Critiques traditional philosophical approaches to cognition and reality and compares them with contemporary notions derived from them. A position based on work of Crozier, Cazeneuve, and MacLuhan is argued for the key place of culture in explicating the universe of signs and in content and methodology of second language instruction. (AMH)

Results indicate that while amount of newspaper reading does not covary with knowledge of city affairs, the reasons why people read newspapers matter. If people read to learn about municipal politics, they tend to be taught. If they read for fun, they learn little. Media effects depend on motives of media users. (PD)

Tests the applicability of Ausubel's theory to the meaningful learning of intellectual skills. Results of three studies of high school students indicate that advance organizers enhance learning of skills related to solubility product problems. This effect was removed if prior teaching in relevant background knowledge was included. (Author/WB)

Provides a core reference library of 100 basic titles (139 books) which have proved useful to instructional developers and client teacher-designers at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. The focus is on instructional design and development, but entries on research and on computer applications in instructional contexts are also…

Selected language acquisition research findings are examined in the light of the language teacher's daily needs. Research results are reported that provide an empirical basis for selecting and grading materials, determining skills to be taught and their order of presentation, deciding on classroom presentation and procedures, and formulating…

Hypothesized that college students' learning from a videotaped lecture will be enhanced by the instructors' nonverbal expressiveness. Results support a positive effect for affective learning and suggest that nonverbal expressiveness directly influences attitudes toward the lecturer and the videotaped message. (PD)

Presented is an experiment investigating children's awareness of regularities in physical phenomena and their capacity for expressing these regularities. Hypothesized and confirmed is that children can use statements with the form and purpose of a physical law. Cartoons related to Archimedes' principle (and connected gravitation and fluid…

In conjunction with oral instruction in social studies, students were assigned to one of five organizer treatment conditions. Treatment conditions consisted of an advance or a post organizer presented visually or orally. Results indicated that nonwritten cognitive organizers facilitated both the learning and the retention of oral instruction.…

A sequential-developmental approach to the assessment of individuals from the earliest sensorimotor period through the level of abstract reasoning is discussed. The assessment is hierarchically sequenced and is concerned with how and why individuals process information. The assessment procedures provide practical data on levels of development. (JN)

Describes a model which recognizes active and passive roles of teachers and learners as a means of identifying five basic methods of teaching. (CHC)

Described is a Piagetian learning cycle based on Monte Carlo modeling of several simple reaction mechanisms. Included are descriptions of learning cycle phases (exploration, invention, and discovery) and four BASIC-PLUS computer programs to be used in the explanation of chemical reacting systems. (Author/DS)

A study conducted with 20 good and 20 poor first-grade readers suggested that the ability to induce grapheme-phoneme relationships was much more strongly related to reading ability than was receptive vocabulary. Good readers appeared to apply a principled solution to a word-learning task, while poor readers used an associative solution. (Author/GT)

Fifteen-year-old John Scott created a 35-page science fiction comic. The authors describe his effort to demonstrate that art teachers should not denigrate such work simply because it derives from popular culture, for it is a valid form of creative expression and one which teaches important artistic processes. (SJL)

A model of learning from instruction proposed that students perceive and cognitively respond to instructional stimuli before engaging learning processes per se. University students were trained to recognize only or to recognize and cognitively respond to teacher skills in lectures. Additional prelecture practice in recognition enhanced learning.…

The author, an architect, discusses how architecture can provide sources of content for the curriculum in general and the art program in particular. She views architecture as a way of organizing the built environment, important to understanding history, social sciences, and mathematics as well as art. (KC)