Lauren B. Resnick

• University of Pittsburgh

How to help teachers learn and foster productive classroom talk? In what ways can video be used to support teacher learning? This article presents a randomized controlled trial examining the efficacy of using visualizations to enhance video use in a teacher professional development program. Free online copy is available at: https://tinyurl.com/yymh...

This study seeks to understand the emotional connection of teachers' academically productive talk (APT) with student learning from the students' perspective. Using a sample of 2,225 students (N7th grade = 1,146 and N8th grade = 1,079) from 16 middle schools in a city of China, we investigate the relationship between students' perceptions of their t...

We employ Sfard’s (Thinking as communicating, 2008) “ritual towards exploration” idea to theorize the learning trajectory of two middle school teachers attending a professional development (PD) program designed around the 5 Practices for Orchestrating Productive Discussions and Accountable Talk. Data included four cycles of lesson recordings, inclu...

A small but powerful body of evidence shows that certain forms of classroom discussion can produce learning gains that go beyond the topics actually discussed. In a range of countries, students who engaged in dialogue showed better initial learning and retained their learning gains for longer periods when compared to untreated comparison groups. In...

When we think about talk in the classroom, most of us picture the same thing. The teacher stands at the front of the room, posing questions, asking students for brief answers, and evaluating their responses. This form of classroom dialogue, known as recitation, allows teachers to transmit facts and effectively manage large groups of learners. The a...

Our study tracks change in teachers' practice in the context of a professional development (PD) program aimed at getting teachers to teach mathematics " exploratively " : using cognitively demanding tasks, exploration phase in groups and whole-classroom discussions. Participants included 7 middle school teachers in an urban district in eastern Unit...

This volume offers a historical and critical analysis of the emerging field of the learning sciences, which takes an interdisciplinary approach to understanding and improving how children and adults learn. It features a wide range of authors, including established scholars who founded and guided the learning sciences through the initial turbulence...

Teachers can reflect on and analyze their classroom discourse to inform their instructional practice. When teachers try to do so however, they often face analytic difficulties, which include the data set (e.g., data input, data transformation, and utterances by unknown speakers), coding (e.g., coding complexity, reliability, and efficiency), visual...

We now understand that human intelligence, once thought to be determined almost solely by heredity, is malleable. In developed countries, average intelligence test scores have increased substantially since the tests began to be administered 100 years ago. In school settings, however, intelligence is often still treated as a fixed attribute that lim...

Socializing Intelligence Through Academic Talk and Dialogue focuses on a fast-growing topic in education research. Over the course of 34 chapters, the contributors discuss theories and case studies that shed light on the effects of dialogic participation in and outside the classroom. This rich, transdisciplinary endeavor will appeal to scholars and...

In this paper, we explore student dropout behavior in a Massively Open Online Course (MOOC). We use a survival model to measure the impact of three social factors that make predictions about attrition along the way for students who have participated in the course discussion forum.

Under certain conditions, student learning in one domain can transfer-produce greater understanding in a domain that was not directly taught. An emerging body of research relates this phenomenon to the nature and quality of classroom talk. This paper cites examples of mathematics classrooms in the US, science classrooms in England, and humanities c...

In this chapter, we describe the evolution of an intermediary organization, the Institute for Learning (IFL) at the University of Pittsburgh, devoted to improving teaching and learning in some of America's largest and most challenged school districts. Over the nearly 20 years of IFL's life, we have learned that design-based researchers have to move...

Accountable Talk is a form of classroom interaction that positions students as thinkers in interaction and encourages students to make their thinking visible for collaborative reasoning. This paper reports on a two-year teacher professional development program in which teachers were coached to use Accountable Talk practices in their classrooms. Onl...

It is widely recognized today that a teacher's surrounding professional community inevitably affects the kind of teaching that students are offered. However, until recently, it has been difficult to quantify and systematically study the nature of professional relationships in schools and districts. The articles in this special issue provide a much-...

This chapter presents a detailed study of patterns of verbal interaction in a classroom context. In doing so it extends an important previously developed construct for analysis of productive talk for learning originating within the collaborative learning and intelligent tutoring communities, namely that of transactivity. Specifically, our focus is...

