This study investigated 137 Venezuelan college freshmen's performance on the Torrance Test of Creative Thinking as a function of field dependence or independence as well as "field mobility." Findings indicated that the most mobile students performed best on creativity tests whereas "fixed" students performed better on tests of…

As part of a study of ecology, students in a second and third grade classroom developed board games. The research, creation, rule making, naming, and testing of several games are described. The games' levels of abstraction, presentation of factual information, content, and potential for sustained interest are considered. (LB)

Assesses the ability of tenth grade students (n=364) to acquire meanings of graphs that are frequently used in their biology textbooks. Indicates that the main source of failure to process information equally well from tables and graphs was not a lack of basic analytical skills but rather a lack of understanding of the relationship between…

Explores the type of school construction suitable for instruction that includes lectures, experiment, and creation. The philosophical bases of a triadic approach to learning that appeals to feeling, rationality, and imagination are considered. Four detailed diagrams portraying the author's concepts are included. (Contains four references.) (KRN)

The relationship between argumentation and informal reasoning is discussed, followed by a consideration of instructional factors that influence argumentation performance. An account of one expert student reasoner is provided. Instruction in argumentation is reviewed, and suggestions are made for argumentation based on classroom experience. (SLD)

Examined prosocial moral reasoning in children during an 11-year period. Found that (1) hedonistically oriented reasoning declined until adolescence; (2) reasoning based on others' needs increased until early adolescence and then declined; and (3) girls' overall reasoning was higher than boys'. Found some association of prosocial reasoning with…

This study examined the problem-solving protocols of 21 students in a grade 11 enriched physics course as well as 3 adult "experts" in physics. Experts and high performing students made more correct metastatements and more references to prior knowledge than did average performing students. (DB)

This article addresses the close relationship between reasoning skills and literacy, especially in the context of the education of students with deafness. The importance of providing deaf learners with cognitive strategy instruction applied to various aspects of literacy is stressed. (DB)

Discusses geometrical reasoning in the framework of the theory of Figural Concepts to highlight the interaction between the figural and conceptual components of geometrical concepts. Examples of students' difficulties and errors in geometrical reasoning are interpreted according to the internal tension that appears in figural concepts resulting…

This paper reviews special considerations in teaching higher order thinking skills to students with mild disabilities, focusing on curriculum implications; principles of instruction (prior knowledge, connections between new and existing knowledge, self-regulated learning, and impact of social setting); the use of an anchored instructional…

Evaluation of the relationship between metacognition and analogical reasoning in 80 children (mildly retarded, learning disabled, normal achieving, and gifted) suggests that retarded children's performance reflected a central processing deficiency across processes, learning-disabled children's performance reflected specific processing…

Six fifth-grade children participated in a four-day teaching experiment on complex additively structured problems to investigate difficulties in concurrently holding in mind situations in which items play multiple roles. Difficulties included distinguishing take-away difference from comparison difference and indirect evaluation of an additive…

Twenty-nine children with learning disabilities (LD) in grades 2 and 4 through 7 were compared with children without LD for their development of proportional structures of thought. Significantly fewer children with LD had constructed second-order logical structures necessary to act on problems using multiplicative and preproportional reasoning.…

Despite its apparent simplicity, random assignment is an abstract concept for many students. This article describes a classroom demonstration that uses a standard deck of playing cards. In small groups, students randomly assign playing cards (i.e., participants) to 2 treatment groups. Following randomization, students compare the relative…

Eight teachers were interviewed concerning how students verify conjectures. The study is a sequel to a previous study, "How Students Verify Conjectures" [Bergqvist, T. (2000). "How students verify conjectures." "Research reports in Mathematics Education" 3]. Teachers' expectations of students' reasoning and performance are examined, and also how…