How We Learn: Research, News & Perspectives

SURVEY: New Survey Shows Evolving Demographics of Entertainment Software Users

2008-07-25T11:32:00.000-07:00

Forty percent of gamers are women according to a new survey released today by the video game industry's trade group, the Entertainment Software Association (ESA). Additional findings in the ESA's annual survey of consumer demographics and usage behaviors indicate that the average age of game players has risen to 35. more»

REPORTS: From the Pew Economic Mobility Project

2007-11-13T23:35:00.000-08:00

Here are a set of new reports focused on the details of economic mobility. "Contrary to American beliefs about equality of opportunity, a child’s economic position is heavily influenced by that of his or her parents. Forty-two percent of children born to parents in the bottom fifth of the income distribution remain in the bottom, while 39% born to parents in the top fifth remain at the top,” Julia Issacs , a Brookings Institution fellow, writes in Pew’s latest analysis.more»

Americans have historically shown a unique tolerance to accept high levels of inequality. This springs from an embedded national belief in mobility: a conviction that hard work and honest labor deserve just reward, and a confidence that our society is and should be constructed to provide equality of opportunity, not to guarantee equality of outcomes. But if the ladder of opportunity truly is — or is perceived to be — inaccessible to a great number of Americans, this value system is at risk of crumbling. A discussion that identifies and quantifies the drivers of and obstacles to economic mobility should be a top priority for those interested in preserving and protecting the spirit and reality of the American Dream.

ARTICLE: Building a Nation of Polyglots, Starting With the Very Young

2007-11-13T21:55:00.000-08:00

What would happen if we added being fluent in multiple languages to the national learning standards and accountability structures? Many recent immigrants to the U.S. would actually be advantaged -- and rightfully so. It sure would make sense given an increasingly interconnected world. more»

ARTICLE: Secretary Spellings's Remarks at UNESCO General Conference Plenary Debate in Paris, France

2007-10-19T21:53:00.000-07:00

Universal primary education by 2015 is a UN Millennium Development Goal. In this article Secretary Spelling argues for constructing systems built on the principles of measurement and accountability. I sure hope that there will be considerable attention being given to providing instructional resources, tending to local educational needs and processes, and utilizing models of diagnostic, low-stakes assessment -- rather than simply layering on high-stakes testing and educator accountability. more»

"Around the globe, we have done a good job of educating children of privilege. Now we must begin the harder work of equipping poor and vulnerable children with the skills they need to succeed. As you know, worldwide, approximately 77 million children do not attend school. More than 771 million adults cannot read. Two-thirds of these adults are women, and 85 percent live in just 35 countries."

ARTICLE: Experimental School Gets Rid of Classes, Teachers

2007-10-19T21:34:00.000-07:00

Imagine a school where students select their own learning projects rather than having scheduled classes, where adults serve as guides and critics rather than teachers, where technology is employed as a learning infrastructure, where loners feel comfortable and collaboration is promoted, and where test performances are perfectly fine... more»

PRESS RELEASE: Universities get $7 million for history-education clearinghouse

2007-10-19T20:38:00.000-07:00

Stanford University's School of Education and George Mason University have been awarded $7 million by the U.S. Department of Education to establish a virtual "Federal Clearinghouse for History Education" to help teachers become more effective educators and teach K-12 students why history is relevant to their daily lives... more»

ONLINE DEBATE: The Economist Oxford-Style Debate on Effectiveness of Technology in Education

2007-10-19T20:32:00.000-07:00

Proposition: The continuing introduction of new technologies and new media adds little to the quality of most education. debate»

Over the last several decades, large investments have been made to equip primary and secondary schools with computers and teacher training. Now it is time to examine whether there has been a sufficient return on this investment. Does technology really offer substantive advantages to students? Does technology accelerate or impede real progress in education? Similarly, does technology serve as a teaching crutch or does it offer the ability to promote sustainable change in the world?s classrooms? And if so, is the technology deployed today being used to best possible advantage? What conditions need to exist in schools for technology to have an impact?

IMAGE OF SCIENCE: Astrophysicist Replaces Supercomputer with Eight PlayStation 3s

2007-10-18T09:49:00.000-07:00

Here in the US, we have collectively decided long ago to present the disciplinary work of science as a universalistic methodological apparatus -- packaged in such images as the scientific method, fair tests, experiments. Given that there is no disciplinary unity in method, the gap between the contemporary practice of science and science education continues to expand. This is especially true as we ratchet down to increasingly narrow educational outcomes -- still hopelessly focused on content. Here's a nice image of what the 'practical work' of contemporary science looks like -- it is one of persistent tinkering, customization, finagling of resources, and innovation... more»

VIDEO: A vision of students today [about the world and education]

