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— William Blake

Does the Eagle know what is in the pit?

Or wilt thou go ask the Mole:

Can Wisdom be put in a silver rod?

Or Love in a golden bowl?

…

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noun

One who, or that which, accelerates.

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DOCUMENT RESUME

45 lines
Henry Howard
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E 012 318Thoyre, Henry HowardA Pilot Study on the Use of Small-Group Discussion ina Mathematics Course for Preservice Elementary SchoolTeachers. Final Report.Wisconsin State Universities Consortium of ResearchDevelopment, Stevens Point.Office of Education (DHEW), Washington, D.C. Bureauof Research.BR-6-2728-44May 70OEG-3-6-062728-2129170p. MF-$0.65 HC-$6.58 College Mathematics; Discussion (Teaching Technique) ;*Elementary School Teachers; *Group Discussion;*Mathematics Education; *Preservice Education;Research; Small Group Instruction; *TeacherEducation; Teaching Techniques Reported are the results of an investigation of the effects of small-group discussions in mathematics classes forpreservice elementary school teachers. The content of the courseincluded modern algebraic and geometric concepts. Both classes weretaught by the same instructor and studied from the same set ofunderstanding of the interdependence of all segments of the totalenvironment. allotment: review lecture (5 minutes), class discussion (10 minutes), new material lecture (10 minutes), and class discussion (25 minutes). The "small-group" class used this allotment: review andnew material lecture (10 minutes), small-group discussion {30minutes), and class discussion (10 minutes). The size of thediscussion groups alternated weekly between three and four students.Group composition was randomly determined. Group leadership wasrotated daily. The following measures were analyzed: (1)computational skills, (2) achievement on examinations of independentreading ability in mathematics, (3) attitude toward mathematics, and(4) overall course achievement. The differences which were analyzedand found to be significant included: (1) the post-test measure ofcomputational skills for the small-group class was better (.05) thanthe pretest measure, (2) the independent reading measure for theupper half of the small-group was better (-01) than that of the upperhalf of the lecture class. Other differences found between criterionmeasures were not significant. (Author/RS) sens = = Fe
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