scholarly journals Students’ Views on the Use of Critical Thinking-Based Pedagogical Approach for Vocabulary Instruction

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 116
Author(s):  
Tariq Elyas ◽  
Budor S. Al-Zahrani
Keyword(s):  
Critical Thinking ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Life Experiences ◽  
Vocabulary Instruction ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Language Classrooms ◽  
Training Courses

This research aimed to explore students’ views towards the use of a critical thinking pedagogical model for vocabulary instruction. From this end, a questionnaire was utilized to collect both quantitative and qualitative data to investigate the students’ opinions about such an educational experience. Data analysis revealed that the meaningful and purposeful critical thinking vocabulary tasks triggered learners’ motivation while engaging their higher cognitive abilities in solving the tasks and enabling them to reflect on their topics based on their personal and life experiences. This challenging process led learners to have more opportunities for practicing ‘elaborative rehearsal’, and as a result, to process the targeted vocabulary deeper. This created a stronger association with the taught vocabulary, which ultimately enabled them to be encoded in the learners’ long-term memory. Based on these findings, the authors recommend that teachers, teacher educators, and curriculum designers should draw upon the findings of these studies and consider the advisability of embedding critical thinking-based teaching methods across all strata of the EFL teaching system: policy documents, curricula, teacher training courses and the language classrooms.

scholarly journals Habitat and social context affect memory phenotype, exploration and covariance among these traits

2018 ◽  
Vol 373 (1756) ◽  
pp. 20170291 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Dalesman
Keyword(s):  
Individual Differences ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Lymnaea Stagnalis ◽  
Memory Formation ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Wild Populations ◽  
In Captivity ◽  
Specific Trait ◽  
Context Specific

Individual differences in cognitive ability are predicted to covary with other behavioural traits such as exploration and boldness. Selection within different habitats may act to either enhance or break down covariance among traits; alternatively, changing the environmental context in which traits are assessed may result in plasticity that alters trait covariance. Pond snails, Lymnaea stagnalis , from two laboratory strains (more than 20 generations in captivity) and F1 laboratory reared from six wild populations were tested for long-term memory and exploration traits (speed and thigmotaxis) following maintenance in grouped and isolated conditions to determine if isolation: (i) alters memory and exploration; and (ii) alters covariance between memory and exploration. Populations that demonstrated strong memory formation (longer duration) under grouped conditions demonstrated weaker memory formation and reduced both speed and thigmotaxis following isolation. In wild populations, snails showed no relationship between memory and exploration in grouped conditions; however, following isolation, exploration behaviour was negatively correlated with memory, i.e. slow-explorers showing low levels of thigmotaxis formed stronger memories. Laboratory strains demonstrated no covariance among exploration traits and memory independent of context. Together these data demonstrate that the relationship between cognition and exploration traits can depend on both habitat and context-specific trait plasticity. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Causes and consequences of individual differences in cognitive abilities’.

scholarly journals The Effect of Chronic Treatment with Lacosamide and Topiramate on Cognitive Functions and Impaired Emotional Responses in a Pilocarpine-induced Post-status Epilepticus Rat Model

Folia Medica ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 62 (4) ◽  
pp. 723-729
Author(s):  
Michaela Shishmanova-Doseva ◽  
Jana Tchekalarova ◽  
Zlatina Nenchovska ◽  
Natasha Ivanova ◽  
Katerina Georgieva ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Status Epilepticus ◽  
Antiepileptic Drugs ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Anxiolytic Effect ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Memory Retention ◽  
Learning Session ◽  
Term Memory ◽  
Early Retention

