Previous studies investigating posttest feedback have generally conceptualized feedback as a method for correcting erroneous responses, giving virtually no consideration to how feedback might promote learning of correct responses. Here, the authors show that when correct responses are made with low confidence, feedback serves to correct this…

The effects of computer animations and mental animation on people's mental models of a mechanical system are examined. In 3 experiments, students learned how a mechanical system works from various instructional treatments including viewing a static diagram of the machine, predicting motion from static diagrams, viewing computer animations, and…

This study examined the behaviors and experiences of students who needed assistance while working in peer-directed small groups on mathematics problems and the processes that helped or hindered their learning. Students in 4 seventh-grade classes worked in heterogeneous small groups throughout a 3-week unit on operations with decimal numbers.…

This study analyzes the interpretive activities of scientists related to familiar and unfamiliar graphs. The analyses show that when scientists were familiar with a graph, they read it transparently and thereby leapt beyond the material basis to the thing the graph is said to be about. In contrast, when scientists were less familiar with the…

This article describes how children build increasingly abstract knowledge of linear measurement, emphasizing ways they relate space and number. Assessments indicate children struggle to understand measurement, especially concepts related to complex paths as in perimeter tasks. This article draws on developmental accounts of children's knowledge of…

How does lexical selection function in highly-proficient bilingual speakers? What is the role of the non-response language during the course of lexicalization? Evidence of cross-language interference was obtained by Hermans, Bongaerts, De Bot and Schreuder (1998) using the picture-word interference paradigm: participants took longer to name the…

In five experiments highly-proficient bilinguals were asked to name two sets of pictures in their L2: a) pictures whose names in the L2 and their corresponding L1 translations have the same grammatical gender value, and b) pictures whose names in the L2 and their corresponding L1 translations have different gender values. In Experiments 1, 2, and…

It is a matter of debate whether the two differentiated grammatical systems in a bilingual child develop autonomously, or whether there is interdependence and in what areas (Genesee, 2001; Meisel, 2001). Extensive research is being carried out in the emergence of the two grammars, but not much attention has been given to the development of…

Simultaneous interpreting (SI) is a complex skill, where language comprehension and production take place at the same time in two different languages. In this study we identified some of the basic cognitive skills involved in SI, focusing on the roles of memory and lexical retrieval. We administered a reading span task in two languages and a…

The present study investigated processing of morphologically complex words in three different frequency ranges in monolingual Finnish speakers and Finnish-Swedish bilinguals. By employing a visual lexical decision task, we found a differential pattern of results in monolinguals vs. bilinguals. Monolingual Finns seemed to process low frequency and…

Recounts a study documenting the actual learning trajectory of the classroom community and the diversity in eighth-graders' reasoning as they participated in the classroom mathematical practices that constituted this trajectory. Describes the learning of the research team by documenting conjectures about students' statistical learning and the…

This interview study gathered information about the prior knowledge and thinking of kindergarten to third- graders regarding the supply of water, heat, and light to modern homes. Findings indicated that students possessed only limited and spotty knowledge about utilities in modern homes. Within general trends, there was evidence of growth in…

Examines whether listeners efficiently exploit sentence prosody to direct attention to words bearing sentence accent. Four studies are reported. Results suggest that less efficient mapping of prosody to semantics may be one way in which nonnative listening fails to equal native listening. (Author/VWL)

Two eye-tracking experiments examined spoken language processing in Russian-English bilinguals. The proportion of looks to objects whose names were phonologically similar to the name of a target object in either the same language, the other language, or both languages at the same time was compared to the proportion of looks in a control condition…

Explored the role of age of acquisition in picture naming with a group of unbalanced, late bilinguals and a group of monolinguals. Hypothesized that effects of second language (L2)age of acquisition on l2 picture naming performance would be found (Author/VWL)