A new approach to the development of the item characteristic curve (ICC), which expresses the functional relationship between the level of performance on a given task and an independent variable that is relevant to the task, is presented. The approach focuses on knowledge states, decision processes, and other circumstances underlying responses to…

Interest is examined in relation to its role in the learning process. A broadly based model of learning is presented, and implications of the model for the educational context are considered. In the framework presented, learning involves the perception, interpretation, and storage of information about the environment under particular motivational…

Various researchers have associated meaningful problem solving with methods guided directly by a conceptual knowledge base. By contast, a meaningless solving course, or sequence of operations, is essentially independent of the solver's conceptual understanding of the problem under consideration. This paper is the first to document a meaningless,…

The diffusion and adoption of new knowledge is an important outcome of education. This study used the results of two annual cross sectional surveys in a largely rural state, Nebraska, one of school administrators and one of students. The purpose of the survey was to identify how widespread Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV)/Acquired Immune…

The constant comparative method of B. G. Glaser and A. L. Strauss (1967) of qualitative data analysis is illustrated using data from a study that investigated the knowledge and beliefs of four preservice secondary school mathematics teachers. Data sources included interviews, observations, a written instrument, and artifacts. Data analysis…

Given the current and widespread practical interest in mathematical understanding, particularly with respect to higher order thinking skills, curriculum reform advocates in many countries cite the need for teaching mathematics with understanding. However, the characterization of understanding in ways that highlight its growth, as well as the…

In a nontraditional engineering course students participated in internships in which they worked in teams for local industry or government clients to develop an engineering solution to an open-ended problem. This paper focuses on one of the teams as it solved the problem and explores the organization of the team's work within the constraints of…

Whether boys and girls perform differently on mathematics estimation items with a picture format (applied context [AC] items) compared with items with a numbers-only (NC) format was studied when effects of computational skill, conceptual knowledge, and quantitative ability were controlled. Subjects were approximately 80,000 students from grades 4…

The 206 mathematics achievement tests cited in this bibliography are used to assess students' knowledge of various mathematical skills and operations. Many of the tests described are included because one or more of their subtests measure some aspect of mathematical knowledge. Although grades 1 through 12 are represented, the tests are primarily…

This study examined the effects of race/ethnicity and degree of acculturation on knowledge and attitudes about human immunodeficiency virus/Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS). Subjects were 274 college students from 5 racial/ethnic groups (Whites, Blacks, Hispanics, Asian Americans, U.S. born, having an Asian origin with families that…

The purpose of this paper is to test three hypotheses about background knowledge that arise from the literature of cognitive psychology. The data base consists of the matrices of correlation coefficients that have been accumulated as part of an ongoing meta-analysis of factors influencing attitude and achievement in science. A search of the…

A new form of knowledge proposed for a teacher education curriculum is dialogical and grounded in an educational researcher's experience of existing as a living contradiction within the politics of truth of a university. It includes a systematic form of action-reflection cycle and depends for its generalizability on teacher researchers producing…

A descriptive study was conducted in three junior high schools in Calgary (Alberta) to examine: (1) student attitudes toward computers, (2) student preferences for different kinds of software, and (3) student knowledge of computers and computer applications. Subjects (n=157) completed a survey designed to evaluate their attitudes and knowledge…

A study examined teachers' familiarity with selected multi-ethnic literature and their use of it in literature-based classrooms. A questionnaire surveyed 50 elementary teachers of whom 30 were from a K-5 inner city elementary school with a literature-based reading program, and 20 were classroom teachers completing requirements for a graduate…

This case study presents a first-hand account of learning to teach, occasioned by an educational researcher's consultation visit to Thailand. The visit entailed the teaching skills of lecturing, and conducting workshops and consultation meetings. The difficulties of this task were exacerbated by the consultant's lack of prior formal teaching…