Executive functions are crucial for complex learning in addition to prior knowledge. In this article, we argue that executive functions can moderate the effectiveness of instructional approaches that vary with respect to the demand on these functions. In addition, we suggest that engagement in complex activity contexts rather than specific…

Different knowledge types have their own specific features and tasks in the learning process. Procedural knowledge is used in craft and technology education when students solve problems individually and share their working knowledge with others. This study presents a detailed analysis of a one student's learning process in technology education and…

We evaluate here the performance of four models of cross-situational word learning: two global models, which extract and retain multiple referential alternatives from each word occurrence; and two local models, which extract just a single referent from each occurrence. One of these local models, dubbed "Pursuit," uses an associative…

The purpose of this work is to assist partners in identifying, naming, and facilitating dynamic relational forces and learning processes that shape the effectiveness of community engagement practice and partnerships. We offer a hypothetical case to assist in framing and discussing concepts of reciprocity and power in partnerships and how these…

Prior work shows that children selectively learn from credible speakers. Yet little is known how they treat information from non-credible speakers. This research examined to what extent and under what conditions children may or may not learn from problematic sources. In three studies, we found that children displayed trust toward previously…

Educators throughout the ages have offered metaphors and analogies for teaching and teachers. Prominent among them are: gardener, midwife, facilitator, guide, sacrament. Each of these metaphors shed light, from a different angle, on the act of teaching. This article proposes the metaphor of tragedy as a way of shedding new light, from a totally…

The aim of the current study is to develop and validate an instrument to measure the four sources of teacher efficacy among Chinese primary school teachers. A 26-item Sources of Teacher Efficacy Questionnaire (STEQ) was proposed with four subscales: mastery experience, vicarious experience, social persuasion, and physiological arousal. The results…

Surviving threats in the environment requires brain circuits for detecting (or anticipating) danger and for coordinating appropriate defensive responses (e.g., increased cardiac output, stress hormone release, and freezing behavior). The bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST) is a critical interface between the "affective…

Distinguishing threatening from nonthreatening stimuli is essential for survival and stimulus generalization is a hallmark of anxiety disorders. While auditory threat learning produces long-lasting plasticity in primary auditory cortex (Au1), it is not clear whether such Au1 plasticity regulates memory specificity or generalization. We used…

Animal studies suggest that time delay between acquisition and retrieval of contextual anxiety increases generalization. Moreover, such generalization is prevented by preexposure to the context (CTX), presumably due to an improved representation of such context. We investigated whether preexposure and time-passing modulate generalization of…

Recent research has called for the use of fine-grained measures that distinguish implicit knowledge from automatized explicit knowledge. In the current study, such measures were used to determine how the two systems interact in a naturalistic second language (L2) acquisition context. One hundred advanced L2 speakers of Japanese living in Japan…

We offer a new approach to emergent knowledge in processes of conceptual change in dyadic interaction by drawing on Pickering's ("The Mangle of Practice," The University of Chicago Press, London, 1995) Mangle of Practice theory, which theorizes the emergence of new scientific knowledge as occurring due to material resistance and human…

The purpose of this article is to discuss the relationship between learning, epistemology, and intersubjectivity in the context of problem-based learning and project-oriented work at a university level. It aims to show how the collaboration of students in a group over a long period of time can put emphasis on the knowledge-practice discussion, and…

Research in learning progressions (LPs) has been essential towards building understanding of how students' ideas change over time. There has been little work, however, into how ideas between separate but related constructs within a multi-faceted LP relate. The purpose of this paper is to elaborate on the idea of "progression webs" to…

After reviewing the studies and literature that dealt with information management, it was apparent that many students failed to manage and process information during their learning process. This is not due to a decline in the degree of intelligence or lack of tendency to study, but due to the lack of learning processes that include planning,…