2007-10-18T09:34:00.000-07:00

Here's a short video made by some college students summarizing how they learn, what they need to learn, their goals, hopes, dreams & what kinds of changes they will experience in their lifetime... more»

RESOURCE: Educator orientation island unveiled in Second Life

2007-10-18T00:11:00.000-07:00

A new destination in Second Life designed to help quickly orient teachers to the immersive enterprise... more» more» more»

BOOK: The Gestural Origin of Language

2007-10-17T23:38:00.000-07:00

The authors of this volume demonstrate that modern language is derived from practical actions and gestures that were increasingly recognized as having the potential to represent, and hence to communicate. In other words, the fundamental ability that allows us to use language is our ability to use pictures or icons, rather than linguistic symbols... more»

STUDY: Young toddlers think in terms of the whole object, not just parts

2007-10-17T22:29:00.000-07:00

"This new research shows that as young toddlers learn language, they are more likely to focus on objects rather than parts..." more»

HANDBOOK: The New Handbook of Science and Technology Studies

2007-10-16T17:50:00.000-07:00

Science and Technology Studies is a flourishing interdisciplinary field that examines the creation, development, and consequences of science and technology in their cultural, historical, and social contexts. The Handbook of Science and Technology Studies provides a comprehensive and authoritative overview of the field, reviewing current research and major theoretical and methodological approaches and analyzing emergent issues in a form that is accessible to new and established scholars from a range of disciplines. more» more» table of contents»

ARTICLE: Failing Schools Strain to Meet U.S. Standard

2007-10-16T09:30:00.000-07:00

"More than 1,000 of California’s 9,500 schools are branded chronic failures, and the numbers are growing. Barring revisions in the law, state officials predict that all 6,063 public schools serving poor students will be declared in need of restructuring by 2014, when the law requires universal proficiency in math and reading.

“What are we supposed to do?” Ms. Paramo asked. “Shut down every school?” more»

REPORT: National Action Plan for STEM Education

2007-10-15T22:55:00.000-07:00

The United States possesses the most innovative, technologically capable economy in the world, and yet its science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education system is failing to ensure that all American students receive the skills and knowledge required for success in the 21st century workforce... more»

ARTICLE: Snooze or Lose

2007-10-15T22:51:00.000-07:00

Overstimulated, overscheduled kids are getting at least an hour’s less sleep than they need, a deficiency that, new research reveals, has the power to set their cognitive abilities back years... more»

QUOTE: Goethe on How We See and Learn to See

2007-10-12T12:16:00.000-07:00

"We don’t know what we see; we see what we know."
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

STUDY: Ten Myths of Scientific Collaboration

2007-10-11T12:33:00.000-07:00

From this book, here are 10 myths of scientific collaboration...

Big Myths...

ICTs improve collaboration
Larger collaborations are more rigid & hierarchical (No -- on matters pertaining to the generation of scientific research, they are not. Size is less significant than we suspected.)
Outcomes of a collaboration determine success.
Collaborations are based on Trust. (Trust has no influence on outcomes.)

Other Myths...

Co-authorship tells us important things about collaboration
We can learn from high energy physics. (Not typical - Physics is only typical of high-energy physics. Not a model.)
Collaboration is a necessity
Collaborations are formed by people who know each other.
Collaborations benefit everyone (e.g., Matthew effect).
Benefits of collaboration are greater than the costs. (Believe it -- but it isn’t true.)

BOOK: Structures of Scientific Collaboration

2007-10-11T10:59:00.000-07:00

"Collaboration among organizations is rapidly becoming common in scientific research as globalization and new communication technologies make it possible for researchers from different locations and institutions to work together on common projects. These scientific and technological collaborations are part of a general trend toward more fluid, flexible, and temporary organizational arrangements, but they have received very limited scholarly attention..." more»

The authors find that collaborative research depends on both technology and bureaucracy; scientists claim to abhor bureaucracy, but most collaborations use it constructively to achieve their goals. The book analyzes the structural elements of collaboration (among them formation, size and duration, organization, technological practices, and participant experiences) and the relationships among them. The authors find that trust, though viewed as positive, is not necessarily associated with successful projects; indeed, the formal structures of bureaucracy reduce the need for high levels of trust--and make possible the independence so valued by participating scientists.

SPECIAL ISSUE: Social Cognition in SCIENCE

2007-10-04T22:49:00.000-07:00

Social cognition is a very active field these days. SCIENCE magazine recently did a series of articles on recent developments... more»

OPINION: Cave Man Didn’t Have Classrooms

2007-10-02T20:54:00.000-07:00

In the beginning, there was action -- and learning was accomplished through sustained apprenticeships and deliberative practice. And now, of course, there is still action -- but we put a lot of energy into thinking it isn't the central thing... more»

The cave man’s mind was never prepared for, or concerned with, knowing. There was no test. There were no game shows. There was no Nobel Prize. There was action. The winner was the person who brought down the elk or buffalo. He didn’t have to know how to do it, at least not consciously. He had to be able to do it. What knowledge he had was unconscious. He may not have been able to say what he knew that helped him throw a rock straight. He could just do it. He practiced a lot.

