Educational Psychology 13e by Woolfolk

Educational Psychology by Woolfolk (13th edition) is the 13th edition of the Educational Psychology textbook authored by Anita Woolfolk, The Ohio State University, and published by Pearson Education Limited in 2016.

• Absence seizure. A seizure involving only a small part of the brain that causes a child to lose contact briefly with ongoing events -- short lapses of consciousness.
• Academic language. The entire range of language used in elementary, secondary, and university-level schools including words, concepts, strategies, and processes from academic subjects.
• Academic learning time. Time when students are actually succeeding at the learning task.
• Academic tasks. The work the student must accomplish, including the product expected, resources available, and the mental operations required.
• Accommodation. Altering existing schemes or creating new ones in response to new information.
• Accountable. Making teachers and schools responsible for student learning, usually by monitoring learning with high-stakes tests.
• Achievement tests. Standardized tests measuring how much students have learned in a given content area.
• Acronym. Technique for remembering by using the first letter of each word in a phrase to form a new, memorable word.
• Action research. Systematic observations or tests of methods conducted by teachers or schools to improve teaching and learning for their students.
• Action zone. Area of a classroom where the greatest amount of interaction takes place.
• Active teaching. Teaching characterized by high levels of teacher explanation, demonstration, and interaction with students.
• Adaptation. Adjustment to the environment.
• Adaptive teaching. Provides all students with challenging instruction and uses supports when needed, but removes these supports as students become able to handle more on their own.
• Adolescent egocentrism. Assumption that everyone else shares one's thoughts, feelings, and concerns.
• Advance organizer. Statement of inclusive concepts to introduce and sum up material that follows.
• Affective domain. Objectives focusing on attitudes and feelings.
• Algorithm. Step-by-step procedure for solving a problem; prescription for solutions.
• Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA). Federal legislation prohibiting discrimination against persons with disabilities in employment, transportation, public access, local government, and telecommunications.
• Amotivation. A complete lack of any intent to act -- no engagement at all.
• Analogical thinking. Heuristic in which one limits the search for solutions to situations that are similar to the one at hand.
• Anorexia nervosa. Eating disorder characterized by very limited food intake.
• Antecedents. Events that precede an action.
• Anxiety. General uneasiness, a feeling of tension.
• Applied behavior analysis. The application of behavioral learning principles to understand and change behavior.
• Appropriating. Being able to internalize or take for yourself knowledge and skills developed in interaction with others or with cultural tools.
• Argumentation. The process of debating a claim with someone else.
• Arousal. Physical and psychological reactions causing a person to feel alert, attentive, wide awake, excited, or tense.
• Articulation disorders. Any of a variety of pronunciation difficulties, such as the substitution, distortion, or omission of sounds.
• Assertive discipline. Clear, firm, nonhostile response style.
• Assessment. Procedures used to obtain information about student performance.
• Assessment bias. Qualities of an assessment instrument that offend or unfairly penalize a group of students because of the students' gender, socioeconomic status, race, ethnicity, and so on.
• Assimilation. Fitting new information into existing schemes.
• Assisted learning. Providing strategic help in the initial stages of learning, gradually diminishing as students gain independence.
• Assistive technology. Devices, systems, and services that support and improve the capabilities of individuals with disabilities.
• Attachment. Forming an emotional bond with another person, initially a parent or family member.
• Attention. Focus on a stimulus.
• Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Current term for disruptive behavior disorders marked by overactivity, excessive difficulty sustaining attention, or impulsiveness.
• Attribution theories. Descriptions of how individuals' explanations, justifications, and excuses influence their motivation and behavior.
• Authentic assessments. Assessment procedures that test skills and abilities as they would be applied in real-life situations.
• Authentic task. Tasks that have some connection to real-life problems the students will face outside the classroom.
• Autism/Autism spectrum disorders. Developmental disability significantly affecting verbal and nonverbal communication and social interaction, generally evident before age 3 and ranging from mild to major.
• Automated basic skills. Skills that are applied without conscious thought.
• Automaticity. The ability to perform thoroughly learned tasks without much mental effort. The result of learning to perform a behavior or thinking process so thoroughly that the performance is automatic and does not require effort.
• Autonomy. Independence.
• Availability heuristic. Judging the likelihood of an event based on what is available in your memory, assuming those easily remembered events are common.
• Aversive. Irritating or unpleasant.
• Balanced bilingualism. Adding a second language capability without losing your heritage language.
• Basic skills. Clearly structured knowledge that is needed for later learning and that can be taught step by step.
• Behavior modification. Systematic application of antecedents and consequences to change behavior.
• Behavioral learning theories. Explanations of learning that focus on external events as the cause of changes in observable behaviors.
• Behavioral objectives. Instructional objectives stated in terms of observable behaviors.
• Being needs. Maslow's three higher-level needs, sometimes called growth needs.
• Belief perseverance. The tendency to hold on to beliefs, even in the face of contradictory evidence.
• Bilingual. Speaking two languages and dealing appropriately with the two different cultures.
• Bioecological model. Bronfenbrenner's theory describing the nested social and cultural contexts that shape development. Every person develops within a microsystem, inside a mesosystem, embedded in an exosystem, all of which are a part of the macrosystem of the culture. All development occurs in and is influenced by the time period -- the chronosystem.
• Blended families. Parents, children, and stepchildren merged into families through remarriages.
• Body mass index (BMI). A measure of body fat that evaluates weight in relation to height.
• Bottom-up processing. Perceiving based on noticing separate defining features and assembling them into a recognizable pattern.
• Brainstorming. Generating ideas without stopping to evaluate them.
• Bulimia. Eating disorder characterized by overeating, then getting rid of the food by self-induced vomiting or laxatives.
• CAPS. A strategy that can be used in reading literature: Characters, Aim of story, Problem, Solution.
• Case study. Intensive study of one person or one situation.
• Central executive. The part of working memory that is responsible for monitoring and directing attention and other mental resources.
• Central tendency. Typical score for a group of scores.
• Cerebral palsy. Condition involving a range of motor or coordination difficulties due to brain damage.
• Chain mnemonics. Memory strategies that associate one element in a series with the next element.
• Chunking. Grouping individual bits of data into meaningful larger units.
• Classical conditioning. Association of automatic responses with new stimuli.
• Classification. Grouping objects into categories.
• Classroom assessments. Classroom assessments are selected and created by teachers and can take many different forms -- unit tests, essays, portfolios, projects, performances, oral presentations, and so on.
• Classroom management. Techniques used to maintain a healthy learning environment, relatively free of behavior problems.
