Discusses the nature and function of mental models, explains tools for exploratory and expressive learning, and describes a research program to be conducted in the United Kingdom for 10- to 16-year-olds that is designed to explore characteristics of students' mental models. Highlights include knowledge domains; software, including simulations; and…

Describes a survey of teachers enrolling in postgraduate courses in Great Britain that was conducted to determine prior information technology experience and what the students perceived as information technology training needs. Highlights include differences between primary and secondary teachers, gender issues, age, and computer ownership. (16…

Describes a study of 328 British secondary school students that examined their attitudes toward computers in relation to gender, computer-related courses at school, and the availability of a computer at home. Use of the Computer Attitude Scale (CATT) is described, results are analyzed, and practical and theoretical implications for instructional…

Describes results of a survey of student teachers in the United Kingdom who described their experiences with information technology (IT) during their final primary teaching practice. Data are related to an earlier survey of the same students during their first teaching practice to explore changes in their practices and beliefs about IT. (14…

Describes implementation, support, and evaluation of computer assisted learning (CAL) projects at three universities: Project Athena at Massachusetts Institute of Technology; the Andrew network at Carnegie Mellon University; and a project at Stanford University. Topics discussed include work stations, microcomputers, computer networks, graphics,…

Discussion of research on computers in education in The Netherlands focuses on the development of a national plan for research. The organization of educational research in The Netherlands is explained, experimental programs among groups of schools are described, and research themes for the future are suggested. (six references) (LRW)

Discusses the use of new information technology in schools and reviews research on the psychology of learning and instruction. Highlights include a theory of expertise; individual differences in learning; the role of prior knowledge; social interaction and learning; transfer of cognitive skills; and designing computer-based learning environments.…

Describes the design and development of inservice teacher education courses on application of computer assisted instruction (CAI) in art classrooms, and summarizes participating teachers' opinions on educational value of computer software and peripheral equipment for specific art applications to which they were introduced during the session. (MBR)

Presents results of a survey of British secondary school students which was conducted to obtain information about microcomputer use both in school and at home. Highlights include gender differences, students' attitudes toward computers, experience with computers, assessment of programming ability, and characteristics of competent programmers. (LRW)

Summarizes development of QUEST, a family of general purpose data handling computer programs which support existing curricula; demonstrates their usefulness for administrative recordkeeping and in elementary school history and geography courses for managing large amounts of data from varied sources (i.e., census materials); and compares QUEST with…

An investigation of how secondary students coped when taught binary arithmetic through a computer assisted instruction program used four treatment groups: learner control, learner control with advice; random program control, and adaptive program control. The random group performed less well, but no differences were found between learner and…