RESOURCE: NCTM Illuminations - Standards-based resources that improve the teaching and learning of math

2007-10-02T20:43:00.000-07:00

From the national organization that oversees math ed...here are activities, lessons, clarifications about standards, and links to resources involved in the teaching and learning of math... more»

ARTICLE: 2007 Visualization Challenge Winners

2007-10-02T20:35:00.000-07:00

Scientific visualization is a powerful representational practice that can clarify complex concepts, reveal patterns in data, or provoke a deep aesthetic reaction. SCIENCE magazine held a contest to identify the best visualizations in science for 2007... more»

ARTICLE: What's Next: The Top Topics in Teaching and Learning This Year

2007-09-29T23:09:00.000-07:00

From Edutopia, here are predictions about the trends in education for the upcoming year... more»

TALK: Pushing Past the Achievement Gap (video)

2007-09-29T21:56:00.000-07:00

Gloria Ladson-Billings presents a broad conceptual framing / reaction to the achievement gap... more»

REPORT COMING: National Science Board to Release National Action Plan for 21st Century STEM Education

2007-09-29T21:51:00.000-07:00

The National Science Board (Board) is scheduled to unveil a national action plan for 21st Century STEM education on Wednesday, Oct. 3, in a briefing at the U.S. Capitol... more»

Back from summer vacation...

2007-09-27T09:21:00.000-07:00

I went to a much lower level of posting over the summer given a range of research, professional, and personal goals. The academic year just started yesterday. I'll be back to more regular posting to the blog.

LEGISTLATIVE NEWS: The House and Senate passed the America Competes Act; President Signs It Into Law

2007-08-10T01:55:00.000-07:00

As of the August congressional recess, Congress is poised to add billions of dollars to proposed budgets for the federal investment in research and development (R&D) for fiscal year (FY) 2008... more» more» more»

REPORT: A National Action Plan for Addressing the Critical Needs of the U.S. Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics Education System

2007-08-10T01:44:00.000-07:00

The National Science Board proposed on Wednesday a "national action plan" intended to spur major improvements in the teaching of science and mathematics at all educational levels but especially elementary and secondary schools... report» article»

ARTICLE: The Scientific Research Potential of Virtual Worlds

2007-08-10T01:34:00.000-07:00

Online virtual worlds have great potential as sites for research in the social, behavioral, and economic sciences, as well as in human-centered computer science... more»

ARTICLE: 10 Practical Uses For Psychological Research in Everyday Life

2007-08-07T22:29:00.000-07:00

Here's a top 10 list of what you can learn practically from psychological research... more»

BOOK SERIES: Acting with Technology

2007-08-07T22:14:00.000-07:00

Books published in this new series are concerned with the study of meaningful human activity as it is mediated by tools and technologies. The series will explore developments in postcognitivist theory and practice concerning technology from the fields of sociology, communication, education, and organizational studies, as well as from science and technology studies, human-computer interaction and computer-supported collaborative work... more»

ARTICLE: Baby Einsteins: Not So Smart After All

2007-08-07T22:00:00.000-07:00

Mounting evidence suggests that passive screen sucking not only doesn't help children learn, but could also set back their development...more»

ARTICLE: Anthropologists Go Native in the Corporate Village

2007-07-05T23:12:00.000-07:00

There is a growing trend for anthropologists to be hired to work to understand the cultural workings of corporations. Intel has been hiring ethnographers for years to influence product design. "Adding an anthropologist to a research team is like moving from black-and-white TV to color...we're able to observe shades of color that others can't see. Anthropologists understand complexity and can help devise answers that reflect that complexity." article» more»

QUOTE: Richard Rorty on Rational Argument

2007-06-29T13:40:00.001-07:00

"What counts as rational argumentation is as historically determined and as context-dependent, as what counts as good French."

