Cognitive Tutors: Lessons Learned

This article reviews the 10-year history of tutor development based on the advanced computer tutoring theory (J. R. Anderson, 1983, 1993). We developed production system models in ACT of how students solved problems in LISP, geometry, and algebra. Computer tutors were developed around these cognitive models. Construction of these tutors was guided by a set of eight principles loosely based on the ACT theory. Early evaluations of these tutors usually, but not always, showed significant achievement gains. Best case evaluations showed that students could achieve at least the same level of proficiency as conventional instruction in one third of the time. Empirical studies showed that students were learning skills in production-rule units and that the best tutorial interaction style was one in which the tutor provides immediate feedback, consisting of short and directed error messages. The tutors appear to work better if they present themselves to students as nonhuman tools to assist learning rather than as emulations of human tutors. Students working with these tutors display transfer to other environments to the degree that they can map the tutor environment into the test environment. These experiences have coalesced into a new system for developing and deploying tutors. This system involves selecting a problem-solving interface, constructing a curriculum under the guidance of a domain expert, designing a cognitive model for solving problems in that environment, building instruction around the productions in that model, and deploying the tutor in the classroom. New tutors are being built in this system to achieve the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) standards for high-school mathematics in an urban setting.     

我曾经学过

I've learned that you cannot make someone love you. All you can do is be someone who can be loved.     

Learned variability

Potential contributors to sustained levels of variability in the topography of the rat’s barpress were investigated in two experiments. Behavior was classified into discretely defined components, and changes in components and their sequential organization were analyzed. Experiment 1 showed that topographic variability in the rat is modulated by shifts in reinforcement schedules. Variability decreased between either dipper training or extinction and continuous reinforcement (CRF), and increased between CRF and extinction. Once the press was acquired, variability did not change if the schedule (CRF) did not change. Experiment 2 showed that, regardless of subsequent changes in topographic requirements, rats initially shaped to press under more stringent criteria sustained higher levels of variability during CRF, but not during extinction, than rats shaped with less stringent criteria. The results suggest that subjects learn not only what to do during reinforcement but also how differently or variably to do it.     

Lessons Learned

In the current context of standards-based reform and heightened accountability for school performance, state education agencies (SEAs) have an important, but not yet well-articulated, role to play in local school improvement efforts. This article starts to articulate such a role by examining the variety of approaches and strategies used by 7 SEAs to support schools and districts applying for and ultimately implementing the federal Comprehensive School Reform (CSR) program. Building from the assertion that SEAs can and do make choices about how to best implement federal programs, we explore the choices that the studied SEAs have made around (a) the integration of the CSR program with other state and federal initiatives, (b) the different levels of funding provided to schools, (c) the continuity of SEA leadership around CSR, and (d) the variety of support strategies provided to participating schools. Although these SEAs have supported CSR in different ways, we conclude that the most important state strategy for leveraging systemic advantage from CSR involves the extent to which SEA staff have stayed with the program and thus gained in-depth knowledge of the program necessary to improve CSR in their states.     

Developing Faculty Research Skills: Lessons Learned

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this reflective commentary is to describe and analyze how efforts were made to engage polytechnic nursing faculty in a multi-institutional, interprofessional research project, and the effectiveness of methods used. We describe the professional development and project management activities provided along with our reflection as to their effectiveness. The faculty members worked at a polytechnic, a small vocational and technical institution in Western Canada with approximately 14,000 full-time students, where faculty were not required to participate in research. Assumptions were made about their interest, knowledge, and ability regarding the research process. These assumptions led the investigators to implement professional development activities that were not effective. Spontaneous informal, anecdotal feedback from some faculty members to the authors, and the authors’ own observations, informed the results. Assumptions about novice faculty research skills may not be accurate; therefore, an effort should be made to perform a pre-assessment of these skills, to create a lesson plan, to assess the effectiveness of teaching strategies, and to evaluate the effectiveness of supportive measures in order to address learning needs.     

