Explored in two studies disparities between how students with different degrees of extroversion and introversion engaged in small-group discussions requiring construction and critique of arguments. Found that extroverted students exhibited a greater tendency to use conflictual discourse, whereas introverted students worked with one another…

Presents a case study of one classroom teacher's attempt to develop critical discourse in students, focusing particularly on the ability of language-minority students to participate in critical discussions. Suggests that allowing students to explore topics of personal relevance--as may occur in a critical literacy curriculum--is one way of…

Explores the ideas and reasoning students use to make a collaborative environmental management decision. Compares students' discussions with scientists' guidelines for making environmental management decisions. Finds that whereas across groups students touched on all of the themes that scientists consider to be important for making environmental…

Examines gender features in eighth-grade students' writing in terms of the relationships among characters and the use of violence, comparing the analyses to perspectives offered by the students in small group conversations. Finds evidence of competitive relationships within sports and romance stories, as well as elements of violence and metaphors…

Presents ways that daily circle time can help build a community of learners in early childhood settings. Notes the importance of involving children in circle time routines, and building shared rituals, such as greetings and recognition. Discusses the use of circles at midday and the end of the day for reflection and community building. (KB)

Describes how the authors introduced and organized small-group literature discussions in a first-grade bilingual class. Discusses the four most frequent types of student responses in discussions: living through the experience; looking closely at text and illustrations; exploring social issues; and making connections (to other books, life…

Examines reliability issues in the large-scale assessment of speech communication through authentic techniques, used recently in Saskatchewan. Performance-based approaches enable educators to evaluate the integrated, interpersonal communication skills of large student populations, thereby modeling best professional practice. However, decentralized…

Describes a study of a graduate level online course that investigated whether the systematic use of instructor-initiated audio emails, as a supplement to regular textual forms of communication, would increase students' participation in group discussion and result in more favorable student perceptions of student/faculty relationships and quality of…

The paper reports a small-scale research on the predisposition of adult ESOL learners in a further education college to the components of autonomous learning. The research is based on the perception that there is an untested assumption that all students will react positively to the concept of autonomous learning and by implication are positively…

Constructivism is the philosophy that has been cited most frequently in the past 20 years in education. It has been argued that a constructivist philosophy offers a means of education that would result in knowledge generation and creation; therefore, it is superior to other views. Making the shift toward a constructivist philosophy, however,…

Results of an exploratory factor analysis study designed to examine and refine the Corrective Feedback Instrument are reported. The Corrective Feedback Instrument-Revised replaces the Corrective Feedback Instrument and consists of 30 items that can be used to encourage conversations about giving, receiving, and clarifying corrective feedback in…

Discussion and writing are very powerful ways to support learning. This article describes the use of a free, synchronous online forum to expand student-teacher discussions beyond the time/place constraints of the physical physiology classroom. The main participants were medical students enrolled in physiology class at the University of Zagreb…

Critical thinking is important for lessons in classes for gifted and talented students. Since definitions of critical thinking are plentiful and varied, teachers must decide what behaviors are most productive in the classroom. One viable method to promote critical thinking through productive discussion is the Dixon-Hegelian method. This paper…

There has been growing interest and increasing use of case study (CS) materials in teacher education. Yet efforts to systematically evaluate the effectiveness of CS have been scarce. We compared instructional effectiveness of CS to another commonly used discussion strategy, an application question (AQ) method, with graduate students enrolled in a…

A previous study (Wallace, Yang, Hand, & Hohenshell, 2001) indicated that seventh-grade life science students using a learning tool known as the Science Writing Heuristic (SWH) performed significantly better on conceptual test questions than did a control group. In the present study, the researcher studied more deeply how students utilized a…