INTERACTIVE MEDIA: What will shape the future of Education? The 2006-2016 Education Map

2007-06-23T22:24:00.000-07:00

Here's a research-based interactive and participatory map of the predicted major influences on education over the coming decade... more»

RESOURCE: Project Implicit - Online Implicit Association Tests (IATs)

2007-06-08T21:20:00.000-07:00

This web site presents a method that demonstrates the conscious-unconscious divergences much more convincingly than has been possible with previous methods. This new method is called the Implicit Association Test, or IAT for short... more»

STUDY: Understanding the Building Blocks of Language and Thought

2007-06-08T20:49:00.000-07:00

Infants comprehend spatial relationships such as "in" and "on" through language input from caregivers and the babies' own play behaviors... more»

ARTICLE: Japanese scientists develop robo-toddler

2007-06-08T20:41:00.000-07:00

A group of scientists in Japan have developed a robot that acts like a toddler to better understand child development... more» more» movie»

RESEARCH GROUP: Harvard Family Research Project

2007-06-06T22:11:00.000-07:00

The Harvard Family Research Project (HFRP) strives to promote more effective educational practices, programs, and policies for disadvantaged children and youth by generating, publishing, and disseminating our and others’ research. Their complementary learning model focuses on how school-based and non-school-based supports can be linked and can all work toward consistent learning and developmental outcomes for children. They have developed a set of Family Involvement Teaching Cases that relate to dilemmas in family educational involvement. more»

REPORT: Catalyzing the Development and Innovative Use of Open Educational Resources

2007-06-06T14:19:00.000-07:00

Here's a proposal about Open Educational Resources from the Center for Open and Sustainable Learning (COSL) at Utah State University. Their mission is to facilitate the provision of high quality learning opportunities. We accomplish our mission by promoting open education and by building tools to catalyze the creation, sharing, and reuse of open educational resources... more»

QUOTE: Jerome Bruner on Design Research in Education

2007-06-05T14:08:00.000-07:00

"Rather, the master question from which the mission of education research is derived: What should be taught to whom, and with what pedagogical object in mind? That master question is threefold: what, to whom, and how? Education research, under such a dispensation, becomes an adjunct of educational planning and design. It becomes design research in the sense that it explores possible ways in which educational objectives can be formulated and carried out in the light of cultural objectives and values in the broad." - Jerome Bruner from Issues in Educational Research (1999)

ARTICLE: When Should a Kid Start Kindergarten?

2007-06-03T10:11:00.000-07:00

Here's an article on the "graying of kindergarten." Some argue that one way to help solve the accountability crisis (i.e., poor performance on high-stakes achievement tests) is to just have parents hold back (or "red-shirt") their children. Of course, we could also get a bump by just pushing off the testing and not starting it in the third grade. How about we let kindergarten be kindergarten and allow instruction to be guided by children's development and interests rather than attempting to reverse-engineer a solution to this heavily manufactured crisis... more»

In a report on kindergarten, the National Association of Early Childhood Specialists in State Departments of Education wrote, "Most of the questionable entry and placement practices that have emerged in recent years have their genesis in concerns over children's capacities to cope with increasingly inappropriate curriculum in kindergarten.

STUDY: New Adult Brain Cells May Be Central To Lifelong Learning

2007-06-01T17:09:00.000-07:00

In a recent study, researchers have shown that "new adult neurons showed a pattern of changing plasticity very similar to that seen in brain cells in newborn animals. That is, the new adult brain cells showed a 'critical period' in which they were highly plastic before they settled into the less plastic properties of mature brain cells. In newborn animals, such a critical period enables an important, early burst of wiring of new brain circuitry with experience..." more»

STUDY: Children can perform approximate math without arithmetic instruction

2007-06-01T07:30:00.000-07:00

"Study shows that children spontaneously show a sense of number when presented with symbolic math." This work will no doubt feed the nativist developmental camp. It is quite striking that so many programs of developmental psych research are built upon the assumption that if a child has not attended school yet then they must not have been taught in any formal way -- say in the home by parents, siblings, or media. This is especially not true in these academically fueled times we live in. But their assumption allows them to claim things are "spontaneous" or taught "implicitly" -- when the fact of the matter is that they just never empirically look at actual early childhood development in naturalistic settings... more»

STUDY: Thinking straight while seeing red?

2007-06-01T07:19:00.000-07:00

New studies claim that: "Anger is appropriately blamed for flawed thinking since it tends to alter perception of risk, increase prejudice, and trigger aggression... Anger can actually prompt more careful and rational analysis of another person’s reasoning." But they apparently cue anger that is orthogonal to the task subject matter at hand -- so it supports the idea that reflecting on a prior event that angered you somehow gets you more focused in your reasoning. I wonder if there an associated physiological arousal response that would helps explain the effect... more»

RESOURCE: New Graduation Rate Resource

2007-05-31T22:35:00.000-07:00

Here's a beta version of a new online mapping tool to help the public, policymakers, and educational leaders understand the high school graduation crisis... web site» tool» article»

RESOURCE: Scratch - With simplified code, programming becomes child's play

2007-05-31T22:22:00.000-07:00

Scratch is a new programming language that makes it easy to create your own interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art -- and share your creations on the web... article» web site»

RESOURCE: Recommended Fieldwork & Analysis Equipment for Video-based Ethnographic Research

