The purpose of the study was to examine children's intuitive knowledge in the field of physical science, eliciting their theories of gravity and motion. Six grade seven children were interviewed across three tasks using a 'demonstration-interview' technique. The three tasks involved the motion of balls of different mass rolling down an inclined plane, falling freely in air, and falling in a water-filled tube. In each task, children were asked to predict and explain what would happen when one ball is 'let go', and when two balls of equal size but different mass were 'let go'. They were allowed to observe the phenomenon, and explain what they observed. Also, each child was asked to predict and explain what would happen when the experiment is done in a hypothetical situation on the moon, and in a space craft in outer space. The results of the study confirmed the commonly held ideas children maintain of gravity and motion, and yet illuminated some new connections between gravity and other factors. Having conducted the interviews across three tasks, a rich amount of information was revealed, and a variety of possible structures of children's conceptual frameworks of gravity and motion was deduced. The study revealed that children's prior knowledge has an impact on the acquisition of science concepts as taught through formal schooling. Their ideas persist in spite of the classroom schooling they receive. Therefore it is often necessary to restructure this prior knowledge before new knowledge can be properly incorporated into their conceptual frameworks. The study suggests that educators, as well as curriculum writers, need to re-examine the instructional methods and the role of inquiry in science education. / Education, Faculty of / Graduate

After many years of teaching experience in a school where good citizenship prevailed among the students, it has been rather surprising recently to find that standards of conduct formerly observed are being disregarded. It has been noted that this is a rather general situation throughout the city and in other localities and not existing in just one school. The object of this study was to seek some of the causes back of the records of poor citizenship among pupils and make some definite plans for improvement. / Typescript. / "August, 1949." / "Submitted to the Graduate Council of Florida State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts under Plan II." / Advisor: W. Edwards, Professor Directing Paper. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 42-43).

"The purpose of this paper is to report some learning experiences planned by a teacher and her third grade pupils that led to a better understanding of community resources and community life. To give a clear, yet brief, picture of how this third grade project developed, the writer has found it advisable: (1) to present some reasons why planning for community study is important; (2) to describe the scope of the study undertaken with a third grade group, and to list some of the major activities; (3) to tell briefly what the study meant to the children and to the teacher who guided them. In organizing the project which did so much to enrich the social living of the pupils, it was found that subject matter material from history, health and science contributed a great deal. Thus the project while not text-book centered did not eliminate the use of printed material of many kinds including the state adopted text books"--Introduction. / Typescript. / "August, 1958." / "Submitted to the Graduate Council of Florida State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science." / Advisor: W. Edwards, Professor Directing Paper. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 27-28).

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Currently, the pre-primary education curriculum in Hong Kong is using an Integrated Thematic Approach. In language learning, teaching activities are random and there is a lack of systematic teaching of Chinese characters. The aim of this study is to construct a theory in the teaching and learning of Chinese characters for preschoolers and to investigate the effectiveness of the “Young Children Integrative and Effective Approach” (IEA). The theoretical framework of this research is based on the Integrative and Effective Approach and includes other word recognition theory, young children vocabulary acquisition and metalinguistic awareness research to further construct the IEA. The researcher has used multiple-case study method, including teaching experiments, classroom observations, interviews of teachers and young children, and analysis of young children’s work samples, in the collection of data. The samples of this research come from two individual schools. The first case study isthe lower class of School A (n=30); and the second case study is the upper class of School B (n=26).Each case is divided into the experimental group and control group. The researcher conducted the research in the two schools, and invited the young children to attend the word recognition pre-test and post-test. For in-depth investigation, the researcher followed up on the learning of three children of different abilities of the experimental group in School A in the second year. The research results were divided into two parts. In the first part, findings from the paired-samples t-test analysis showed that the young children in the experimental group using the IEA had significant improvement in word recognition. The data collected through classroom observations, teacher interviews and young children’s work sample analysis illustrated that the effectiveness of IEA lies in enhancing the young children’s learning of the meaning, sound and shape of Chinese characters. As for the second part, findings from Two-way ANCOVA (teaching method x ability group) showed that young children of the middle and lower ability from the experimental group had significant improvement in the word recognition test compared with the control group. Moreover the data collected through the sample works of the three young children of different abilities from the experimental group and interviews indicated that IEA could continuously improve preschoolers of different abilities in their learning of Chinese characters throughout the two years. The contributions of this study include filling the research gap, and developing a theoretical framework. The findings of the study could serve as a reference for early childhood teacher training, and for the development of curriculum and teaching materials. 香港的學前教育，主要採用「主題教學」的綜合課程模式，其中語文範疇變成隨機的教學活動，缺乏識字教學的系統。本研究的目的是建構幼兒識字學與教的理論及探討實踐「幼兒綜合高效識字法(高效法)」的效果。 本研究的理論，建基於「綜合高效識字法」，包括其他的識字理論、幼兒的詞彙習得及元語言意識的研究，進一步發展「高效法」的理論框架。 研究者採用多重個案設計，包括教學實驗、課堂觀察、教師及幼兒訪談、幼兒作品分析，從多渠道搜集資料。研究對象以兩所學校為整體單位。第一個案是學校甲的低班,共30人﹔第二個案是學校乙的高班，共26人。各個個案再分為實驗組和控制組。研究員在兩所學校進行教學實驗，並邀請幼兒參與識字的前後測試。為了增強研究的深度，第二年跟進學校甲實驗組3位不同能力幼兒的學習。 研究結果分為兩部分，第一部分，從配對T檢驗的分析，結果顯示「高效法」能全面提升幼兒的識字能力。其次，從實驗組的課堂觀察、教師訪談及幼兒作品的資料分析，結果深入了解「高效法」有效的特點，在於能促進幼兒的形音義發展。 第二部分，從二因子共變數(教學法x能力組別)的分析，結果顯示相對於控制組別，「高效法」能提升中能力或低能力幼兒的識字能力。其次，從實驗組3位不同能力幼兒的作品及訪談資料的分析，結果顯示「高效法」能持續於兩年增進不同能力幼兒的識字學習。 本研究的貢獻包括填補了幼兒識字教學法的研究缺口，並且發展幼兒識字學與教的理論框架。而研究所得，可應用於幼兒教育的教師培訓，以及發展識字課程及教材。 / published_or_final_version / Education / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

