This study begins the task of mapping out two approaches that may be helpful in overcoming incorrect responses to conservation tasks, focusing on the non-conserved quantity. The incorrect responses, which were the result of over-generalizations of conservation, and gradually increased with age despite formal knowledge and minor perceptual input,…

This study presents our attempt to elicit students' progression in understanding the matter concept. Past work has identified the big ideas about matter students need to understand, the many everyday understandings students hold about these ideas, and levels of understanding through which students progress in developing understanding of the big…

The relative effectiveness of four different training conditions on the attainment of conservation of quantity was examined in a 5-Group design. Subjects were 75 nonconserving preschoolers, ranging in age from 3.10 to 5.0 years. Treatment consisted of five conditions: (1) pretense play training, (2) direct conservation training, (3) a combination…

In a study to determine procedural effects of volume conservation tasks performed by adolescent females, the results revealed that the LaVatelli water displacement test was significantly more difficult than the Elkind test or Piaget's test. (Author/RL)

This study compared the effects of a formal, an open-framework, and a control preschool program on children's intellectual development. The formal program, based on Ausubel's and Piaget's theories, had a daily schedule of short prescriptive teaching sessions followed by related learning activities. The informal program, based on Piaget's theory,…

The comparative school readiness and cognitive ability of kindergarten children from lower-income schools (N=47) and from higher-income schools (N=71) were assessed using the Preschool Inventory and a battery of eight Piagetian tasks. The overall purpose of the study was to ascertain characteristics of the children's cognitive development as a…

Analyzes cognitive developmental changes in the use of a convention for measurement among New Guinea's Oksapmin people. A total of 103 individuals (including unschooled children, unschooled adults, second-grade children, and sixth-grade adolescents) were administered three types of tasks assessing ability to compare lengths. (Author/RH)

Indicated that early readers are more likely to be advanced in cognitive development than are nonearly-reading peers. After one year of formal reading instruction, early readers maintained their advantage in reading achievement. Measures of concrete operations were found to predict reading achievement for early and nonearly readers. (Author/DB)

Examined empathy and conservation abilities of nonretarded children with autism and compared their performance to that of normally developing children. Autistic children performed surprising well, but not as well as normal children. There was a closer association between cognitive abilities and affective understanding among the autistic children…

Nonretarded (NR) and educable mentally retarded (EMR) 6- to 19-year-old children in Istanbul, Turkey, completed conservation tasks. Found a similarity in the developmental progression of conservation concepts between the two groups and between these groups and groups of NR and EMR children in England as reported in previous studies. (BC)

Examined were effects of advance organizer (AO) instruction on acquisition of conservation concepts in 3- and 4-year-olds. Participants were 28 children who were equally divided into experimental and control groups, pretested, and found to be nonconservers. A sequence of two AO lessons and related learning activities was presented to the…

The effects of advance organizer instruction on the acquisition of number, mass, area, quantity, and length conservation concepts in 3- and 4-year-old children are examined. Participating in the experiment were 28 children, a total of 14 in respective experimental and control groups. All children were pretested and determined to be nonconservers.…

This paper is a progress report on a series of experiments which have sought to probe the cognitive development of mildly mentally retarded and normal children, using conservation training as the principal research tool. Three- and 4-year-old children were given Verbal Rule instruction in a 2 x 2 x 2 design intended to probe the importance of…

Investigates the extent of similarity in the sequence of development of concepts in children with Down's Syndrome, children with other forms of retardation, and nonretarded children. (Author/BB)