2007-05-31T20:52:00.000-07:00

My research has been conducting a video-based, team ethnography over the past two years. Because people have been asking about what equipment we use in our work, we've written up a brief technical report on the choices we've made and a bit about what we've learned... more» report»

RESOURCE: Audio Gear for Rich Media

2007-05-31T08:07:00.000-07:00

I'll post our list of field recording equipment in a later article, but here's a nice summary of equipment and software that can be used to capture quality audio recordings... more»

RESOURCE: The National Science Digital Library

2007-05-30T06:52:00.000-07:00

NSDL is the U.S. online library for education and research in Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics. more»

EDUCATIONAL OBJECTS: Interactive Physics Simulations

2007-05-29T12:35:00.000-07:00

From the Physics Education Technology Team, here are a range of educational simulations focused on the learning of physics. more»

STUDY: Putting action in perspective

2007-05-26T21:15:00.000-07:00

Embodied approaches to cognition propose that our own actions influence our understanding of the world. Do other people's actions also have this influence? There seems to be a tendency to adopt the actor's perspective when attention is drawn to specific actions being performed. more»

ARTICLE: News from the Temporal Dynamics of Learning Center

2007-05-26T19:12:00.000-07:00

A better understanding of the role that timing plays in human learning could lead to improved teaching techniques and alter the trajectories of countless human lives... news» center web site»

CLASSIC: Practical Thinking at Work (LCHC Newsletter, 1984)

2007-05-26T18:59:00.000-07:00

Bridging the gap between lab and field, here are a range of early reports presented in newsletter format of core studies associated with the "practical thinking" perspective -- a precursor to everyday and distributed cognition... more»

BOOK: Navigating Numeracies: Home/School Numeracy Practices

2007-05-26T17:41:00.000-07:00

This volume approaches numeracy as a social practice with ethnographic work on the meanings and uses of numeracy in schools and home and community contexts... more»

RESEARCH GROUP: Early Algebra, Early Arithmetic

2007-05-26T17:38:00.000-07:00

This project has the view that present-day curricula underestimate, by a long shot, the learning capabilities of students. They feel that the best way to show this, and to pave the way to major reform in mathematics education, is to set up a research basis that we and others can learn from... more» publications»

STUDY: New Computer Model Predicts Crowd Behavior

2007-05-26T17:32:00.000-07:00

Since you can't arrange an angry mob experimentally, why not try to simulate them and the resulting dynamics... more»

BOOK: The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools, and Societies

2007-05-26T11:59:00.000-07:00

"The Difference" is about how we think in groups--and how our collective wisdom exceeds the sum of its parts. Diversity wins out over homogeneity... more»

Why can teams of people find better solutions than brilliant individuals working alone? And why are the best group decisions and predictions those that draw upon the very qualities that make each of us unique? The answers lie in diversity--not what we look like outside, but what we look like within, our distinct tools and abilities."The Difference" reveals that progress and innovation may depend less on lone thinkers with enormous IQs than on diverse people working together and capitalizing on their individuality.

NEW JOURNAL: Mind, Brain, and Education

2007-05-26T11:36:00.000-07:00

This journal will promote the integration of the diverse disciplines that investigate human learning and development -- to bring together education, biology, and cognitive science to form the new field of mind, brain, and education. more»

Human beings are unique in their ability to learn through schooling and diverse kinds of cultural instruction. Education plays a key role in cultural transformations: It allows members of a society, the young in particular, to efficiently acquire an ever-evolving body of knowledge and skills that took thousands of years to invent. It is time for education, biology, and cognitive science to join together to create a new science and practice of learning and development.

CONSENSUS REPORT: Learning In and Out of School in Diverse Environments

2007-05-13T00:54:00.000-07:00

This new report summarizes important principles that educational practitioners, policy makers, and researchers can use to build upon the learning that occurs in the homes and community cultures of students from diverse groups...

announcement»
report»
slides»

PRINCIPLE 1: Learning is situated in broad socio-economic and historical contexts and is mediated by local cultural practices and perspectives.

PRINCIPLE 2: Learning takes place not only in school but also in the multiple contexts and valued practices of everyday lives across the life span.

PRINCIPLE 3: All learners need multiple sources of support from a variety of institutions to promote their personal and intellectual development.

PRINCIPLE 4: Learning is facilitated when learners are encouraged to use their home and community language resources as a basis for expanding their linguistic repertoires.

