Comparison of the effects of pretest anxiety on the social and nonsocial problem solving of 45 boys (ages 9 to 11) with learning disabilities (LD) and 45 nondisabled boys found the LD group reported significantly higher pretest anxiety which escalated over the course of the problem-solving session. However, boys with or without LD were equally…

The Diet Cola Test was designed as a process assessment of science aptitude in intermediate grade students. Investigations of the instrument's reliability and validity indicated that data did not support use of the instrument for identifying individual students' aptitude. However, results suggested the test's appropriateness for evaluating…

Describes research concerning achievement differences between sixth grade boys and girls in individualistic and cooperative-learning situations. Reports that cooperative learning produced greater retention and higher level learning. Found no differences in achievement, verbal participation, perceived leadership, and status between the sexes at the…

This practicum was designed to incorporate critical thinking skills instruction and practice into a fourth-grade curriculum to increase fourth-grade students' ability to recognize and apply critical thinking strategies to appropriate situations. This program concentrated on the increasing of six critical thinking skills: classification, sequence…

Children rarely cite more than one strategy when asked to explain how they solved a particular arithmetic problem, hence their verbal explanations will not necessarily reveal whether they have considered multiple strategies on that problem. However, previous work has shown that, when asked to explain their performance on a task, children often use…

This paper describes one aspect of a multi-factor investigation of the parameters which mediate in the effectiveness of an inservice staff development program. The paper also represents an attempt to recognize and to meet the problems associated with the evaluation of inservice programs for teachers in terms of student outcomes. The inservice…

The focus in this report is the concept of what it means to "do mathematics" in the context of a group working committee of teachers and researchers committed to reforming mathematics teaching. During a regular meeting of this group of teachers and researchers, the participants explored the mathematical reasoning embedded in one…

Reports on a study of 34 high-ability fifth-grade students randomly assigned to individual- or cooperative-learning conditions. Finds that achievement was higher on recall and higher order reasoning measures and that the students demonstrated higher academic self-esteem and greater cohesion in the cooperative condition. (CFR)

This study applied brain lateralization research and a model of generative teaching and learning to economic education. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of verbal-only, imagery-only, and integrated (verbal-to-imaginal) strategies on fifth graders' proclivity to use economic reasoning (i.e. cost-benefit analysis) in personal…

Reports on a study of the impact of metacognition among 10 middle school-aged British students with learning difficulties. Finds that student awareness and subsequent control over thought processes were enhanced through self-reporting and self-appraisal. Examines this kind of reflection on enhanced learning capabilities and self-esteem. (CFR)

Children begin school with the ability to use their informal and implicit conceptual knowledge to guide their problem solving, but shift to the use of superficial strategies in their attempts to solve word problems as they progress through school. This paper describes a study designed to investigate the effects of an instructional sequence that…

Recent calls for reform in mathematics education suggest students must learn to recognize mathematical elements in situations, flexibly apply appropriate mathematical tools, and engage in mathematical reasoning. These things suggest teachers must make their students' thinking a prominent part of their classroom instruction; they must make their…

In 1986 the United States (U.S.)-Japan Seminar on Mathematical Problem Solving convened to compare the state of problem solving in the classroom and in research in the two countries. The data and results given in this paper are the results of research conducted in the United States in response to the 1986 seminar. The U.S. and Japanese research…