FINDING:

Teachers who establish classrooms characterized by an open, democratic climate promote learning because such a classroom climate correlates significantly with the development of critical and creative thinking abilities.

FINDING:

Teachers who teach creative problem-solving strategies improve learning by providing students with general purpose problem-solving tools appropriate for a variety of situations.

FINDING:

Teachers who employ cooperative learning methods promote learning because these collaborative experiences engage students in an interactive approach to processing information, resulting in greater retention of subject matter, improved attitudes toward learning and enhanced interpersonal relations among group members.

FINDING:

Teachers who teach thinking skills and processes directly promote learning because such explicit instruction helps students to better understand and more effectively apply the types of thinking required by the curriculum.

FINDING:

Teachers who teach concepts inductively through the use of examples and non-examples promote learning because this strategy actively involves students in structing a personal understanding of a new concept.

FINDING:

Teachers who utilize graphic organizers with their students promote learning because knowledge that is organized into holistic conceptual frameworks is more easily remembered and understood than unstructured bits of information.

FINDING:
By attending to students' srengths and helping develop other areas, teachers accommodate more learners and give students a greater repertoire of problem solving tools.

FINDING:
Teachers who help students develop and internalize metacognitive strategies through direct instruction, modeling, and use of practice, promote learning because the effective use of such strategies is one of the primary differences between more and less able learners.

Incorporate extensive reading of varied kinds of material.

Foster interactive learning.

Extend students' background knowledge.

Utilize meaning-making skills and strategies such as summarizing, questioning, and interpreting.

Organize instruction into broad, thematically-based clusters of work.

Teach critical reading/writing skills.

Emphasize discussion and analysis.

Stress the composing processes.

Provide balanced attention to different forms of reading, writing, and speaking.

Provide early intervention.

Expose students to varied kinds of literature.

Provide assessment that reflects the content and process of instruction.

Focus instruction on the development of important mathematical ideas.

Incorporate the use of calculators.

Work with small groups of children.

Increase amount of time spent on mathematics.

Focus on number sense.

Utilize concrete materials for mathematics instruction on a long-term basis.

Encourage students' intuitive solution methods for problem solving and allow for interaction and discussion in this process.

Utilize the learning cycle approach (exploration, invention, and application).

Utilize cooperative learning for classroom and laboratory instruction.

Use analogies for the development of conceptual understandings.

Provide wait time after asking questions.

Use student-generated and teacher-generated concept maps.

Incorporate computer simulations.

Use computers to collect and display data.

Employ systematic approaches in problem solving.

Encourage qualitative understanding of concepts to solve quantitative problems.

Use a Science-Technology-Society approach.

Incorporate real-life situations.

Use discrepant events to produce cognitive conflict.

Encourage thoughtful classroom climates that promote higher-order thinking.

Utilize the jurisprudential approach.

Teach critical thinking skills and strategies in the context of content knowledge, with attention to their appropriate applications.

Support concept development by using definitions, examples and non-examples, exploration of relations to other concepts, and students' prior knowledge.

Incorporate effective phrasing, pacing, and distribution of questions and responses to students' answers.

Encourage cognitive prejudice reduction by developing reasoning skills to draw valid inferences about group differences.

Utilize computer data-bases and simulations in social studies.

Encourage community service.

Incorporate constructivist teaching strategies.