ARTICLE: Bots on The Ground

2007-05-12T15:22:00.000-07:00

Humans have long displayed an uncanny ability to make emotional connections with their manufactured helpmates. People frequently treat machines they come to depend upon as "sort of alive." more»

PAPER: Pointing as Situated Practice

2007-05-12T00:02:00.000-07:00

Gesture is bound up in becoming an expert. One way that people learn to see as a professional through pointing... more»

BROADCAST: Gestures help learning

2007-05-11T22:27:00.000-07:00

Turns out that hand gestures are important for the learning of science subjects... more» book»

MICRO-REVIEW: Meaning and Memory in Gesture

2007-05-11T22:24:00.000-07:00

"Perhaps gestures contain meaning, displaying the mind at work or perhaps they help us produce speech more effectively. Either way gestures are not just useless by-products of some other process, but provide vital support for our communicative abilities..." more»

ARTICLE: Beginning the Journey: Five-Year-Olds Drive Their Own PBL Projects

2007-05-10T07:38:00.000-07:00

Project-based learning ties nicely into role play dimensions of early development. "Student-driven projects, enhanced by technology, launch kindergartners on their way to lifelong learning..." more»

CLASSIC: Certainty and the Public Understanding of Science: Science on Television

2007-05-05T00:25:00.000-07:00

In this paper, Collins shows us how mainstream science documentaries systematically avoid revealing the 'window of uncertainty' that is a cornerstone of the epistemic practice of science. It is little wonder that the images of science held by the public are at odds with the practical dimensions of actual scientific work... more»

ARTICLE: What the myth of mirror neurons gets wrong about the human brain

2007-04-28T20:04:00.000-07:00

Mirror neurons have become the "left brain/right brain" of the 21st century... more»

The myth of mirror neurons may not do much harm. Perhaps it's even good for science that in the 21st century we turn to the brain, rather than gods and monsters, for our mythical images. Still, science and science writing are supposed to get us closer to the truth, while the myth of mirror neurons may do just the opposite. Instead of teaching us about how the mind works, it may perpetuate some broad misconceptions about neuroscience and what the study of the brain can tell us about human nature.

STUDY: I like to do it, I’m able, and I know I am: Longitudinal couplings between domain-specific achievement, self-concept, and interest

2007-04-28T12:25:00.000-07:00

Here's a study of longitudinal development of the intraindividual coupling between academic achievement, interest, and self-concept of ability (SCA) with a sample of about 1,000 children between grades 1 and 12. The degree of coupling was the highest between interest and SCA and the lowest between interest and achievement... more»

STUDY: Toddlers find photos easier to learn from than drawings

2007-04-28T10:19:00.000-07:00

What do toddlers learn from everyday picture-book reading interactions? Well, the older children get, the better they become at realizing the connection between abstract representations and their real-life counterparts. Learning follows the iconicity... more» more»

ARTICLE: Congress Gets Competitive With Bills

2007-04-27T20:20:00.000-07:00

With strong support from both parties, the U.S. Senate recently passed several pieces of legislation greatly increasing federal funding for research and education in an effort to boost student interest in science, technology, engineering, and math... more»

BOOK: How We Reason

2007-04-14T12:56:00.000-07:00

I haven't seen it first-hand yet, but here's a recent book by Johnson-Laird providing an update on his take on mental models... more»

BOOK: Discovering Successful Pathways in Children's Development: Mixed Methods in the Study of Childhood and Family Life

2007-04-14T12:49:00.000-07:00

This book provides a new perspective on the study of childhood and family life. Successful development is enhanced when communities provide meaningful life pathways that children can seek out and engage... more»

Successful pathways include both a culturally valued direction for development and competence in skills that matter for a child's subsequent success as a person as well as a student, parent, worker, or citizen. To understand successful pathways requires a mix of qualitative, quantitative, and ethnographic methods--the state of the art for research practice among developmentalists, educators, and policymakers alike.

QUOTE: Richard Feynman on Philosophy of Science & Science

2007-04-14T12:37:00.000-07:00

"Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds." - Attributed to Richard Feynman

STUDY: Self-regulation Abilities, Beyond Intelligence, Play Major Role In Early Achievement

2007-04-08T13:46:00.000-07:00

Although intelligence is generally thought to play a key role in children's early academic achievement, aspects of children's self-regulation abilities--including the ability to alternately shift and focus attention and to inhibit impulsive responding--are uniquely related to early academic success and account for greater variation in early academic progress than do measures of intelligence... more»

ARTICLE: Language Gap Mars Parent-Teacher Chats

2007-04-08T12:10:00.000-07:00

Federal law requires school districts to provide interpreters for parent-teacher conferences. But demand far outstrips the state and federal funds provided. How are schools adapting? more»

ORGANIZATION: Encore - an Educational Network and Community for Open Resource Exchange

2007-04-08T09:23:00.000-07:00

Using an open-source Encore's goal is to support researchers as they exchange open source or open content materials, including relevant support documentation, constraints to implementation, and contact info... more»

ENCORE is implemented in an enhanced wiki format, allowing for easy maintenance of small thematic spaces and collaborations. Researchers may find great materials here, and get support from colleagues to embed or intermingle those materials effectively and appropriately. Instructors or students in learning sciences courses may find and contribute reviews of papers, technologies, or other resources. Small groups can form "Collaborations" to support their efforts to exchange materials or develop new ones.

