Math anxiety has serious consequences for those who experience it in daily life, at school, or at work. A cognitive process approach makes knowledge work for the learner, joins skill and content, links motivation to cognition, and uses social communities. (JOW)

Small group cooperative learning can be applied with all age levels of mathematics students. A community of learners actively working together enhances each person's mathematical knowledge, proficiency, and enjoyment. Classroom procedures for cooperative mathematics lessons are outlined. (JD)

Reviews four approaches to cooperative learning: the structural, the explicit teaching, the discovery, and the contextual. Each approach contributes to the development of cooperative skills. Ending lessons with reflection on both academic content and group process may be most useful in ensuring a balance between content and process. (JD)

Investigates the effect of cooperative completion of a cloze passage with subjects who are relatively sophisticated in both language use and group interaction strategies. Finds that groups produced more responses than individuals; gave fewer idiosyncratic or illogical responses; attended to larger chunks of text; and used every available clue. (RS)

Presents resources available from the Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC) designed to help teachers implement strategies to reduce prejudice. Includes resources on using cooperative learning in prejudice reduction and resources for combating prejudice in the social studies classroom. Discusses four types of strategies for decreasing…

Challenges inhibiting forms of individualistic competition and presents use of cooperative learning as an effective method for conflict resolution and interpersonal skill building. Sees cooperative approach for classroom use as both developmental and ongoing. (Author/NB)

Three instructional settings for interactive laserdisc are (1) individual, allowing self-pacing and flexible scheduling; (2) group, allowing interaction, simpler scheduling, and cost effectiveness; and (3) cooperative learning, which builds rapport, halves costs of individual training, and enables learning through discussion. (SK)

Cooperative learning is a set of instructional strategies in which students are grouped in teams working together toward a common goal. Cooperative learning provides for student interaction in a way that dramatically increases discussion and critical thinking without sacrificing achievement. (JOW)

Cooperative learning can benefit all students, whether "average," low-achieving, gifted, or mainstreamed. Teachers trained at the University of Minnesota's Cooperative Learning Center expect to see students in small, heterogeneous groups using special skills and caring about each others' learning. Tips on cooperative spelling groups are…

Outlines the Cooperative Integrated Reading and Composition (CIRC) program, a sequenced and structured reading/language arts program used by elementary level students at Bracher School in Santa Clara, California. Describes several cooperative reading and writing activities used in this program. (MM)

Reports on the results of survey research designed to determine how students feel about peer assistance and group writing. Finds that results were generally favorable, although more problems surfaced regarding collaborative projects than peer criticism. States that statistical analysis of objective and open-ended items yielded suggestions for…

Reports on a study designed to determine whether academic achievement of students taught in the cooperative group mastery mode would be different from the achievement of students who learn in an individualized method and to determine whether gains or losses would be seen in nonacademic outcomes such as social relations, self-esteem, and classroom…

Explores changes in students' conceptions about solution chemistry in the context of instruction based on collaboration between a researcher and an experienced teacher attempting to implement strategies from the literature on conceptual change. (ZWH)

Compares four small-group literacy-learning approaches (cooperative, collaborative, participatory, and workplace team) in terms of assumptions, relationship to literacy, learning activities, and teacher role. Concludes that they are validated more in theory than in practice; more attention to gender, class, and culture is also needed. (SK)

Explains how the theater arts require a blend of contemplation and creativity that embodies the heart of real education. Demonstrates that for an actor and a director to produce a scene they must read and understand the lines, research the context, and define the character emotionally, intellectually, and physically. (TB)