• Cloud computing. Allows computer users to access applications, such as Google documents or Microsoft Web Mail, as well as computing assets such as network-accessible data storage and processing to use online applications.
• Cmaps. Tools for concept mapping developed by the Institute for Human and Machine Cognition that are connected to many knowledge maps and other resources on the Internet.
• Coactions. Joint actions of individual biology and the environment -- each shapes and influences the other.
• Co-constructed process. A social process in which people interact and negotiate (usually verbally) to create an understanding or to solve a problem. The final product is shaped by all participants.
• Code switching. Moving between two speech forms.
• Cognitive apprenticeship. A relationship in which a less-experienced learner acquires knowledge and skills under the guidance of an expert.
• Cognitive behavior modification. Procedures based on both behavioral and cognitive learning principles for changing your own behavior by using self-talk and self-instruction.
• Cognitive development. Gradual orderly changes by which mental processes become more complex and sophisticated.
• Cognitive domain. In Bloom's taxonomy, memory and reasoning objectives.
• Cognitive evaluation theory. Suggests that events affect motivation through the individual's perception of the events as controlling behavior or providing information.
• Cognitive load. The volume of resources necessary to complete a task.
• Cognitive objectives. Instructional objectives stated in terms of higher-level thinking operations.
• Cognitive science. The interdisciplinary study of thinking, language, intelligence, knowledge creation, and the brain.
• Cognitive view of learning. A general approach that views learning as an active mental process of acquiring, remembering, and using knowledge.
• Collaboration. A philosophy about how to relate to others -- how to learn and work.
• Collective monologue. Form of speech in which children in a group talk but do not really interact or communicate.
• Commitment. In Marcia's theory of identity statuses, individuals' choices concerning political and religious beliefs, for example, usually as a consequence of exploring the options.
• Community of practice. Social situation or context in which ideas are judged useful or true.
• Compensation. The principle that changes in one dimension can be offset by changes in another.
• Complex learning environments. Problems and learning situations that mimic the ill-structured nature of real life.
• Computational thinking. The thought processes involved in formulating problems so you can represent their solution steps and algorithms for computing.
• Concept. A category used to group similar events, ideas, objects, or people.
• Concept map. A drawing that charts the relationships among ideas.
• Concrete operations. Mental tasks tied to concrete objects and situations.
• Conditioned response (CR). Learned response to a previously neutral stimulus.
• Conditioned stimulus (CS). Stimulus that evokes an emotional or physiological response after conditioning.
• Confidence interval. Range of scores within which an individual's true score is likely to fall.
• Confirmation bias. Seeking information that confirms our choices and beliefs, while ignoring disconfirming evidence.
• Consequences. Events that follow an action.
• Conservation. Principle that some characteristics of an object remain the same despite changes in appearance.
• Constructionism. How public knowledge in disciplines such as science, math, economics, or history is constructed.
• Constructivism/constructivist approach. View that emphasizes the active role of the learner in building understanding and making sense of information.
• Constructivist approach. See constructivism.
• Context. Internal and external circumstances and situations that interact with the individual's thoughts, feelings, and actions to shape development and learning. The physical or emotional backdrop associated with an event.
• Contiguity. Association of two events because of repeated pairing.
• Contingency contract. A contract between the teacher and a student specifying what the student must do to earn a particular reward or privilege.
• Continuous reinforcement schedule. Presenting a reinforcer after every appropriate response.
• Convergent questions. Questions with only one right answer -- usually factual questions or rote knowledge questions.
• Convergent Thinking. Narrowing possibilities to a single answer.
• Cooperation. Way of working with others to attain a shared goal.
• Cooperative learning. Situations in which elaboration, interpretation, explanation, and argumentation are integral to the activity of the group and where learning is supported by other individuals.
• Co-regulation. A transitional phase during which students gradually appropriate selfregulated learning and skills through modeling, direct teaching, feedback, and coaching from teachers, parents, or peers.
• Correlations. Statistical descriptions of how closely two variables are related.
• Creativity. Imaginative, original thinking or problem solving.
• Criterion-referenced grading. Assessment of each student's mastery of course objectives.
• Criterion-referenced testing. Testing in which scores are compared to a set performance standard.
• Critical periods. If learning doesn't happen during these periods, it never will.
• Critical thinking. Evaluating conclusions by logically and systematically examining the problem, the evidence, and the solution.
• Crystallized intelligence. Ability to apply culturally approved problem-solving methods.
• Cueing. Providing a stimulus that "sets up" a desired behavior.
• Cultural deficit model. A model that explains the school achievement problems of ethnic minority students by assuming that their culture is inadequate and does not prepare them to succeed in school.
• Cultural tools. The real tools (computers, scales, etc.) and symbol systems (numbers, language, graphs) that allow people in a society to communicate, think, solve problems, and create knowledge.
• Culturally relevant pedagogy. Excellent teaching for students of color that includes academic success, developing/maintaining cultural competence, and developing a critical consciousness to challenge the status quo.
• Culturally responsive management. Taking cultural meanings and styles into account when developing management plans and responding to students.
• Culture. The knowledge, values, attitudes, and traditions that guide the behavior of a group of people and allow them to solve the problems of living in their environment.
• Culture-fair/culture-free test. A test without cultural bias.
• Cyber aggression. Using e-mail, Twitter, Facebook, or other social media to spread rumors, make threats, or otherwise terrorize peers.
• Decay. The weakening and fading of memories with the passage of time.
• Decentering. Focusing on more than one aspect at a time.
• Declarative knowledge. Verbal information; facts; "knowing that" something is the case.
• Deficiency needs. Maslow's four lower-level needs, which must be satisfied first before higher-level needs can be addressed.
• Defining attribute. Qualities that connect members of a group to a specific concept.
• Descriptive studies. Studies that collect detailed information about specific situations, often using observation, surveys, interviews, recordings, or a combination of these methods.
• Development. Orderly, adaptive changes we go through between conception and death; these developmental changes remain for a reasonably long period of time.
• Developmental crisis. A specific conflict whose resolution prepares the way for the next stage.
• Deviation IQ. Score based on a statistical comparison of an individual's performance with the average performance of others in that age group.
• Dialect. Any variety of a language spoken by a particular group.
• Differentiated instruction. A flexible approach to teaching that matches content, process, and product based on student differences in readiness, interests, and learning needs. Takes into account students' abilities, prior knowledge, and challenges so that instruction matches not only the subject being taught but also students' needs.
• Direct instruction/explicit teaching. Systematic instruction for mastery of basic skills, facts, and information.
• Disability. The inability to do something specific such as walk or hear.
