This article reports an experimental study of the impact of textbook availability on mathematics achievement of students in Nicaraguan first-grade classes. This intervention is compared with control classes in which textbooks are rare and with a radio-based instructional program using student worksheets. (Author/GK)

Empirical validity of nonoverlapping scores of original problem solving on a lenient solution-standard predictor was evidenced in college students by high correlations with corresponding scores on stringent solution-standard criterion tasks. Findings support the construct validity of conceptualizations of original problem solving based on…

Two studies are reported that examine intraindividual variability in performance on measures of fluid intelligence, varying either practice or testing time conditions. Substantial improvement in level of correct performance is obtained for both conditions; error patterns, however, differ for the two. (Author/GK)

Two studies were conducted to determine whether students perceive meaningful influence patterns among the causal variables involved in determining exam performance. It was observed that the students perceived a number of both unidirectional and bidirectional intercausal effects; these were related to both perceived success and causal attributions.…

This study addressed whether students could change their reading rate when presented with two clearly explicated purposes for reading. Results indicated that students could adapt their reading rate to fit different purposes but that passage difficulty affected the degree of flexibility. (Author/GK)

Matched pairs of skilled and less skilled readers read aloud material in cloze procedure format and printed in geometric transformations. Skilled readers made greater use of grammatical and contextual information. The stability of differences suggests that differential utilization of syntactic and semantic cues contributes to differences in…

Reading disabled children were given direct instruction on a medial vowel sound, practice on monosyllabic words containing the sound, and specific transfer training on nonsense syllables. Word attack strategy was varied for the five treatment groups. The initial bigram strategy yielded significantly better performance on transfer words. (Author/BW)

This study offers an analysis of bilingual acquisition with particular emphasis on conditions that required the child to use negative syntactic structures. English monolinguals scored differently than bilinguals in English. There also was evidence that Spanish negative constructions were used in English negative constructions. (Author/BW)

Kelley's cube model of causal inferences was investigated by relating high and low students' attributions to reported affect and expectations. Low and high scoring students clustered in different cells of the cube. Predictions concerning estimates of distinctiveness, consistency, and consensus and their relation to affect and expectations were…

This article describes the development and validation of an instrument to assess adults' orientations toward control versus autonomy in their interactions with children. The responses from 68 teachers had a good range and were internally consistent and temporally stable. Further, the measure was shown to be externally valid. (Author/BW)

Eighty-four sixth-grade students were assigned to three conditions, and studied two controversial issues with materials representing both pro and con views. Controversy, compared with concurrence seeking and individualistic study, promoted higher achievement and retention, greater search for information, more cognitive rehearsal, and positive…

Sixty sixth graders were assessed for their level of moral development and rated by their teachers on classroom conduct. Children who employed lower stages of moral reasoning displayed more conduct problems and displayed more variability in their conduct ratings. (Author/BW)

A secondary analysis was conducted to test the validity of five behaviors from five classroom observation systems: approves/praises; asks questions; criticizes/disapproves; gives directions; and presents facts or judgments. Scores for each were intercorrelated and arranged in a multitrait-multimethod matrix. Evidence was found of construct…

High school students read and rated descriptions of teachers (Experiment 1) and teachers read and rated descriptions of students (Experiment 2) that varied across sex and sex-role behavior. Male students were less positive in their evaluations of teachers than were females. Male teachers were rated more highly than female teachers. (Author/BW)

Thirty learning disabled children were randomly assigned to two conditions focusing on sentence comprehension: a sentence anagram/word grouping treatment and a more traditional sentence study treatment. Subjects in the sentence anagram/word grouping condition had significantly higher cloze scores. (Author/BW)