Introduction: Epilepsy and antiepileptic drugs can affect negatively the cognitive abilities of patients. Aim: The present study aimed to evaluate the effect of topiramate (TPM) and lacosamide (LCM) on the emotional and cognitive re-sponses in naive animals and in animals with pilocarpine-induced status epilepticus.  Materials and methods: Male Wistar rats were randomly divided into 6 groups and status epilepticus was evoked in half of them by a single i.p. administration of pilocarpine (Pilo) (320 mg/kg): Pilo-veh, Pilo-TPM (80 mg/kg) and Pilo-LCM (30 mg/kg). Matched naive rats were treated with the same doses as follows: C-veh, C-TPM, and C-LCM. In a step-down passive avoidance test, the learning session was held for one day, the early retention test was conducted on day 2, and the long-term memory test - on day 7. Motor activity and anxiety were evaluated in an open field test.  Results: The Pilo-TPM and Pilo-LCM groups increased the time spent on the platform compared to Pilo-veh animals while the C-LCM animals decreased the time compared to C-veh animals during short- and long-term memory retention tests. TPM and LCM exerted an anxiolytic effect in naive rats. The two antiepileptic drugs were unable to alleviate the hyperactivity, but they alleviated the impulsivity associated with decreased anxiety level in epileptic rats. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that LCM and TPM have a beneficial effect on cognition both in naive and epileptic rats. While the two antiepileptic drugs can produce an anxiolytic effect in naive rats, they alleviate the impulsivity after pilocarpine treatment.

Teaching Critical Thinking and Team Based Concept Mapping

2010 ◽  
pp. 171-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dawndra Meers-Scott ◽  
LesLee Taylor ◽  
John Pelley
Keyword(s):  
Critical Thinking ◽  
Problem Solving ◽  
Collaborative Learning ◽  
Concept Mapping ◽  
Concept Maps ◽  
Personality Types ◽  
New Method ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Group Activities

Critical thinking cannot be fully developed without involvement in collaborative learning activities that elicit problem solving dialogue. Concept maps are effective tools for dialogue because they require decisions about the organization of and the relationships between facts and concepts. This active decision making process develops both long term memory and the ability to apply that knowledge. The authors describe a new method for incorporating scored concept maps into an established collaborative learning method, Team-Based Learning, as a way to improve the effectiveness of individual preparation and for enhancing the problem solving dialogue during group activities. Their new method, Team-Based Concept Mapping, has advantages for students with different personality types and with different backgrounds because it provides greater clarity and precision in the group dialogue. The effect of concept mapping on the interaction between different personality types is discussed and suggestions for future studies to develop this method are offered.

scholarly journals Teacher Educators Using Encounter Stories

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danné Davis ◽  
Janna Kellinger
Keyword(s):  
Black Women ◽  
Prospective Teachers ◽  
Qualitative Data ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Life Experiences ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Social Needs ◽  
Heterosexual Women ◽  
Michelle Obama ◽  
K 12

Many prospective teachers are unaware of the encounters that Black, heterosexual women or White lesbians face. Here, we present encounter stories—individual narratives of poignant encounters and interactions that we have experienced with people unlike us—to identify with and ultimately draw on their experiences. Subsequently, the narratives become data that not only inform our work as teacher educators and scholars but also are used to shape prospective teachers’ understanding of inimitable difference. Despite the heralded affirming visibility of Michelle Obama and Ellen Degeneres, oppressive practices and perspectives against Black women and lesbians continue. Our encounter stories are put forward as qualitative data that goes against the grain and empowers. Further, our narratives challenge the conventional linear written format by intersecting our authentic voices with extant theory. Given the growing diversity in K-12 education, it is crucial that prospective teachers gain meaningful insight of unique, real life experiences, examine those experiences against their own familiarities to recognize sameness amid difference. Subsequently, this recognition will help to situate prospective teachers to meet the curricular and social needs of all schoolchildren.

scholarly journals Impairment in Long-Term Memory Formation and Learning-Dependent Synaptic Plasticity in Mice Lacking Glycogen Synthase in the Brain

2013 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 550-556 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jordi Duran ◽  
Isabel Saez ◽  
Agnes Gruart ◽  
Joan J Guinovart ◽  
José M Delgado-García
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Glycogen Synthase ◽  
Long Term Potentiation ◽  
Normal Activity ◽  
Synaptic Strength ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Brain Functions ◽  
The Brain

