David N. Perkins – författare

Is invention really "99 percent perspiration and one percent inspiration" as Thomas Edison assured us? Inventive Minds assembles a group of authors well equipped to address this question: contemporary inventors of important new technologies, historians of science and industry, and cognitive psychologists interested in the process of creativity. In telling their stories, the inventors describe the origins of such remarkable devices as ultrasound, the electron microscope, and artificial diamonds. The historians help us look into the minds of innovators like Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, Michael Faraday, and the Wright brothers, drawing on original notebooks and other sources to show how they made their key discoveries. Finally, cognitive psychologists explore the mental processes that figure in creative thinking.Contributing to the authors' insight is their special focus on the "front end" of invention - where ideas come from and how they are transformed into physical prototypes. They answer three questions: How does invention happen? How does invention contrast with other commonly creative pursuits such as scientific inquiry, musical composition, or painting? And how might invention best happen - that is, what kinds of settings, conditions, and strategies appear to foster inventive activity? The book yields a wealth of information that will make absorbing reading for cognitive and social psychologists, social historians, and many working scientists and general readers who are interested in the psychology of personality and the roots of ingenuity.

Declining test scores, burgeoning drop-out rates, poor showings in international comparisons--the malaise of public education seems to grow everyday. In this context, technology has emerged as one of the hopes of a renewed educational enterprise. Yet modern information-processing technologies have proved far from a panacea for the ills of education. Software Goes to School describes why that is the case in its consideration of three broad themes. The first part of the book addresses the question of what it means to understand. What constitutes understanding something? What are our principle resources in teaching for understanding? The second part of the book focuses front and centre on what technology can offer in teaching for understanding. Individual chapters examine how technologies afford new ways of representing complex concepts and make available new means by which students can manipulate abstract entities in a "hands-on" way. The last part of the book discusses the complexities of realistic educational settings, explores what happens when technology-based innovations are introduced, and examines the means by which a pedagogy of understanding can take root and thrive. Authored by an eminent group of researchers, this book offers numerous practical guidelines on how computers and software can work together for the betterment of the teaching process. Students and professionals in educational psychology, developmental psychology, and educational computing--as well as concerned parents--will want to read this stimulating new work.

This work brings together leading experts to offer an in-depth examination of how computer technology can play an invaluable part in educational efforts through its unique capacities to support the development of students in the understanding of difficult concepts. It is intended for students, researchers and professionals in educational psychology, developmental psychology, and software design.

Based on extensive reasoning acquisition research, this volume provides theoretical and empirical considerations of the reasoning that occurs during the course of everyday personal and professional activities. Of particular interest is the text's focus on the question of how such reasoning takes place during school activities and how students acquire reasoning skills.

Based on extensive reasoning acquisition research, this volume provides theoretical and empirical considerations of the reasoning that occurs during the course of everyday personal and professional activities. Of particular interest is the text's focus on the question of how such reasoning takes place during school activities and how students acquire reasoning skills.