• Discrimination. Treating or acting unfairly toward particular categories of people.
• Disequilibrium. In Piaget's theory, the "outof-balance" state that occurs when a person realizes that his or her current ways of thinking are not working to solve a problem or understand a situation.
• Distractors. Wrong answers offered as choices in a multiple-choice item.
• Distributed practice. Practice in brief periods with rest intervals.
• Distributive justice. Beliefs about how to divide materials or privileges fairly among members of a group; follows a sequence of development from equality to merit to benevolence.
• Divergent questions. Questions that have no single correct answer.
• Divergent thinking. Coming up with many possible solutions.
• Domain-specific knowledge. Information that is useful in a particular situation or that applies mainly to one specific topic.
• Domain-specific strategies. Consciously applied skills to reach goals in a particular subject or problem.
• Dual coding theory. Suggests that information is stored in long-term memory as either visual images or verbal units, or both.
• Educational psychology. The discipline concerned with teaching and learning processes; applies the methods and theories of psychology and has its own as well.
• Effective instruction delivery (EID). Instructions that are concise, clear, and specific, and that communicate an expected result. Statements work better than questions.
• Egocentric. Assuming that others experience the world the way you do.
• Elaboration. Adding and extending meaning by connecting new information to existing knowledge.
• Elaborative rehearsal. Keeping information in working memory by associating it with something else you already know.
• Embodied cognition. Theory stating that cognitive processes develop from real-time, goal-directed interactions between humans and their environment.
• Emergent literacy. The skills and knowledge, usually developed in the preschool years, that are the foundation for the development of reading and writing.
• Emotional and behavioral disorders. Behaviors or emotions that deviate so much from the norm that they interfere with the child's own growth and development and/or the lives of others -- inappropriate behaviors, unhappiness or depression, fears and anxieties, and trouble with relationships.
• Empathetic listening. Hearing the intent and emotions behind what another says and reflecting them back by paraphrasing.
• Empirical. Based on systematically collected data.
• Enactive learning. Learning by doing and experiencing the consequences of your actions.
• Engaged time. Time spent actively engaged in the learning task at hand. Also referred to as time on task.
• English as a second language (ESL). The classes devoted to teaching English to students who are English language learners.
• English language learners (ELLs). Students who are learning English and whose primary or heritage language is not English.
• Entity view of ability. Belief that ability is a fixed characteristic that cannot be changed.
• Epilepsy. Disorder marked by seizures and caused by abnormal electrical discharges in the brain.
• Episodic buffer. The process that brings together and integrates information from the phonological loop, visuospatial sketchpad, and long-term memory under the supervision of the central executive.
• Episodic memory. Long-term memory for information tied to a particular time and place, especially memory of the events in a person's life.
• Epistemological beliefs. Beliefs about the structure, stability, and certainty of knowledge, and how knowledge is best learned.
• Equilibration. Search for mental balance between cognitive schemes and information from the environment.
• Ethnicity. A cultural heritage shared by a group of people.
• Ethnography. A descriptive approach to research that focuses on life within a group and tries to understand the meaning of events to the people involved.
• Event-related potential (ERP). Measurements that assess electrical activity of the brain through the skull or scalp.
• Evidence-based practice in psychology (EBPP). Practices that integrate the best available research with the insights of expert practitioners and knowledge of the characteristics, culture, and preferences of the client.
• Executive control processes. Processes such as selective attention, rehearsal, elaboration, and organization that influence encoding, storage, and retrieval of information in memory.
• Executive functioning. All those processes that we use to organize, coordinate, and perform goal-directed, intentional actions, including focusing attention, inhibiting impulsive responses, making and changing plans, and using memory to hold and manipulate information.
• Exemplar. An actual memory of a specific object.
• Exhibition. A performance test or demonstration of learning that is public and usually takes an extended time to prepare.
• Expectancy × value theories. Explanations of motivation that emphasize individuals' expectations for success combined with their valuing of the goal.
• Experimentation. Research method in which variables are manipulated and the effects recorded.
• Expert teachers. Experienced, effective teachers who have developed solutions for classroom problems. Their knowledge of teaching process and content is extensive and well organized.
• Explicit memory. Long-term memories that involve deliberate or conscious recall.
• Exploration. In Marcia's theory of identity statuses, the process by which adolescents consider and try out alternative beliefs, values, and behaviors in an effort to determine which will give them the most satisfaction.
• Expressive vocabulary. All the different words a person uses in speaking or writing.
• Extended families. Different family members -- grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and so on -- living in the same household or at least in daily contact with the children in the family.
• Extinction. The disappearance of a learned response.
• Extraneous cognitive load. The resources required to process stimuli irrelevant to the task.
• Extrinsic motivation. Motivation created by external factors such as rewards and punishments.
• Failure-accepting students. Students who believe their failures are due to low ability and there is little they can do about it.
• Failure-avoiding students. Students who avoid failure by sticking to what they know, by not taking risks, or by claiming not to care about their performance.
• First-wave constructivism. A focus on the individual and psychological sources of knowing, as in Piaget's theory.
• Flash-bulb memories. Clear, vivid memories of emotionally important events in your life.
• Flexible grouping. Grouping and regrouping students based on learning needs.
• Flow. A mental state in which you are fully immersed in a challenging task that is accompanied by high levels of concentration and involvement.
• Fluid intelligence. Mental efficiency, nonverbal abilities grounded in brain development.
• Flynn effect. Because of better health, smaller families, increased complexity in the environment, and more and better schooling, IQ test scores are steadily rising.
• Formal operations. Mental tasks involving abstract thinking and coordination of a number of variables.
• Formative assessment. Ungraded testing used before or during instruction to aid in planning and diagnosis.
• Free, appropriate public education (FAPE). Public funding to support appropriate educational programs for all students, no matter what their needs.
• Functional behavioral assessment (FBA). Procedures used to obtain information about antecedents, behaviors, and consequences to determine the reason or function of the behavior.
• Functional fixedness. Inability to use objects or tools in a new way.
• Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). An MRI is an imaging technique that uses a magnetic field along with radio waves and a computer to create detailed pictures of the inside of the body. A functional MRI uses the MRI to measure the tiny changes that take place in the brain during brain activity.
• Funds of knowledge. Knowledge that families and community members have acquired in many areas of work, home, and religious life that can become the basis for teaching.
• Gender biases. Different views of males and females, often favoring one gender over the other.
• Gender identity. The sense of self as male or female as well as the beliefs one has about gender roles and attributes.
• Gender schemas. Organized cognitive structures that include gender-related information that influences how children think and behave.