教育制度的习得性失效及其矫治

所谓教育制度的习得性失效,是指人们参照他人或既往应对经验,对教育制度采取有意为之乃至习以为常的改变或变通,结果导致教育制度低效或无效运行的现象。这种教育制度的习得性失效主要表现为教育制度的虚假和不公正运行,对教育制度的不合理变通及"多数人暴政"现象。造成这种现象的原因主要是教育制度目标群体的执行主体地位缺失及制度运行过程中存在的官僚主义和寻租行为等。为此,我们应当真正实现教育制度运行的民主化、公开化,建立完善高效的制度运行监控机制,努力提高制度执行人员的素质,建立有效的责任追究和奖惩机制,健全制度运行的信息沟通机制,尽可能降低制度运行的交易成本,从而确保教育制度运行的良好效果。     

Tom＇s Family

This is Tom.He is an American boy _1_ is twelve. _2_ father is a worker, His mother is a teacher. _3_ teaches _4_ English. She is _5_ good teacher. We all like _6_ .Tom is _7_ good friend. My name is Li Ying._8_ are all in Class Two.Grade One.     

Bringing Research Into Educational Practice: Lessons Learned

Bringing research into educational practice is necessary but does not happen automatically. The Transfercenter for Neuroscience and Learning, at the University of Ulm in Germany, is set up to transfer (neuro)scientific knowledge into educational practice. In doing so we have learned why this does not happen automatically, and have tried to make sure it happens anyway. We have realized that transferring research into educational practice needs a special research approach, which we suggest could be labeled “translational research” as seen in medical research. We have also realized that transfer requires a special type of scientist. We try to hire generalists who work and think interdisciplinarily and who are committed to providing a service to practitioners. Finally, we feel that neuroscience provides a possible foundation for learning sciences.     

An Alternative Professional Development Program: Lessons Learned

Abstract. This article describes how a group of small liberal arts college faculty embraced the opportunity to create a faculty learning circle as an alternative professional development program. We provide a review of the program, discuss the lessons learned, and offer recommendations for future efforts in developing a similar faculty development program. Analysis of participant responses to the learning circle indicated that the experience met all their intended objectives. Faculty learning circles contribute to the participants' professional development and could be incorporated into any college campus.     

女诗人:女性话语的自发者——唐代宫怨诗创作主体考察之一

唐代宫怨诗以作者身份看,大致可以分为两类:女诗人的自我抒发与男诗人的代言之作。女诗人包括有名号的后妃、和亲的公主、普通的宫女三类。这些女诗人的宫怨诗可以说是女性话语的自发者,以我手写我心,真实地透露了她们的心声,其诗歌中哀怨的内容不同而艺术风格相近,都呈现出明显的女性色彩的情感基调和抒情话语模式。     

Learned helplessness in chickens

Evidence of the learned helplessness effect was obtained in 24- to 48-h-old domestic chickens. Twenty-four hours after exposure to escapable shock, inescapable shock, or no shock, subjects were tested on a one-way shuttle task with shock-offset reinforcement. The inescapable shock group showed retarded learning in comparison with other groups. It is argued that the data are difficult to account for in terms of Costello’s (1978) application of the systematic bias in the triadic design.     

Struggle,Practice, and Possibility: Lessons Learned from Marginalized Women of Mexican Descent in Their First Year of College through the CAMP Program

This study examines the ways in which a support and retention scholarship program (College Assistance Migrant Program—CAMP) mediated the first-year college experience of three situationally marginalized, female students of Mexican descent. Findings suggest that educators at all levels of schooling should create opportunities for this population of students to participate in supportive teaching-learning communities. Such communities that practice and promote academically and personally empowering interactions can help these students overcome obstacles and learn to become successful students.     

Lessons Learned from Exemplary Schools

This article presents lessons learned about successful professional development for promoting technology integration from eight exemplary schools. Through a qualitative investigation into school leaders’ and teachers’ intentional goals of improving student engagement and achievement, formal, informal, and individual opportunities are described from these schools. The data led to a deep understanding of the ways these schools implemented PD; in most schools purposeful reconfiguration of the entire curriculum was a corollary to the professional development. We found that the most effective models incorporated district wide, school based, formal and informal opportunities that accommodated preferences in both learning and delivery models.     

Back to the Future: We Listened and We Learned

Being asked to give the 39^th Amy Morris Homans Commemorative Lecture at NAKPEHE is a tremendous honor. While certainly aware of Miss Homans' legacy related to the promotion of women, physical education, and the training of teachers, I admit it has been many years since revisiting details of her life and her work. In order to prepare my comments for this lecture, it seemed critical that I do so, and what a remarkable journey it has been these past months. It allowed me to come to know my own background more thoroughly, recognize where my own beliefs were developed, and understand what I hope is the impact of my work on prospective teachers and subsequently their pupils. Born 100 years almost to the day after Miss Homans, I too am a teacher educator. With this in mind, teaching and teacher education seemed an appropriate focus for this lecture today.