Glycogen is the only carbohydrate reserve of the brain, but its overall contribution to brain functions remains unclear. Although it has traditionally been considered as an emergency energetic reservoir, increasing evidence points to a role of glycogen in the normal activity of the brain. To address this long-standing question, we generated a brain-specific Glycogen Synthase knockout (GYS1Nestin-KO) mouse and studied the functional consequences of the lack of glycogen in the brain under alert behaving conditions. These animals showed a significant deficiency in the acquisition of an associative learning task and in the concomitant activity-dependent changes in hippocampal synaptic strength. Long-term potentiation (LTP) evoked in the hippocampal CA3-CA1 synapse was also decreased in behaving GYS1Nestin-KO mice. These results unequivocally show a key role of brain glycogen in the proper acquisition of new motor and cognitive abilities and in the underlying changes in synaptic strength.

scholarly journals The Way of Learning Preserved in The Structure of Individual Experience Shapes Task-Switching: Implications for Neuroscience and Education

2021 ◽  
pp. 291-299
Author(s):  
Alexey A. Sozinov ◽  
Anastasiia V. Bakhchinaa ◽  
Yuri I. Alexandrov
Keyword(s):  
Task Switching ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Task Difficulty ◽  
Brain Activity ◽  
Cognitive Effort ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Individual Experience ◽  
Fundamental Field ◽  
History Of

Task switching is a behavioral phenomenon that serves as a tool for assessment of individual cognitive abilities that becomes especially essential in our multitasking milieu. Factors of task-switching include cognitive load and cognitive effort, mostly derived from task difficulty, as well as age and practice. The analysis of brain activity on the level of single neurons shows that the activations that contribute to task performance and switching differ with respect to the protocol of learning the alternated tasks. We argue that task switching is affected by the history of learning and in turn it changes the structure of individual experience. On this basis we outline perspectives of task switching studies in the fundamental field of long-term memory and applied field of education and therapy.

scholarly journals The Relationship between EFL Teachers’ Critical Thinking and Use of Motivational Strategies

2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 14
Author(s):  
Gholamreza Parsi
Keyword(s):  
Critical Thinking ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Rank Order ◽  
Motivational Strategies ◽  
Efl Teachers ◽  
Training Courses ◽  
Language Schools ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

The present study was conducted to investigate the relationship between EFL teachers’ critical thinking and use of motivational strategies. The participants of this study were 101 EFL teachers. These teachers were both male and female between 21 to 36 years old, and they taught intermediate and advanced levels and varied in their experience from 3 to 17 years. They were chosen randomly from private language schools in Mashhad and two questionnaires were given to them: A questionnaire to evaluate the use of motivational strategies (Cheng and Dornyei, 2007) and another questionnaire to estimate their critical thinking (Honey, 2000).To fulfill the objective of the study, a Spearman Rank Order Correlational analysis was conducted to investigate any significant relationship between the two variables. The results showed that there is no correlation between critical thinking and motivational strategies. This result may help teacher educators to consider the relationship of critical thinking and teachers’ use of motivational strategies as an integral part of the teaching and learning process in teacher training courses. 

scholarly journals The Effects of Psychosocial Stress on Memory and Cognitive Ability: A Meta-Analysis

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth McManus ◽  
Deborah Talmi ◽  
Hamied Haroon ◽  
Nils Muhlert
Keyword(s):  
Social Interactions ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Psychosocial Stress ◽  
Animal Studies ◽  
Web Of Science ◽  
Meta Analysis ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Stress Induction ◽  
The Impact

AbstractThe impact of stress on cognitive abilities, such as memory, is well documented in animal studies but it is not yet clear how stress in human social interactions affects memory. This review systematically explored the evidence regarding the effects of psychosocial stress on memory and associated cognitive abilities. PubMed, PsycInfo and Web of Science databases were searched for studies assessing the effects of psychosocial stress on long-term memory or related cognitive functions. Fifty-one studies were identified and compared based on the timing of stress induction. No overall effect of psychosocial stress induction was seen on long-term or working memory regardless of whether stress induction occurred following encoding or before retrieval. Psychosocial stress had a moderate effect in studies comparing memory for emotional compared to neutral stimuli, but the direction of this effect varied across studies. Psychosocial stress decreased performance on executive function tasks. Our findings demonstrate that psychosocial stress may not have the clear effects on memory previously ascribed to it, suggesting potentially different mechanisms from physiological stressors.

