This paper details a study of knowledge-building activities in the domain of computer software. Thirty-six adults--evenly split among beginning, intermediate, and advanced knowledge levels--were videotaped while they attempted to learn a common spreadsheet package. Subjects were asked to think aloud while learning. Each knowledge building activity…

Memory work has potential usefulness as a method of helping students explore their relationship to science. Students have multiple early experiences with the natural world, but often these experiences are divorced from their school-based learning. It is known, however, that students use their informal experiences of the natural world in their…

As illustrated by a concept map in chapter 1, this book discusses three concepts: (1) the nature of knowledge, its capture, creation, and use; (2) the nature of human learning; and (3) a theory of education tying together the first two concepts. Chapter 2 discusses the need for a theory of education to resolve numerous questions, issues, and…

This booklet examines the learning process in reading, not with an eye to simple solutions, but with concern about problems and potential remedies. Within this framework, it discusses research on the brain and learning processes and suggests some ways to improve instruction for all children in grades K-8. After an introduction, sections of the…

Schools usually adopt year-round education (YRE) for its cost saving features, but a year-round calendar affects all aspects of a school. The primary educational benefit of YRE is that it facilitates continuous student learning. YRE's effect on the curriculum is more complicated at the secondary level than at the elementary level. While studies…

A group of 73 normal children (ages 8 to 10) was compared to 49 age-matched developmentally dyslexic children of average intelligence on the California Verbal Learning Test for Children (CVLT-C), to determine if reading disability was associated with impaired verbal memory. Dyslexics differed significantly from controls on 9 of the 12 CVLT-C…

This report, presented at the symposium "Deaf Readers: Clues to the Role of Sound in Reading," addresses the nature of phonological recoding--use of the inner voice in silent reading--for deaf readers. Studies are reported on the forms in which deaf readers recode the printed text. Findings noted include that deaf readers--specifically, second…

Concepts, propositions, proposition sets, and process patterns are discussed as elements of a model of language-related basic thinking skills. The term "concept" is defined and illustrated, and a model of concept attainment is briefly described. Illustrations are offered for a set of 430 basic concept clusters intended for use as a…

By examining the reasons why lessons cannot be repeated and plans are unavoidably incomplete, we can discover why the technology of control has inherent limitations. Moral arguments against the rigorous application of the technology of control were also examined. (Author/RK)

The following is a response to the article "Grammar Discounted", an article about the views of Seymour Yesner, an English consultant with the Minneapolis public schools. The article appeared in the April, 1975, NJEA Review. (Editor)

Presents evidence that young children's comprehension of the locatives "in", "on", and "under" is, at least in part, contextually determined. Children were given tasks with verbal instructions which were either contextually congruent or incongruent. Results are interpreted in terms of the non-linguistic as well as linguistic strategies apparently…

This study indicated that the school performance and intelligence quotients of associative responders diverge significantly over time from those of nonassociative responders. This divergence becomes greater with age, suggesting that reliance on associative responding in preference to reasoning may cumulatively interfere with intellectual…

Author focuses on the information processing approach to interaction studies and particularly on the process, the events that occur before, during and after a learning task. (Author/HB)

In the first of a series of feature articles, the author suggested some of the problems involved in constructing a "core curriculum" for students of all abilities. (Editor/RK)

Author described his own strategy for helping people learn to compose music, which he called the improvisational approach. (Author/RK)