The purpose of this article is to report on the importance of providing pre-service and in-service teachers with experience and specific training in critical thinking skills. The essential concepts in elementary mathematics curricula can be augmented to include and cultivate critical thinking skills that have tremendous ramifications for future…

In Canada, the province of Ontario has had a rather turbulent relationship with interdisciplinarity as it has tried to implement this practice into the public school system. Specifically, the provincial government has repeatedly attempted to introduce such reforms as integrated units, harmonized objectives, and open-concept, student-centered pods,…

Interdisciplinary processes are being developed for a better present and future in primary and secondary education teaching in France. Over the past few years, the education authorities have increased incentives to open the subjects for one another and created new teaching-learning programs for interdisciplinary purposes. In spite of the obvious…

The Latina/o population makes up the largest ethnic minority group in the United States. Unfortunately, the Latina/o population also experiences higher rates of poverty in comparison to other ethnic groups (U.S. Census Bureau, 2006). Educational attainment is one of the key factors in elevating one's socioeconomic standing, yet Latina/o…

Using the wealth of sites available in the Chicago metropolitan area, online learning technologies, and classroom interactions, Roosevelt University's seminar "The Sustainable City" takes a multidisciplinary approach to urban ecology, waste management, green design, climate change, urban planning, parklands, water systems, environmental…

"Computing in the Humanities," an undergraduate course for Computer Science Department majors and minors and Web Programming minors at New York University, represents a unique collaboration between the Computer Science Department and the University Archives. The course's final assignment required students to select, digitize, and contextualize…

Significant limitations have emerged in America's science training pipeline, including inaccessibility, inflexibility, financial limitations, and lack of diversity. We present three effective programs that collectively address these challenges. The programs are grounded in rigorous science and integrate through diverse disciplines across…

Worldwide, science education reform movements are stressing the need to promote "scientific literacy" among young people. Increasingly, this is taken to include empowering students to engage critically with science-related news reporting. Despite this requirement now featuring in statutory curricula throughout the UK, there has, to date,…

According to the author, the Modern Language Association's (MLA's) recent publication of the reports "Foreign Languages and Higher Education: New Structures for a Changed World" and "Report to the Teagle Foundation on the Undergraduate Major in Language and Literature" concerning foreign language education has caused many of them to reexamine the…

Photosynthesis may be an unlikely topic to inspire an opera or ballet, but in a 2nd grade classroom in Pikesville, Maryland, the children were asked to use dance to help them learn about that process. Small groups of pupils in this class at Fort Garrison Elementary School brainstormed to come up with dance movements to convey elements of…

The learning outcome of a physics laboratory course for medical students was examined in an interdisciplinary field study and discussed for the electrical physiology ("Propagation of Excitation and Nerve Cells"). At the Ludwig-Maximilians-University of Munich (LMU) at a time about 300 medicine students were assessed in two successive…

There is growing support for education that is cross-curricular, locally-relevant and involves a high degree of student responsibility. This investigation examines the perspectives of students who have participated in an outdoor learning programme that is theoretically underpinned by the above themes. "Outdoor Journeys" involves learning…

Modern biological sciences require practitioners to have increasing levels of knowledge, competence, and skills in mathematics and programming. A recent review of the science curriculum at the University of Queensland, a large, research-intensive institution in Australia, resulted in the development of a more quantitatively rigorous undergraduate…

In his book, "A Whole New Mind", Daniel Pink champions the benefits of right-brained thinking: creativity, flexibility, empathy, and meaning. He stresses the need to not only be logical, but also aware of emotion; to not only be sequential, but also conceptual; and to not only be calculating, but also recognize value. The project described in this…

More than ever before, leaders within the field of education are looking to research on basic processes to inform and improve educational practices. Success requires building a reciprocal relationship between the field of education and research on learning and development, similar to what exists between biology and medicine. Key to this effort is…