This study investigated student learning outcomes using a case-based approach focused on cellular respiration. Students who used the case study, relative to students who did not use the case study, exhibited a significantly greater learning gain, and demonstrated use of higher-order thinking skills. Preliminary data indicate that after engaging…

In its policy rationale for evidence-based practice in psychology (EBPP), the APA Presidential Task Force on Evidence-Based Practice (see record 2006-05893-001) claims to have constituted itself with "scientists and practitioners from a wide range of perspectives and traditions, reflecting the diverse perspectives within the field" (p. 273). We…

The purpose of the study was to explore students' alternative conceptions and their associative thinking regarding internal transport in plants through administration of a refined diagnostic test. Questions of associative thinking and explanation were added to form a third tier of the previous two-tier test. The study found three terms related to…

After decades of research into formal or logical fallacies of reasoning, psychologists have only recently begun to examine the informal reasoning fallacies that are routinely present in critical discussions, debates, and other forms of argumentation. The present study considers several possible influences on an ability to identify and analyze…

The competition among relations in nominals (CARIN) theory of conceptual combination (C. L. Gagne & E. J. Shoben, 1997) proposes that people interpret nominal compounds by selecting a relation from a pool of competing alternatives and that relation availability is influenced by the frequency with which relations have been previously associated…

This critical review presents studies of Mexican American fathers in the United Sates to provide researchers with an understanding of contemporary fatherhood. It describes the myths that cause methodological and conceptual problems in interpreting the results of studies on Mexican American fathers. Several common challenges and limitations in…

This essay describes how in the 1890s the Committee of Ten arrived at their recommendations about the organization of the high school biological sciences and seeks to correct the frequently held, but erroneous view that the Committee of Ten was the initiator of the Biology-Chemistry-Physics order of teaching sciences prevalent in high schools…

This paper reports the development of innovative assessment sessions within two core technical courses in Civil Engineering at the University of Queensland. Peer Assessment Learning Sessions (PALS) facilitate a student's peer assessment of a colleague's problem-based learning assignment or tutorial within a "traditional" whole-class…

In this article, the author argues that the Rhoda Bernard (2005) paper "Making Music, Making Selves" is seriously flawed in research design, literature review and, more importantly, in its conclusions. Bernard's hammering of the idea of self as having multiple identities is well taken, but today it is more than accepted as a given. The problem is…

In recent years, there has been a considerable development of administrative skills in study-abroad management, but much less in the educational dimension of this endeavour. The field is burdened by myths and conceptions that exist unchallenged in the uncontested climate of study abroad. An exploration of three of these prevailing myths…

This study was conducted to determine 4th, 5th, and 6th grade Turkish primary students' conceptions about the particulate nature of matter via a test. The test consists of 36 items related to the changes of microscopic properties of solid, liquid and gas matters during phase changing, cooling, heating and pressing of them. The sample of the study…

This article presents the authors' response to McVee, Dunsmore, and Gavelek's "Schema Theory Revisited." In "Schema Theory Revisited," McVee, Dunsmore, and Gavelek (2005) proposed a rearticulation of schema theory intended to encompass the ideas that schemata and other cognitive processes are embodied, that knowledge is situated in the transaction…

The purpose of this study was to examine critically how family literacy is promoted and represented through the images and written texts on Web sites developed by providers of family literacy programs. Naturalistic research over the last 20 years or so demonstrates that the family is a rich site for supporting children's literacy development…

In this article, the author shares his experience growing up speaking African American Vernacular English in school and his observations about nonstandard American plantation English. The author's amateur linguistic observations about nonstandard American plantation English gave rise to immediate dialect comparisons between African American…

Leslie David Burns calls teachers to the political forefront, believing that we need to educate our communities about our work by dispelling inaccurate public assumptions about literacy, "best" teaching practices, and accountability standards. He provides teachers with a list of practical steps for "intentional political action" at the grassroots…