STUDY: The root of dyscalculia found

2007-04-08T06:18:00.000-07:00

Dyscalculia is just as prevalent in the population as dyslexia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder – around 5% of the population is affected. Scientists have induced dyscalculia in subjects without the maths learning difficulty for the first time. The study, which finds that the right parietal lobe is responsible for dyscalculia, potentially has implications for diagnosis and management through remedial teaching... more»

“This is the first causal demonstration that the parietal lobe is the key to understanding developmental dyscalculia. Most people process numbers very easily – almost automatically – but people with dyscalculia do not. We wanted to find out what would happen when the areas relevant to maths learning in the right parietal lobes were effectively knocked out for several hundred milliseconds. We found that stimulation to this brain region during a maths test radically impacted on the subjects’ reaction time. This provides strong evidence that dyscalculia is caused by malformations in the right parietal lobe and provides sold grounds for further study on the physical abnormalities present in dyscalculics’ brains. It’s an important step to the ultimate goal of early diagnosis through analysis of neural tissue, which in turn will lead to earlier treatments and more effective remedial teaching.

CONFERENCE: "CogSci In the Real World" Theme at the 2007 Conference of the Cognitive Science Society

2007-04-08T06:06:00.000-07:00

The conference will be held in Nashville, Tennessee from August 1-4, 2007...conference» theme»

PROJECT: Our next teachers: avatar experts

2007-04-08T06:00:00.000-07:00

It was only a matter of time. Researchers have been funded to develop a networking system which will create virtual representations of real people to improve our knowledge. They will use artificial intelligence and natural language processing software to enable us to interact with these avatars. It sounds like they may be using ethnographic field techniques to capture the expertise of the "teacher subject" before they build the system... more»

RESOURCE: NYT TimesSelect content is now free for university students and faculty

2007-04-07T21:00:00.000-07:00

The pay content for the New York Times is now available to university students and full-time faculty for free... more»

STUDY: Toddlers engage in 'emotional eavesdropping' to guide their behavior

2007-04-07T16:28:00.000-07:00

From the Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences: 18-month-old toddlers engage in "emotional eavesdropping" by listening and watching emotional reactions directed by one adult to another and then using this emotional information to shape their own behavior. It is the first demonstration that infants can modify their own behavior in response to an emotional communication that does not involve them. press release» study»

RESOURCE: New Version of InqScribe Video and Audio Transcription Tool

2007-04-07T16:23:00.000-07:00

The best video and audio transcription package I'm aware of just got updated. We make extensive use of InqScribe in my research group -- and we have been quite pleased with it. It is intuitive, feature-rich, and exceedingly reasonable in terms of cost... more»

ARTICLE: As States Feel Pressed to Revisit Standards, Calls Are Being Renewed to Tighten Them

2007-04-07T16:13:00.000-07:00

At a time of increased interdisciplinarity and an exponential expansion in data production, is it really the time for narrowing the curricular goals of K-12 education? Moves toward fewer standards might be a good fit with the heightened attention to inherently narrow accountability structures like high-stakes tests. But will fewer concepts taught more coherently across 13 years of instruction really serve youth well? Could we ever agree what those "core" concepts should be? more»

RESOURCE: Online Video Annotation Takes A Giant Leap Forward

2007-04-07T09:22:00.000-07:00

For those of you who video-based research, here's info on an updated platform for online video annotation. It allows a user to easily add subtitles, text, animated shapes and pointers, freehand text and drawings, images, webcam video and even RSS feeds directly into your web-hosted videos... article» Mojiti platform» demo»

ARTICLE: Subtracting a 'gifted' gap in math education

2007-04-07T09:14:00.000-07:00

Students from low-income backgrounds or certain minority groups are all too often overlooked for placement in gifted and talented programs... more»

BOOK: The Seven Sins of Memory: How the Mind Forgets and Remembers

2007-04-07T09:01:00.000-07:00

Declarative memory -- about people, places, and things -- is highly fallible and susceptible to distortion and suggestion. This book provides a framework for understanding the memory miscues that occur in everyday life: absent-mindedness, transience, blocking, misattribution, suggestibility, bias, and persistence... more»

RESOURCE: Students' and Teachers' Conceptions and Science Education

2007-04-06T20:13:00.000-07:00

This (updated) bibliography of 7700 articles attempts to document research on teaching and learning science with a certain emphasis on research from constructivist perspectives. The database was originally focused on the "conceptions" literature -- but now it is focused more broadly on constructivist approaches to science ed... more»