• Genderlects. Different ways of talking for males and females.
• General intelligence (g). A general factor in cognitive ability that is related in varying degrees to performance on all mental tests.
• General knowledge. Information that is useful in many different kinds of tasks; information that applies to many situations.
• Generalized seizure. A seizure involving a large portion of the brain.
• Generation 1.5. Students whose characteristics, educational experiences, and language fluencies are somewhere in between those of students born in the United States and students who are recent immigrants.
• Generativity. Sense of concern for future generations.
• Germane cognitive load. Deep processing of information related to the task, including the application of prior knowledge to a new task or problem.
• Gestalt. German for pattern or whole. Gestalt theorists hold that people organize their perceptions into coherent wholes.
• Gifted and talented. Students who demonstrate outstanding aptitudes and competences in one or more of many domains.
• Glial cells. The white matter of the brain. These cells greatly outnumber neurons and appear to have many functions such as fighting infections, controlling blood flow and communication among neurons, and providing the myelin coating around axon fibers.
• Goal. What an individual strives to accomplish.
• Goal orientations. Patterns of beliefs about goals related to achievement in school.
• Goal structure. The way students relate to others who are also working toward a particular goal.
• Goal-directed actions. Deliberate actions toward a goal.
• Good behavior game. Arrangement where a class is divided into teams and each team receives demerit points for breaking agreedupon rules of good behavior.
• Grade-equivalent score. Measure of grade level based on comparison with norming samples from each grade.
• Grading on the curve. Norm-referenced grading that compares students' performance to an average level.
• Group consequences. Rewards or punishments given to a class as a whole for adhering to or violating rules of conduct.
• Group discussion. Conversation in which the teacher does not have the dominant role; students pose and answer their own questions.
• Group focus. The ability to keep as many students as possible involved in activities.
• Handicap. A disadvantage in a particular situation, sometimes caused by a disability.
• Heritage language. The language spoken in the student's home or by members of the family.
• Heuristic. General strategy used in attempting to solve problems.
• Hierarchy of needs. Maslow's model of seven levels of human needs, from basic physiological requirements to the need for self-actualization.
• High-stakes testing. Standardized tests whose results have powerful influences when used by school administrators, other officials, or employers to make decisions.
• Hostile aggression. Bold, direct action that is intended to hurt someone else; unprovoked attack.
• Human agency. The capacity to coordinate learning skills, motivation, and emotions to reach your goals.
• Humanistic interpretation. Approach to motivation that emphasizes personal freedom, choice, self-determination, and striving for personal growth.
• Hypothesis/hypotheses. A prediction of what will happen in a research study based on theory and previous research.
• Hypothetico-deductive reasoning. A formal-operations problem-solving strategy in which an individual begins by identifying all the factors that might affect a problem and then deduces and systematically evaluates specific solutions.
• I message. Clear, non-accusatory statement of how something is affecting you.
• Identity. Principle that a person or object remains the same over time. (Piaget) The complex answer to the question: "Who am I?" (Erikson).
• Identity achievement. Strong sense of commitment to life choices after free consideration of alternatives.
• Identity diffusion. Un-centeredness; confusion about who one is and what one wants.
• Identity foreclosure. Acceptance of parental life choices without consideration of options.
• Images. Representations based on the physical attributes -- the appearance -- of information.
• Immersive virtual learning environment (IVLE). A simulation of a real-world environment that immerses students in tasks like those required in a professional practicum.
• Immigrants. People who voluntarily leave their country to become permanent residents in a new place.
• Implicit memory. Knowledge that we are not conscious of recalling but that influences our behavior or thought without our awareness.
• Importance/attainment value. The importance of doing well on a task; how success on the task meets personal needs.
• Incentive. An object or event that encourages or discourages behavior.
• Inclusion. The integration of all students, including those with severe disabilities, into regular classes.
• Incremental view of ability. Belief that ability is a set of skills that can be changed.
• Individualized education program (IEP). Annually revised program for an exceptional student, detailing present achievement level, goals, and strategies, drawn up by teachers, parents, specialists, and (if possible) the student.
• Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Latest amendment of PL 94-142; guarantees a free public education to all children regardless of disability.
• Industry. Eagerness to engage in productive work.
• Informal assessments. Ungraded (formative) assessments that gather information from multiple sources to help teachers make decisions.
• Information processing. The human mind's activity of taking in, storing, and using information.
• Initiative. Willingness to begin new activities and explore new directions.
• Inquiry learning. Approach in which the teacher presents a puzzling situation and students solve the problem by gathering data and testing their conclusions.
• Inside-out skills. The emergent literacy skills of knowledge of graphemes, phonological awareness, syntactic awareness, phoneme-grapheme correspondence, and emergent writing.
• Insight. In problem solving, the sudden realization of a solution. In the triarchic theory of intelligence, the ability to deal effectively with novel situations.
• Instructional objectives. Clear statement of what students are intended to learn through instruction.
• Instrumental aggression. Strong actions aimed at claiming an object, place, or privilege -- not intended to harm, but may lead to harm.
• Integration. Fitting the child with special needs into existing class structures.
• Integrity. Sense of self-acceptance and fulfillment.
• Intellectual disabilities/mental retardation. Significantly below-average intellectual and adaptive social behavior, evident before age 18.
• Intelligence. Ability or abilities to acquire and use knowledge for solving problems and adapting to the world.
• Intelligence quotient (IQ). Score comparing mental and chronological ages.
• Interest or intrinsic value. The enjoyment a person gets from a task.
• Interference. The process that occurs when remembering certain information is hampered by the presence of other information.
• Intermittent reinforcement schedule. Presenting a reinforcer after some but not all responses.
• Internalize. Process whereby children adopt external standards as their own.
• Intersubjective attitude. A commitment to build shared meaning with others by finding common ground and exchanging interpretations.
• Interval schedule. Length of time between reinforcers.
• Intimacy. Forming close, enduring relationships with others.
• Intrinsic cognitive load. The resources required by the task itself, regardless of other stimuli.
• Intrinsic motivation. Motivation associated with activities that are their own reward.
• Jigsaw classroom. A learning process in which each student is part of a group and each group member is given part of the material to be learned by the whole group. Students become "expert" on their piece and then teach it to the others in their group.
• Keyword method. System of associating new words or concepts with similar-sounding cue words and images.
• KWL. A strategy to guide reading and inquiry: Before -- What do I already know? What do I want to know? After -- What have I learned?
• Lateralization. The specialization of the two hemispheres (sides) of the brain cortex.