Influence of Variations in Body Hydration on Cognitive Function

2000 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Cian ◽  
N. Koulmann ◽  
P.A. Barraud ◽  
C. Raphel ◽  
C. Jimenez ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Short Term Memory ◽  
Recovery Period ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Term Memory ◽  
Arm Crank Ergometer ◽  
Subjective Estimates ◽  
Passive Hyperthermia

Abstract Eight healthy men, unacclimated to heat, were submitted to variations in body hydration. The subjects were kept euhydrated, dehydrated by controlled passive hyperthermia or exercise on a treadmill up to a weight loss of 2.8%, or hyperhydrated using a solution containing glycerol, with a total ingested volume equal to 21.4 ml/kg of body weight. On completion of a 90-min recovery period, the subjects were assigned a pedaling exercise on an arm-crank ergometer. Psychological tests were administered 30 min after the phase of hydration variation and 15 min after the arm crank exercise. Both dehydration conditions impaired cognitive abilities (i.e., perceptive discrimination, psycho-motor skills, and short-term memory) as well as subjective estimates of fatigue, without any relevant differences between them. Short-term memory was significantly greater following hyperhydration when compared to euhydration (P < .05). Following arm crank exercise, further effects of dehydration were found for tracking performance only (P < .05). Moreover, long-term memory was impaired in both control and dehydration situations, whereas there was no decrement in performance in the hyperhydration condition.

scholarly journals Protein-bound uremic toxins are associated with cognitive function among patients undergoing maintenance hemodialysis

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yi-Ting Lin ◽  
Ping-Hsun Wu ◽  
Shih-Shin Liang ◽  
Mwenya Mubanga ◽  
Yuan-Han Yang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Function ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Uremic Toxins ◽  
Free Form ◽  
Maintenance Hemodialysis ◽  
Long Term Memory ◽  
Negatively Associated ◽  
Manipulation Language ◽  
State Examination

AbstractPatients with chronic kidney disease have a greater risk of cognitive impairment. Cerebral uremic solute accumulation causes uremic encephalopathy; however, the association of protein-bound uremic toxins on cognitive function remains unclear. The present study aimed to investigate the association of two protein-bound uremic toxins, namely indoxyl sulfate (IS) and p-cresyl sulfate (PCS), on cognitive function in patients receiving hemodialysis (HD) for at least 90 days. Circulating free form IS and PCS were quantified by liquid chromatography/mass spectrometry. Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and Cognitive Abilities Screening Instrument (CASI) were used to evaluate cognitive function. In total, 260 HD patients were recruited with a mean age of 58.1 ± 11.3 years, of which, 53.8% were men, 40% had diabetes, and 75.4% had hypertension. The analysis revealed that both free IS and free PCS were negatively associated with the CASI score and MMSE. After controlling for confounders, circulating free IS levels persisted to be negatively associated with MMSE scores [β = −0.62, 95% confidence interval (CI): −1.16 to −0.08] and CASI scores (β = −1.97, 95% CI: −3.78 to −0.16), mainly in the CASI domains of long-term memory, mental manipulation, language ability, and spatial construction. However, there was no correlation between free PCS and total MMSE or total CASI scores after controlling for confounders. In conclusion, circulating free form IS, but not PCS is associated with lower cognitive function test scores in HD patients. Thus, a further study is needed to evaluate whether a decrease in free IS levels can slow down cognitive decline in HD patients.

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