RESOURCE: TagCrowd - an online tool for creating simple visual summaries of any text

2007-04-06T14:29:00.000-07:00

Simple online tool for visualizing word frequencies in any user-supplied text by creating what is popularly known as a tag cloud... more»

ORGANIZATION: Mondialogo Engineering Award

2007-04-06T12:27:00.000-07:00

The Mondialogo Engineering Award invites engineering students in developing and developed countries to form international teams to create project proposals that address the United Nations Millennium Development Goals -- proposals to improve the quality of life in the developing world, particularly poverty eradication and the promotion of sustainable development... more»

ARTICLE: New Breed of Digital Tutors Yielding Learning Gains

2007-04-06T12:20:00.000-07:00

Describing the work of the LearnLab Science of Learning Center, here's an interesting article on the scaling of cognitive tutors out into school instruction... more»

Educators are finding that "intelligent tutors" are an effective supplement to classroom instruction, thanks to their ability to understand a student's shortcomings, customize instruction, and provide instant tracking of behavior. Developed by Carnegie Mellon University researchers, Cognitive Tutor programs are currently in use in 1,500 school districts nationwide, and are either available on the market or in development for instruction in chemistry, foreign language, reading, and computer science, among other subjects. "What distinguishes intelligent tutors from integrated learning systems or skill-building software is that the tutors sort of both scaffold and support more complex cognitive processes," said Center for Children and Technology director Margaret Honey. "Well-designed tutors are smart enough to know there's not a single way to solve a problem, and that's what makes them 'intelligent.'" The NSF, the pentagon, and the Department of Education have supported intelligent-tutoring systems since the 1970s, but in a 2004 What Works Clearinghouse study, Cognitive Tutor Algebra was one of only two middle school math programs to receive a "positive" rating for effectiveness. Studies have shown that Cognitive Tutor can improve a student's performance by a single letter grade, while one-on-one human instruction has been found to increase performance by two letter grades. The "goal is not to replace teaching," explains CMU human-computer interaction professor Kenneth R. Koedinger. "It's to give teachers more time to do what they do best ... The contrast to use might be a textbook. With textbooks, students don't get feedback on solutions."

STUDY: Opportunities to Learn in America's Elementary Classrooms

2007-04-06T12:14:00.000-07:00

Here's an analysis of elementary school classrooms in the United States that is discouraging in terms of the range of quality of students' experiences... more» activity mapping»

BOOK SERIES: The Science Inside Book Series at AAAS

2007-04-06T09:10:00.000-07:00

The AAAS has been producing mainstream press book accounts around what is known scientifically on particular topics -- focusing on health issues in particular... more»

RESOURCE: How to Educate Your IRB [about ethnography]

2007-04-02T20:14:00.000-07:00

Through the use of repeated boilerplate language across proposals, it may be possible to keep university IRB committees somewhat informed about the variety of methodological techniques and assumptions that underlie the logic of inquiry associated with ethnography... more»

REPORT: Taking Science to School: Learning and Teaching Science in Grades K-8

2007-04-02T18:42:00.000-07:00

Here's a synthesis of what we know about how children learn science across the K-8 grade span. It argues that they are much more capable than our historical account of young children as "concrete" thinkers -- and it shows how they bring a lot of relevant prior knowledge to kindergarten from the earliest years of development... report» article» press release» press release»

STUDY: Body position affects memory for events

2007-04-02T18:36:00.000-07:00

Turns out that holding your body in the right physical position seems to lead to faster, more accurate access to certain memories... more»

BOOK: The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down

2007-03-27T00:04:00.000-07:00

A heart-wrenching account of the kind of culture clash that can take place between the Western medical establishment and those who live according to fundamentally different indigenous knowledge... more»

CLASSIC: Ecological Niche Picking: Ecological Invalidity as an Axiom of Experimental Cognitive Psychology

2007-03-26T23:51:00.000-07:00

Although Cole, Hood and McDermott failed to get this article published in mainstream journals at the time, this paper was a clarion call for focusing on cognition as it occurs in everyday life and for questioning the generalizability of findings from mainstream laboratory experimental work on cognition... more»

RESOURCE: Online concept mapping tool

2007-03-26T23:46:00.000-07:00

From information aesthetics, here's a nice online app for basic concept mapping... more»

BOOK: Unlocking the Clubhouse: Women in Computing

2007-03-17T19:10:00.000-07:00

"The information technology revolution is transforming almost every aspect of society, but girls and women are largely out of the loop. Although women surf the Web in equal numbers to men and make a majority of online purchases, few are involved in the design and creation of new technology. It is mostly men whose perspectives and priorities inform the development of computing innovations and who reap the lion's share of the financial rewards"... more»