• Learned helplessness. The expectation, based on previous experiences with a lack of control, that all of one's efforts will lead to failure.
• Learning. Process through which experience causes permanent change in knowledge or behavior.
• Learning disability. Problem with acquisition and use of language; may show up as difficulty with reading, writing, reasoning, or math.
• Learning management system (LMS). Systems that deliver e-learning, provide tools and learning materials, keep records, administer assessments, and manage learning.
• Learning preferences. Preferred ways of studying and learning, such as using pictures instead of text, working with other people versus alone, learning in structured or in unstructured situations, and so on.
• Learning sciences. An interdisciplinary science of learning, based on research in psychology, education, computer science, philosophy, sociology, anthropology, neuroscience, and other fields that study learning.
• Learning strategies. A special kind of procedural knowledge -- knowing how to approach learning tasks.
• Learning styles. Characteristic approaches to learning and studying.
• Least restrictive environment (LRE). Educating each child with peers in the general education classroom to the greatest extent possible.
• Legally blind. Seeing at 20 feet what a person with normal vision would see at 200 feet and/or having severely restricted peripheral vision.
• Legitimate peripheral participation. Genuine involvement in the work of the group, even if your abilities are undeveloped and contributions are small.
• Lesson study. As a group, teachers develop, test, improve, and retest lessons until they are satisfied with the final version.
• Levels of processing theory. Theory that recall of information is based on how deeply it is processed.
• LGBTQ. Individuals whose sexual orientation is lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgendered, or who are currently questioning their sexual orientation.
• Limited English proficient (LEP). A term also used for students who are learning English when their primary or heritage language is not English -- not the preferred term (English language learner; ELL) because of the negative connotations.
• LINCS vocabulary strategy. A strategy that uses stories and imagery to help students learn how to identify, organize, define, and remember words and their meanings.
• Loci method. Technique of associating items with specific places.
• Locus of causality. The location -- internal or external -- of the cause of behavior.
• Long-term memory. Permanent store of knowledge.
• Low vision. Vision limited to close objects.
• Mainstreaming. Teaching children with disabilities in regular classes for part or all of their school day.
• Maintenance rehearsal. Keeping information in working memory by repeating it to yourself.
• Massed practice. Practice for a single extended period.
• Massive multi-player online games (MMOG). Interactive gaming environments constructed in virtual worlds where the learner assumes a character role, or avatar.
• Mastery experiences. Our own direct experiences -- the most powerful source of efficacy information.
• Mastery goal. A personal intention to improve abilities and learn, no matter how performance suffers.
• Mastery-oriented students. Students who focus on learning goals because they value achievement and see ability as improvable.
• Maturation. Genetically programmed, naturally occurring changes over time.
• Mean. Arithmetical average.
• Means-ends analysis. Heuristic in which a goal is divided into sub-goals.
• Measurement. An evaluation expressed in quantitative (number) terms.
• Median. Middle score in a group of scores.
• Melting pot. A metaphor for the absorption and assimilation of immigrants into the mainstream of society so that ethnic differences vanish.
• Menarche. The first menstrual period in girls.
• Mental age. In intelligence testing, a performance that represents average abilities for that age group.
• Metacognition. Knowledge about our own thinking processes.
• Metalinguistic awareness. Understanding about one's own use of language.
• Microgenetic studies. Detailed observation and analysis of changes in a cognitive process as the process unfolds over a several-day or several-week period of time.
• Minority group. A group of people who have been socially disadvantaged -- not always a minority in actual numbers.
• Mirror systems. Areas of the brain that fire both during perception of an action by someone else and when performing the action.
• Mnemonics. Techniques for remembering; the art of memory.
• Mode. Most frequently occurring score.
• Modeling. Changes in behavior, thinking, or emotions that happen through observing another person -- a model.
• Monolingual. Speaking only one language.
• Moral dilemma. Situations in which no choice is clearly and indisputably right.
• Moral realism. Stage of development wherein children see rules as absolute.
• Moral reasoning. The thinking process involved in judgments about questions of right and wrong.
• Morality of cooperation. Stage of development wherein children realize that people make rules and people can change them.
• Moratorium. Identity crisis; suspension of choices because of struggle.
• Motivation. An internal state that arouses, directs, and maintains behavior.
• Motivation to learn. The tendency to find academic activities meaningful and worthwhile and to try to benefit from them.
• Movement management. Keeping lessons and the group moving at an appropriate (and flexible) pace, with smooth transitions and variety.
• Multicultural education. Education that promotes equity in the schooling of all students.
• Multiple representations of content. Considering problems using various analogies, examples, and metaphors.
• Myelination. The process by which neural fibers are coated with a fatty sheath called myelin that makes message transfer more efficient.
• Natural/logical consequences. Instead of punishing, have students redo, repair, or in some way face the consequences that naturally flow from their actions.
• Need for autonomy. The desire to have our own wishes, rather than external rewards or pressures, determine our actions.
• Need for competence. The individual's need to demonstrate ability or mastery over the tasks at hand.
• Negative correlation. A relationship between two variables in which a high value on one is associated with a low value on the other. Example: height and distance from top of head to the ceiling.
• Negative reinforcement. Strengthening behavior by removing an aversive stimulus when the behavior occurs.
• Neo-Piagetian theories. More recent theories that integrate findings about attention, memory, and strategy use with Piaget's insights about children's thinking and the construction of knowledge.
• Neurogenesis. The production of new neurons.
• Neurons. Nerve cells that store and transfer information.
• Neutral stimulus. Stimulus not connected to a response.
• Nigrescence. The process of developing a Black identity.
• Norm group. Large sample of students serving as a comparison group for scoring tests.
• Norm-referenced grading. Assessment of students' achievement in relation to one another.
• Norm-referenced testing. Testing in which scores are compared with the average performance of others.
• Normal distribution. The most commonly occurring distribution, in which scores are distributed evenly around the mean.
• Object permanence. The understanding that objects have a separate, permanent existence.
• Objective testing. Multiple-choice, matching, true/false, short-answer, and fill-in tests; scoring answers does not require interpretation.
• Observational learning. Learning by observation and imitation of others -- vicarious learning.
• Operant conditioning. Learning in which voluntary behavior is strengthened or weakened by consequences or antecedents.
• Operants. Voluntary (and generally goal-directed) behaviors emitted by a person or an animal.
• Operations. Actions a person carries out by thinking them through instead of literally performing the actions.
• Organization. Ongoing process of arranging information and experiences into mental systems or categories. Ordered and logical network of relations.
• Outside-in skills. The emergent literacy skills of language, narrative, conventions of print, and emergent reading.
