (N=275) at start and at end of…

This article explores the mediational role of classroom discourse in the development of shared understanding in the multiethnic classroom. Successful participation in classroom discourse not only requires linguistic and cognitive competence, but also demands cultural knowledge, which often is taken for granted. Research carried out in a…

Studies show that misconceptions about psychology are pervasive. This study examined how the strength of prior beliefs and the sources of misinformation relate to conceptual change following an introductory psychology course. Ninety introductory psychology students completed a 36-item "Psychological Information" questionnaire. Testing during the…

This study investigated factors affecting second/foreign language (L2) reading comprehension in a hypermedia environment within the theoretical framework of dual coding and cognitive load theories, and interactive models of L2 reading. The independent variables were reading ability, topic interest, prior topical knowledge, and the number of times…

Preservice teachers come to any teacher education course with prior experiences, knowledge and beliefs about learning and teaching. Additionally, the belief systems of preservice teachers often serve as a lens through which they view the content of the teacher education program. Consequently, it is essential that teacher educators take these prior…

One of the key reasons that multimedia, and particularly hypertext systems, are gaining in importance is that they inspire hopes of optimizing learners' processes of knowledge construction. The present study is concerned with the respective influence of individual learner variables (i.e. particularly domain-specific prior knowledge) on the use of…

This paper is based on experiences with remedial online learning from a national collaboration initiative in the Netherlands involving the University of Amsterdam, Erasmus Rotterdam University and Maastricht University (www.web-spijkeren.nl). The central question is how prior knowledge tests and online remedial summer courses can contribute to…

Children can learn a lot about social studies by "reconstructing a culture" in the classroom. To reconstruct a culture, students can make use of prior knowledge to build a hierarchy of concepts about culture as well as learn social science subject knowledge appropriate to their grade level. In addition, they can have the tactile…