Previous investigations on Piagetian cognitive levels among college students both within and across academic disciplines have not addressed the issue of possible differences in cognitive levels between traditional undergraduates and older returning students. Piagetian cognitive levels were studied among traditional- and nontraditional-age college…

The Information Acquisition Preference Inventory was used to examine cognitive styles in relationship to students' use of study tasks and to assess subjects' preferred ways of learning and problem solving. The inventory, which has students rank words describing their own learning behavior, identifies four distinctive learning preference modes:…

The need for cognitive style mapping and student grouping in order to enhance learning and retention in foreign language instruction is examined. The four components of classical audio-lingual language instruction, listening, speaking, reading, and writing, are discussed. Different learning modalities are considered, including visual, auditory,…

Bloom's Taxonomy is reviewed and analyzed in this report; the summative finding being that few educational innovations have had equal impact upon the profession. The taxonomy is first defined with particular attention being paid to "Handbook 1: Cognitive Domain." Various universities' and colleges' use of the taxonomy is described.…

The construct of involvement, used by marketers and consumer behaviorists for many years as a predictive measure of the qualitative relationship between an individual and a stimulus, has long been defined as having affective or cognitive roots. However, definitions that favor one or the other too heavily are less helpful because they are too…

This study used the Learning Style Inventory by Dunn, Dunn, and Price to identify learning style variables among school students in isolated Northeastern Manitoba communities. The importance of these learning styles to educational practice is discussed. The study sample consisted of Cree-speaking students enrolled in grades 4 through 10 at 3…

In order to make intelligent decisions concerning the implementation of reflectively based teacher education programs, educators need to develop a richer, more precise empirical knowledge of the cognitive abilities and orientations of prospective social studies teachers. Research suggesting inferior intellectual capabilities of the faculty and…

This paper summarizes two related sets of data. First, the findings of an inquiry titled, "The Appropriateness of Forced Choice True/False Response Formats for Selected Learning Style Inventories" is reported. This inquiry compared data from two forms of the Dunn/Price Learning Style Inventory. The first form was the real Dunn/Price…

This paper discusses cognitive and noncognitive variables, and their relationship with each other, in learning and in educational evaluation. The nature of noncognitive learning environment variables is examined. The following instruments that have been widely used in assessing classroom environment are described: (1) the Learning Environment…

This study encompassed the collection of teacher reported (N=326) testing practices and the direct assessment of teacher-made tests (N=175) for item cognitive functioning levels and construction errors. Focus was on assessing the nature and quality of teacher-made tests used in public school classrooms and describing the classroom teachers'…

In this study 6,942 items from two standardized achievement test batteries--the Stanford (Early School Achievement Battery, Achievement Battery, and Test of Academic Skills) and the Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills--were analyzed. Focus was on determining: (1) the extent to which these test batteries included general cognitive operations (GCOs)…

Previous research by Maratsos found that 3-year-olds were more accurate than four and 5-year-olds in selecting 'big' rectangles or animals when choosing between pairs of stimuli. A study then investigated the nature of the previous experiments themselves, particularly the procedures the researcher followed and the possible inferences which he drew…

The study compares the achievement of Jewish and Arab students in the high school biology matriculation examinations in Israel with special reference to differences between boys and girls. While Jewish and Arab students follow the same syllabus and take identical matriculation examinations, significant differences exist in learning and achievement…

The following discussions and workshops were presented at a conference on assessing higher order thinking skills organized by the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory: (1) "Assessing Higher Order Thinking Skills--Issues and Practices" by S. Rankin; (2) "Writing Multiple-Choice Critical Thinking Items (part 1)" by S. P.…