• Overlapping. Supervising several activities at once.
• Overlearning. Practicing a skill past the point of mastery.
• Overregularize. To apply a rule of syntax or grammar in situations where the rule does not apply, for example, "the bike was broked."
• Overt aggression. A form of hostile aggression that involves physical attack.
• Paraphrase rule. Policy whereby listeners must accurately summarize what a speaker has said before being allowed to respond.
• Parenting styles. The ways of interacting with and disciplining children.
• Part learning. Breaking a list of items into shorter lists.
• Participant observation. A method for conducting descriptive research in which the researcher becomes a participant in the situation in order to better understand life in that group.
• Participants/subjects. People or animals studied.
• Participation structures. The formal and informal rules for how to take part in a given activity.
• Pedagogical content knowledge. Teacher knowledge that combines mastery of academic content with knowing how to teach the content and how to match instruction to student differences.
• Peer cultures. Groups of children or adolescents with their own rules and norms, particularly about such things as dress, appearance, music, language, social values, and behavior.
• Percentile rank. Percentage of those in the norming sample who scored at or below an individual's score.
• Perception. Interpretation of sensory information.
• Performance assessments. Any form of assessment that requires students to carry out an activity or produce a product in order to demonstrate learning.
• Performance goal. A personal intention to seem competent or perform well in the eyes of others.
• Personal development. Changes in personality that take place as one grows.
• Personal learning environment (PLE). Provides tools that support individualized learning in a variety of contexts and situations.
• Personal learning network (PLN). Framework in which knowledge is constructed through online peer interactions.
• Perspective-taking ability. Understanding that others have different feelings and experiences.
• Pervasive developmental disorder (PDD). A term favored by the medical community to describe autism spectrum disorders.
• Phonological loop. Part of working memory. A speech- and sound-related system for holding and rehearsing (refreshing) words and sounds in short-term memory for about 1.5 to 2 seconds.
• Physical development. Changes in body structure and function over time.
• Plasticity. The brain's tendency to remain somewhat adaptable or flexible.
• Portfolio. A collection of the student's work in an area, showing growth, self-reflection, and achievement.
• Positive behavior supports (PBS). Interventions designed to replace problem behaviors with new actions that serve the same purpose for the student.
• Positive correlation. A relationship between two variables in which the two increase or decrease together. Example: calorie intake and weight gain.
• Positive practice. Practicing correct responses immediately after errors.
• Positive reinforcement. Strengthening behavior by presenting a desired stimulus after the behavior.
• Positron emission tomography (PET). A method of localizing and measuring brain activity using computer-assisted motion pictures of the brain.
• Pragmatics. The rules for when and how to use language to be an effective communicator in a particular culture.
• Precorrection. A tool for positive behavior support that involves identifying the context for a student's misbehavior, clearly specifying the alternative expected behavior, modifying the situation to make the problem behavior less likely, then rehearsing the expected positive behaviors in the new context and providing powerful reinforcers.
• Prejudice. Prejudgment or irrational generalization about an entire category of people.
• Premack principle. Principle stating that a more-preferred activity can serve as a reinforcer for a less-preferred activity.
• Preoperational. The stage before a child masters logical mental operations.
• Presentation punishment. Decreasing the chances that a behavior will occur again by presenting an aversive stimulus following the behavior; also called Type I punishment.
• Pretest. Formative test for assessing students' knowledge, readiness, and abilities.
• Priming. Activating a concept in memory or the spread of activation from one concept to another.
• Principle. Established relationship between factors.
• Private speech. Children's self-talk, which guides their thinking and action. Eventually, these verbalizations are internalized as silent inner speech.
• Problem. Any situation in which you are trying to reach some goal and must find a means to do so.
• Problem solving. Creating new solutions for problems.
• Problem-based learning. Students are confronted with a problem that launches their inquiry as they collaborate to find solutions and learn valuable information and skills in the process.
• Procedural knowledge. Knowledge that is demonstrated when we perform a task; "knowing how."
• Procedural memory. Long-term memory for how to do things.
• Procedures/routines. Prescribed steps for an activity.
• Production deficiency. Students learn problem-solving strategies, but do not apply them when they could or should.
• Productions. The contents of procedural memory; rules about what actions to take, given certain conditions. Units of knowledge that combine conditions with actions in "if this happens, do that" relationships that often are automatic.
• Prompt. A reminder that follows a cue to make sure the person reacts to the cue.
• Propositional network. Set of interconnected concepts and relationships in which long-term knowledge is held.
• Prototype. A best example or best representative of a category.
• Psychomotor domain. Physical ability and coordination objectives.
• Psychosocial. Describing the relation of the individual's emotional needs to the social environment.
• Puberty. The physiological changes during adolescence that lead to the ability to reproduce.
• Punishment. Process that weakens or suppresses behavior.
• Pygmalion effect. Exceptional progress by a student as a result of high teacher expectations for that student; named for mythological king, Pygmalion, who made a statue, then caused it to be brought to life.
• Qualitative research. Exploratory research that attempts to understand the meaning of events to the participants involved using such methods as case studies, interviews, ethnography, participant observation, and other approaches that focus on a few people in depth.
• Quantitative research. Research that studies many participants in a more formal and controlled way using objective measures such as experimentation, statistical analyses, tests, and structured observations.
• Quasi-experimental studies. Studies that fit most of the criteria for true experiments, with the important exception that the participants are not assigned to groups at random. Instead, existing groups such as classes or schools participate in the experiments.
• Race. A socially constructed category based on appearances and ancestry.
• Racial and ethnic pride. A positive self-concept about one's racial or ethnic heritage.
• Radical constructivism. Knowledge is assumed to be the individual's construction; it cannot be judged right or wrong.
• Random. Without any definite pattern; following no rule.
• Range. Distance between the highest and the lowest scores in a group.
• Ratio schedule. Reinforcement based on the number of responses between reinforcers.
• READS. A five-step reading strategy: Review headings; Examine boldface words; Ask, "What do I expect to learn?"; Do it -- Read; Summarize in your own words.
• Receptive vocabulary. The words a person can understand in spoken or written words.
• Reciprocal questioning. Students work in pairs or triads to ask and answer questions about lesson material.
• Reciprocal teaching. Learning to apply the strategies of questioning, summarizing, predicting, and clarifying; designed to help students understand and think deeply about what they read.
• Reconstruction. Recreating information by using memories, expectations, logic, and existing knowledge.
• Reflective. Thoughtful and inventive. Reflective teachers think back over situations to analyze what they did and why, and to consider how they might improve learning for their students.