In this article, the authors show that strategies for adapting instruction to students can range from formal external, standardized assessments to informal teacher judgments deeply embedded in day-to-day classroom practice. Both forms of assessments also differ in the epistemological assumptions underlying them. Some strategies are grounded in an a...

Lauren Resnick, James Spillane, Pam Goldman et Elizabeth Rangel observent l’absence d’effet des sciences de l’éducation sur la pratique des enseignants et l’attribuent aux modes de développement professionnels axés sur le « dire » ainsi qu’à une individualisation excessive des points de vue. Les auteurs relèvent aussi le conservatisme et la résista...

Lauren Resnick, James Spillane, Pam Goldman and Elizabeth Rangel observe the lack of impact of the learning sciences on teachers’ practice, identifying the reliance on "telling" as professional development and overly individualised perspectives as at cause. They also note the in-built conservatism and resistance to innovation of schools and school...

This study investigates the influence of a school’s pre-existing social resources on the implementation of a comprehensive literacy-coaching program (Content-Focused Coaching [CFC]). Elementary schools were randomly assigned to receive a CFC-trained coach ( n = 15 schools) or to continue with the literacy coaching resources that are standard for th...

The 21st century will require knowledge and skill well beyond the basic levels of reading and arithmetic that American schools know how to produce more or less reliably. Delivering a "thinking curriculum" to all American students requires major reform in the ways schools and districts organize their work. The transformation of the institution of sc...

Whereas the cognitive processes and effects of collaborative learning have been intensively studied within the Learning Sciences, little attention has been paid to the way motivational and emotional factors may affect them. In this symposium, we present recent findings from three independent lines of research that focus on the way motivation and af...

Classroom discussion practices that can lead to reasoned participation by all students are presented and described by the authors. Their research emphasizes the careful orchestration of talk and tasks in academic learning. Parallels are drawn to the philosophical work on deliberative discourse and the fundamental goal of equipping all students to p...

Standards-based education has now reached a stage where it is possible to evaluate its overall effectiveness. Several earlier papers in the special issue of Educational Measurement: Issues and Practice on “Test Scores and State Accountability” (Volume 24, Number 4) examined specific state policies and their effects on schools and students. This pap...

In this paper, we propose a new model for learning mathematical concepts which cannot develop informally. This is a middle-out approach in which the objects of the system can be mapped both to formal knowledge and to real-life problems. We hypothesize that the key process which governs the acquisition of knowledge within such learning systems is re...

This study presents preliminary findings from research developing an instructional quality assessment (IQA) toolkit that could be used to monitor the influence of reform initiatives on students' learning environments and to guide professional development efforts within a school or district. This report focuses specifically on the portion of the IQA...

This study examined the relationship between the quality of classroom talk and academic rigor in reading comprehension lessons. In addition, the study aimed to characterize effective questions to support rigorous reading comprehension lessons. The data were collected as a part of the Instructional Quality Assessment (IQA) pilot. The IQA is a tool-k...

In order to improve students' opportunities to learn, educators need tools that can assist them to reflect on and analyze their own and others' teaching practice. Many available observation tools and protocols for studying student work are inadequate because they do not directly engage educators in core issues about rigorous content and pedagogy. I...

This study examined the quality of classroom talk and its relation to academic rigor in reading-comprehension lessons. Additionally, the study aimed to characterize effective questions to support rigorous reading comprehension lessons. The data for this study included 21 reading-comprehension lessons in several elementary and middle schools from th...

A new approach and corresponding method are presented which can be of use in resolving the problem of determination of the eigen frequencies for confined systems, such as resonators, wave guides, and the like, filled with a temporally and spatially dispersive medium. The problem of excitation of such systems by external current is considered. The t...

The success of standards-based education systems depends on 2 elements: strong standards, and assessments that measure what the standards expect. States that have or adopt test-based accountability programs claim that their tests are aligned to their standards. But there has been up to now no independent methodology for checking alignment. This art...

The electromagnetic-wave propagation through a medium consisting of two dielectric half-spaces with a plate in between, has been investigated. The half-spaces are isotropic with their dielectric permittivity depending only on the z coordinate. The plate is anisotropic, and the components of its dielectric permittivity tensor are also z-dependent. F...