The development of Discipline-based Art Education (DBAE) has focused attention on curricular structure, especially as it relates to the concept of students' creative expression. Creative self-expression, the focus of many school art programs, is to encourage students' art production. Discipline-based art education in contrast strives to develop students' artistic expression. Achievement of artistic expression requires conceptually focused instruction of art content from four art disciplines, art history, art criticism, studio production, and aesthetics. A discipline-based lesson can be examined for the way artistic expression is fostered as a part of production. Specific examples drawn from one lesson are used to illustrate that artistic expression can be recognizable, sensitive to instruction, and subject to evaluation.

Yeung Pui Lam. / Thesis submitted in: December 2003. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2004. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 99-102). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Table of Content --- p.i / List of Tables --- p.iv / List of Figures --- p.v / Abstract --- p.vi / Chapter Chapter 1 --- INTRODUCTION / Research Background --- p.1 / Purpose and Significance of Study --- p.6 / Organization of the Thesis --- p.8 / Chapter Chapter 2 --- CONCEPTS OF UNIT / Introduction --- p.10 / Concepts of Unit as Key Concepts for Transforming Learning from Whole Numbers to Rational Numbers --- p.11 / Development of Unit Concepts across Additive and Multiplication Conceptual Fields --- p.11 / Six Aspects of Unit Concepts --- p.15 / Formation of Units in Rational Number Situation by Partitioning --- p.19 / Formation of Singleton and Composition Unit --- p.22 / A Flexible Concept of Measurement Unit --- p.23 / Decomposition and Composition of Unit --- p.23 / Reconstructing the Unit Whole --- p.24 / Fraction Equivalence --- p.24 / Chapter Chapter 3 --- SITUATIONS OF MULTIPLICATION AND DIVISION / Introduction --- p.26 / Semantics of Rational Numbers --- p.27 / Part-whole Subconstruct / Part-whole Comparison --- p.27 / Quotient --- p.28 / Operators --- p.31 / Measures --- p.32 / Ratio --- p.32 / Structures of Multiplication and Division --- p.34 / Vergnaud's Interpretation on Multiplicative Structures- --- p.35 / Isomorphism of measures --- p.35 / Product of measures --- p.38 / Multiple Proportion --- p.39 / Greer's Classification on Multiplication/Division Situations --- p.40 / Relationship between Unit Concepts and Rational Number Multiplication and Division --- p.46 / The Role of Unit in the Scope of Rational Numberśؤ --- p.46 / Children's Implicit Model of Fraction Multiplication / Division --- p.47 / The Role of Unit in Multiplication/Division Situation --- p.49 / Research Question --- p.54 / Influence of Concepts of Unit in Students' Solving Rational Number Multiplication and Division --- p.55 / The Development of Unit Concepts in the Course of Learning --- p.57 / Chapter Chapter 4 --- METHODOLOGY / Design --- p.58 / Participants --- p.58 / Instruments --- p.59 / Unit concept test --- p.60 / Fraction multiplication and division test --- p.61 / Procedures --- p.62 / Research Hypothesis --- p.63 / Chapter Chapter 5 --- RESULTS / Dimensions of the Unit Concepts --- p.67 / Relationship between Various Concepts of Unit and Fraction multiplication and division Performance --- p.68 / Relationship between unit concepts and rational number multiplication and division situational problem --- p.69 / Differentiated relationship between unit concepts and situational vs. symbolic rational number multiplication and division --- p.71 / Relationship between unit concepts and types of situational rational number multiplication and division- --- p.73 / Relationship between Grade Level and Performance on Measures of Unit Concepts and Rational Number Multiplication and Division --- p.83 / Chapter Chapter 6 --- DISCUSSION / Summary of Findings --- p.87 / Importance of Concepts of Unit --- p.88 / Dimension of concepts of unit --- p.88 / Relationship between concepts of unit and situational problems --- p.89 / Differentiated impacts of concepts of unit on situational problems and symbolic problems --- p.90 / Differentiated impacts of concepts of unit between multiplication and division problems --- p.91 / Implications of the Findings for Development of Concepts of Unit and Mathematics Learning --- p.92 / Research Implication --- p.92 / Instructional Implication --- p.93 / Limitations in the Study --- p.94 / Directions for Future Research --- p.96 / Conclusion --- p.97 / References --- p.99 / Appendices / Appendix 1: The questionnaire used in present study --- p.104 / Appendix 2: The characteristics of items in Questionnaire I- --- p.115 / Appendix 3: The characteristics of situational problems of fraction multiplication and divisionin questionnaire II --- p.116 / Appendix 4: The CFA model of concepts of unit --- p.117 / Appendix 5: Sample cases for illustrating strategiesin solving situational problems --- p.118