• Refugees. A special group of immigrants who also relocate voluntarily, but who are fleeing their home country because it is not safe.
• Reinforcement. Use of consequences to strengthen behavior.
• Reinforcer. Any event that follows a behavior and increases the chances that the behavior will occur again.
• Relational aggression. A form of hostile aggression that involves verbal attacks and other actions meant to harm social relationships.
• Reliability. Consistency of test results.
• Removal punishment. Decreasing the chances that a behavior will occur again by removing a pleasant stimulus following the behavior; also called Type II punishment.
• Representativeness heuristic. Judging the likelihood of an event based on how well the events match your prototypes -- what you think is representative of the category.
• Reprimands. Criticisms for misbehavior; rebukes.
• Resilience. The ability to adapt successfully in spite of difficult circumstances and threats to development.
• Resistance culture. Group values and beliefs about refusing to adopt the behaviors and attitudes of the majority culture.
• Respondents. Responses (generally automatic or involuntary) elicited by specific stimuli.
• Response. Observable reaction to a stimulus.
• Response cost. Punishment by loss of reinforcers.
• Response set. Rigidity; the tendency to respond in the most familiar way.
• Response to intervention (RTI). A process to make sure students get appropriate research-based instruction and support as soon as possible and that teachers are systematic in documenting the interventions they have tried with these students so they can use this information in planning instruction.
• Restructuring. Conceiving of a problem in a new or different way.
• Retrieval. Process of searching for and finding information in long-term memory.
• Reversibility. A characteristic of Piagetian logical operations -- the ability to think through a series of steps, then mentally reverse the steps and return to the starting point; also called reversible thinking.
• Reversible thinking. Thinking backward, from the end to the beginning.
• Reward. An attractive object or event supplied as a consequence of a behavior.
• Ripple effect. Contagious spreading of behaviors through imitation.
• Rote memorization. Remembering information by repetition without necessarily understanding the meaning of the information.
• Rules. Statements specifying expected and forbidden behaviors; dos and don'ts.
• Scaffolding. Support for learning and problem solving. The support could be clues, reminders, encouragement, breaking the problem down into steps, providing an example, or anything else that allows the student to grow in independence as a learner. Teachers and students make meaningful connections between what the teacher knows and what the students know and need in order to help the students learn more.
• Schema-driven problem solving. Recognizing a problem as a "disguised" version of an old problem for which one already has a solution.
• Schemas (singular, schema). In cognitive theory, basic structures for organizing information; concepts.
• Schemes. In Piagetian theory, mental systems or categories of perception and experience.
• Scoring rubrics. Rules that are used to determine the quality of a student's performance.
• Script. Schema, or expected plan, for the sequence of steps in a common event such as buying groceries or ordering pizza.
• Scripted cooperation. Learning strategy in which two students take turns summarizing material and criticizing the summaries.
• Seatwork. Independent classroom work.
• Second-wave constructivism. A focus on the social and cultural sources of knowing, as in Vygotsky's theory.
• Section 504. A part of civil rights law that prevents discrimination against people with disabilities in programs that receive federal funds, such as public schools.
• Self-actualization. Fulfilling one's potential.
• Self-concept. Individuals' knowledge and beliefs about themselves -- their ideas, feelings, attitudes, and expectations.
• Self-efficacy. A person's sense of being able to deal effectively with a particular task. Beliefs about personal competence in a particular situation.
• Self-esteem. The value each of us places on our own characteristics, abilities, and behaviors.
• Self-fulfilling prophecy. A groundless expectation that is confirmed because it has been expected.
• Self-handicapping. Students may engage in behavior that blocks their own success in order to avoid testing their true ability.
• Self-instruction. Talking oneself through the steps of a task.
• Self-management. Management of your own behavior and acceptance of responsibility for your own actions. Also the use of behavioral learning principles to change your own behavior.
• Self-regulated learning. A view of learning as skills and will applied to analyzing learning tasks, setting goals and planning how to do the task, applying skills, and especially making adjustments about how learning is carried out.
• Self-regulation. Process of activating and sustaining thoughts, behaviors, and emotions in order to reach goals.
• Self-regulatory knowledge. Knowing how to manage your learning, or knowing how and when to use your declarative and procedural knowledge.
• Self-reinforcement. Controlling (selecting and administering) your own reinforcers.
• Semantic memory. Memory for meaning.
• Semilingual. A lack of proficiency in any language; speaking one or more languages inadequately.
• Semiotic function. The ability to use symbols -- language, pictures, signs, or gestures -- to represent actions or objects mentally.
• Sensitive periods. Times when a person is especially ready to learn certain things or responsive to certain experiences.
• Sensorimotor. Involving the senses and motor activity.
• Sensory memory. System that holds sensory information very briefly.
• Serial-position effect. The tendency to remember the beginning and the end, but not the middle of a list.
• Seriation. Arranging objects in sequential order according to one aspect, such as size, weight, or volume.
• Service learning. A teaching strategy that invites students to identify, research, and address real community challenges, using knowledge and skills learned in the classroom.
• Sexual identity. A complex combination of beliefs about gender roles and sexual orientation.
• Shaping. Reinforcing each small step of progress toward a desired goal or behavior.
• Shared regulation. Students working together to regulate each other through reminders, prompts, and other guidance.
• Sheltered instruction. Approach to teaching that improves English language skills while teaching content to students who are English language learners by putting the words and concepts of the content into context to make the content more understandable.
• Sheltered Instruction Observation Protocol (SIOP). An observational system to check that each element of sheltered instruction is present for a teacher.
• Short-term memory. Component of memory system that holds information for about 20 seconds.
• Single-subject experimental studies. Systematic interventions to study effects with one person, often by applying and then withdrawing a treatment.
• Situated learning. The idea that skills and knowledge are tied to the situation in which they were learned and that they are difficult to apply in new settings.
• Social cognitive theory. Theory that adds concern with cognitive factors such as beliefs, self-perceptions, and expectations to social learning theory.
• Social conventions. Agreed-upon rules and ways of doing things in a particular situation.
• Social development. Changes over time in the ways we relate to others.
• Social goals. A wide variety of needs and motives to be connected to others or part of a group.
• Social isolation. Removal of a disruptive student for 5 to 10 minutes.
• Social learning theory. Theory that emphasizes learning through observation of others.
• Social negotiation. Aspect of learning process that relies on collaboration with others and respect for different perspectives.
• Social persuasion. A "pep talk" or specific performance feedback -- one source of self-efficacy.