Educators, policy-makers, and researchers need to be able to assess the efficacy of specific interventions in schools and school Districts. While student achievement is unquestionably the bottom line, it is essential to open up the educational process so that each major factor influencing student achievement can be examined; indeed as a proverb oft...

This study addresses a timely and crucial topic, the socialization of today's youth, by asking such precise questions as-What are the young socialized for? Which skills, modes of thinking or action are required of them and what are their developmental values? All too often, socialization tends to be viewed within the confines of a particular geogra...

The industrialized countries of Europe, North America, and Asia are now well into a period of economic transformation that appears to be as profound in its social effects as the Industrial Revolution itself. As strategies of production and distribution change dramatically, and as the movement of people and goods across national borders accelerates,...

Lois Weiner (2003) argues that the research reports from High Performance Learning Communities (HPLC) were biased because of the close working relationships between the researchers and the leaders of the Community School District Two (CSD2) reform. Contrary to any claims otherwise, this relationship was quite open and acknowledged. The intent of th...

Using rather general assumptions, wave beam propagation is considered in a medium constituted of two half‐spaces with smoothly changing properties, these latter changing stepwise at the half‐spaces' interface. Expressions for the beam‐shape change in the course of propagation are obtained. General results are applied to a Gaussian beam propagating...

The heating of a half-space filled with conducting medium, by propagating electromagnetic wave beam, is considered when the inner and outer thermal reservoirs are present. An expression for the medium temperature is obtained for an arbitrary beam cross-section shape. Asymptotic formulas for the temperature at distances much longer than the beam wid...

Plane-polarized electromagnetic waves reflected from and transmitted through a plane-parallel gyrotropic plate, reveal conventional spatial and unusual temporal rotation of the polarization plane. The calculations take into account reflection coefficients on the interfaces of the plate with surrounding media. The case of the wavelength for which th...

Experimental distortions of the absorption contour shape, related to non-polarization spectroscopy of anisotropic media, have been considered. These distortions lead to incorrect results for three of the main spectroscopic parameters: intensity, half-width, and shape of the spectral contour. The distortions increase with increasing optical density...

During measurements of the temperature dependence of the conductivity of a gated Si-δ-doped GaAs structure with two 'deep' δ-layers in the depletion regime, a resistance saturation was observed when the temperature decreased below 1 K, instead of the exponential growth expected for the variable-range hopping (VRH) mechanism. A possible origin of th...

The influence of the Schottky gate shape on the low temperature conductivity in gated Si-δ-doped GaAs was investigated. For samples with a gate covering the top and also the mesa edge of the structure, an unexpected low-temperature saturation of the variable-range-hopping conductivity (VRH) was observed at T < 1 K. We show that this effect is defin...

It is observed that at temperatures below 1K the resistance of gated Si–δ-doped GaAs structure in the case of carrier localization exhibits unexpected saturation instead of exponential growth as the variable-range hopping (VRH) mechanism conductivity dictates. We experimentally show that this effect is observed if gate electrode covers both the top...

We present the results of measurements of two-dimensional electron transport in Si-δ-doped GaAs samples compensated with Be acceptors. It is shown that the temperature dependence of longitudinal resistivity Rxx in the interval 1K–100mK is well described by the variable-range-hopping mechanism Rxx(T)=R0exp[(T0/T)1/2] peculiar for strongly localized...

Incl. bibl. Over an 11-year period, Community School District in New York City amassed a strong record of successful school improvement in a diverse urban setting. Nesting learning communities and cognitive apprenticeships are keys to success. Principals are responsible for establishing a pervasive culture of learning and teaching in each school. [...

A good deal of research has addressed the topic of naive physics knowledge, with a focus on the physics domain of classical mechanics. In particular, it has been proposed that novices enter into instruction with an existing, well-defined knowledge base that they have derived from their everyday experiences. Most relevant initial knowledge will be s...

The effects of a nearly complete standards-based system in mathematics were evaluated. The Pittsburgh Public School system, Pennsylvania, has adopted a standards-based system that has been largely put into place between 1992 and 1998. The program includes content and performance standards, standards-based assessments, standards-based instructional...