• Sociocultural theory. Emphasizes role in development of cooperative dialogues between children and more knowledgeable members of society. Children learn the culture of their community (ways of thinking and behaving) through these interactions.
• Sociocultural views of motivation. Perspectives that emphasize participation, identities, and interpersonal relations within communities of practice.
• Socioeconomic status (SES). Relative standing in the society based on income, power, background, and prestige.
• Sociolinguistics. The study of the formal and informal rules for how, when, about what, to whom, and how long to speak in conversations within cultural groups.
• Spasticity. Overly tight or tense muscles, characteristic of some forms of cerebral palsy.
• Speech disorder. Inability to produce sounds effectively for speaking.
• Spermarche. The first sperm ejaculation for boys.
• Spiral curriculum. Bruner's design for teaching that introduces the fundamental structure of all subjects early in the school years, then revisits the subjects in more and more complex forms over time.
• Spreading activation. Retrieval of pieces of information based on their relatedness to one another. Remembering one bit of information activates (stimulates) recall of associated information.
• Standard deviation. Measure of how widely scores vary from the mean.
• Standard error of measurement. Hypothetical estimate of variation in scores if testing were repeated.
• Standard scores. Scores based on the standard deviation.
• Standardized tests. Tests given, usually nationwide, under uniform conditions and scored according to uniform procedures.
• Stanine scores. Whole-number scores from 1 to 9, each representing a wide range of raw scores.
• Statistically significant. Not likely to be a chance occurrence.
• Stem. The question part of a multiple-choice item.
• Stereotype. Schema that organizes knowledge or perceptions about a category.
• Stereotype threat. The extra emotional and cognitive burden that your performance in an academic situation might confirm a stereotype that others hold about you.
• Stimulus. Event that activates behavior.
• Stimulus control. Capacity for the presence or absence of antecedents to cause behaviors.
• Story grammar. Typical structure or organization for a category of stories.
• Structured controversy. Students work in pairs within their four-person cooperative groups to research a particular controversy.
• Structured English immersion (SEI). An environment that teaches English rapidly by maximizing instruction in English and using English at a level appropriate to the abilities of the students in the class who are English language learners.
• Successive approximations. Reinforcing small steps to reach a goal; the small component steps that make up a complex behavior.
• Summative assessment. Testing that follows instruction and assesses achievement.
• Sustaining expectation effect. Student performance is maintained at a certain level because teachers don't recognize improvements.
• Synapses. The tiny space between neurons -- chemical messages are sent across these gaps.
• Synaptic plasticity. See plasticity.
• Syntax. The order of words in phrases or sentences.
• T score. Standard score with a mean of 50 and a standard deviation of 10.
• Task analysis. System for breaking down a task hierarchically into basic skills and subskills.
• Taxonomy. Classification system.
• Teachers' sense of efficacy. A teacher's belief that he or she can reach even the most difficult students and help them learn.
• Theory. Integrated statement of principles that attempts to explain a phenomenon and make predictions.
• Theory of mind. An understanding that other people are people too, with their own minds, thoughts, feelings, beliefs, desires, and perceptions.
• Theory of multiple intelligences (MI). In Gardner's theory of intelligence, a person's eight separate abilities: logical-mathematical, linguistic, musical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalist.
• Theory-based. An explanation for concept formation that suggests our classifications are based on ideas about the world that we create to make sense of things.
• Time on task. Time spent actively engaged in the learning task at hand. Also referred to as engaged time.
• Time out. Technically, the removal of all reinforcement. In practice, isolation of a student from the rest of the class for a brief time.
• Token reinforcement system. System in which tokens earned for academic work and positive classroom behavior can be exchanged for some desired reward.
• Top-down. Making sense of information by using context and what we already know about the situation; sometimes called conceptually driven perception.
• Tracking. Assignment to different classes and academic experiences based on achievement.
• Transfer. Influence of previously learned material on new material; the productive (not reproductive) uses of cognitive tools and motivations.
• Transition programming. Gradual preparation of students with special needs to move from high school into further education or training, employment, or community involvement.
• Triarchic reciprocal causality. An explanation of behavior that emphasizes the mutual effects of the individual and the environment on each other.
• Triarchic theory of successful intelligence. A three-part description of the mental abilities (thinking processes, coping with new experiences, and adapting to context) that lead to more or less intelligent behavior.
• True score. The score the student would get if the measurement were completely accurate and error free.
• Unconditioned response (UR). Naturally occurring emotional or physiological response.
• Unconditioned stimulus (US). Stimulus that automatically produces an emotional or physiological response.
• Understanding by Design (UbD). A system of lesson and unit planning that starts with key objectives for understandings and then moves backwards to design assessments and learning activities.
• Universal design. Considering the needs of all users in the design of new tools, learning programs, or Web sites.
• Utility value. The contribution of a task to meeting one's goals.
• Validity. Degree to which a test measures what it is intended to measure.
• Value-added measures. Measures that use statistical analyses to indicate the average test score gain for students, adjusted for their student characteristics such as prior level of achievement.
• Variability. Degree of difference or deviation from mean.
• Verbalization. Putting your problem-solving plan and its logic into words.
• Vicarious experiences. Accomplishments that are modeled by someone else.
• Vicarious reinforcement. Increasing the chances that we will repeat a behavior by observing another person being reinforced for that behavior.
• Virtual learning environments (VLE). A broad term that describes many ways of learning in virtual or online systems.
• Visuospatial sketchpad. Part of working memory. A holding system for visual and spatial information.
• Voicing problems. Inappropriate pitch, quality, loudness, or intonation.
• Volition. Will power; self-discipline; work styles that protect opportunities to reach goals by applying self-regulated learning.
• Warm demanders. Teachers who are especially effective with African American students; they show both high expectations and great caring for their students.
• Within-class ability grouping. System of grouping in which students in a class are divided into two or three groups based on ability in an attempt to accommodate student differences.
• Withitness. According to Kounin, awareness of everything happening in a classroom.
• Work-avoidant learners. Students who don't want to learn or to look smart, but just want to avoid work.
• Working memory. The brain system that provides temporary holding and processing of information to accomplish complex cognitive tasks such as language comprehension, learning, and reasoning; the information that you are focusing on at a given moment.
• Working-backward strategy. Heuristic in which you start with the goal and move backward to solve the problem.
• Z score. Standard score indicating the number of standard deviations above or below the mean that a particular score falls.
• Zero reject. A basic principle of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act specifying that no student with a disability, no matter what kind or how severe, can be denied a free public education.
• Zone of proximal development (ZPD). In Vygotsky's theory, the phase at which a child can master a task if given appropriate help and support.