A temperature-induced crossover from hopping to metallic conductivity is observed for barely insulating samples of Ge:As and Ge:Sb with impurity concentration N just below the critical value . The values of the correlation length are obtained on both sides of the transition. A method is developed for determination of a `delocalization temperature'...

Suggests building U.S. schools around the assumption that effort actually creates ability and outlines the effective features of a system based on this premise: (1) clear expectations; (2) fair evaluation; (3) payoffs for success; (4) the time needed to meet learning expectations; and (5) expert instruction. (SLD)

HE MOST STRIKING FEATURE of the education-reform move- ment in America today is that it is still with us. During the twentieth century, the country has seen many educa- tion-reform efforts come and go with disappointing results. Usually, proposals are made in response to some immediate perceived crisis—a war, an economic downturn, a moment of scien...

A Reply to the Comment by M. P. Sarachik and S. Bogdanovich.

In 1990, we were asked by the Scientific Affairs Division of NATO1 to organize a conference on situated cognition and technologies of learning. In planning the conference, held in Lucca, Italy, in November, 1993, and in recruiting participants, we sought to bring together people from several scholarly disciplines, some of whom might not yet have kn...

Not long ago, projections of how office technologies would revolutionize the production of documents in a high-tech future carriedmany promises. The paper­ less office and the seamless and problem-free sharing of texts and other work materials among co-workers werejust around the corner, we were told. To anyone who has been involved in putting toge...

We show that one can unify the scaling behavior of the conductivity in Ge:As in the vicinity of the metal-insulator transition driven either by the concentration of impurities N or by the magnetic field B by introducing a new scaling variable U=[(N/Nc)-(B/B*)-1], where both the critical impurity concentration Nc and the characteristic magnetic fiel...

A new approach has been developed for the determination of the critical conductivity exponent μ and the critical concentration Nc of the metal-insulator transition without extrapolation of the temperature dependence of the conductivity σ(T) to T = 0. We propose to replace σ(0) by Δσ(T*) = σN(T*)-σNc(T*) at low T*, where σ(T) = a+bTp,p = 1/2 or 1/3...

Recently, standards have become the currency of education reform efforts in the U.S. However, there is no international consensus on what constitutes “world-class” education. The New Standards Project has designed research to describe standards in other countries by using the case-study approach of ethnography to collect data (e.g., curricula, text...

Many have argued for the importance of numeracy, yet little is known about the opportunities for numeracy presented to people in their daily lives. In this study, we analyzed and compared the characteristics of rational numbers in magazines written for children, teenagers, and adults. Our analysis indicates that difficult mathematical concepts that...

Many have argued for the importance of numeracy, yet little is known about the opportunities for numeracy presented to people in their daily lives. In this study, we analyzed and compared the characteristics of rational numbers in magazines written for children, teenagers, and adults. Our analysis indicates that difficult mathematical concepts that...

A method has been developed for determining the effective concentration of shallow impuritiesN * reponsible for the low-temperature conductivity in the vicinity of the metal-insulator transition for inhomogeneous samples of n-Ge:As. The method is based on the measurement of two ratios of sample resistance γ-R(4.2 K)/R(300 K), β=R(2.0 K)/R(4.2 K) an...

This article explores issues involved in using assessments as a means of defining standards and encouraging efforts to meet them. It compares the European examination system with the present American testing system. It also considers issues that must be faced in defining learning domains in ways that do not encourage narrowly focused training on sp...

What is the nature of human thought? A long dominant view holds that the mind is a general problem-solving device that approaches all questions in much the same way. Chomsky's theory of language, which revolutionised linguistics, challenged this claim, contending that children are primed to acquire some skills, like language, in a manner largely in...

This article explores issues involved in using assessments as a means of defining standards and encouraging efforts to meet them. It compares the European examination system with the present American testing system. It also considers issues that must be faced in defining learning domains in ways that do not encourage narrowly focused training on sp...

Performance standards are a powerful means to begin the process of systemic educational change. An educational culture must be created in which standards become the internalized goals of everyone in the system. Principles for developing internalized standards are discussed, along with appropriate government roles. (JDD)