James W Stigler
Biographic Data
| ID | 1476570 |
|---|---|
| NAME | James W Stigler |
| GIVEN NAMES | James W |
| FAMILY NAME | Stigler |
| SIGNATURE | STIGLER J W |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of California, Los Angeles |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-6107-7827 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 23 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 165 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 22 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1986 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
Modelability as a Strategy for Improving the Generalizability and Scalability of Predictive Models
Learning analytics has the potential to enhance education through data-informed decision-making, but persistent challenges around generalizability and scalability continue to limit its real-world impact. In this paper, we introduce the concept of a modelable world: a learning ecosystem purposefully designed to support the development of predictive models that generalize across diverse contexts. We outline three core design principles of modelabil…
Curiosity as a catalyst for conceptual change
Curiosity is widely recognized as a driver of exploration and learning, yet existing theories often under-specify the mechanisms through which curiosity transforms knowledge over time. This paper introduces the Schema Expansion and Error-driven Knowledge-building (SEEK) model, a novel, process-based framework that positions curiosity as a cognitive engine of long-term knowledge development. Drawing on schema theory, SEEK conceptualizes learning a…
The Role of Prior Knowledge in Effects of Embodied Pedagogies on Learning
Background: Embodied learning pedagogies are increasingly popular, but our understanding of how embodied pedagogies enhance learning of complex concepts in higher education over longer periods of time remains nascent, particularly how learners’ prior knowledge might interact with different types of embodied pedagogies. We propose the Performing First Hypothesis as an organizing framework, which posits that learners with lower prior knowledge, bec…
The “Better Book” Approach to Addressing Equity in Statistics
Although improving racial equity in critical college courses such as introductory statistics is a laudable goal, making research-based progress toward that aim in a scalable manner remains a challenge. To translate psychological insights to benefit racially marginalized students, we implemented the “Better Book” approach, where instructors, researchers, and developers work together to improve an online textbook used in introductory statistics. Th…
Status in a psychological statistics class
Great effort has been invested in increasing STEM achievement among students, but feelings of low status among underrepresented or otherwise vulnerable students may be creating additional challenges. The present study assessed how perceptions of social status within the classroom—termed subjective social status—aligned with objective course performance and differed by sex, first-generation status, work status, and race/ethnicity among 713 student…
Watching a hands-on activity improves students’ understanding of randomness
Introductory statistics students struggle to understand randomness as a data generating process, and especially its application to the practice of data analysis. Although modern computational techniques for data analysis such as simulation, randomization, and bootstrapping have the potential to make the idea of randomness more concrete, representing such random processes with R code is not as easy for students to understand as is something like a…
The Better Book Approach for Education Research and Development
Background/Context Despite advances in the learning sciences, a persistent gap remains between research and practice. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study In this project, we develop and try out a new approach to education research and development in which researchers, designers/ developers, and instructors collaborate to continuously improve an online interactive textbook. Intervention/Program/Practice Using a “learn by doing” stra…
Teaching Versus Teachers as a Lever for Change
We examine the distinction between teaching and teachers as it relates to instructional improvement. Drawing from work outside of education on improvement systems and from analyzing the Japanese system of lesson study, we contend that a focus on teach ing can shape a coordinated system for improvement whereas a focus on teach ers, common in the United States, leads to elements that are uncoordinated and often work against the continuous, steady i…
Automated Scoring of Teachers’ Open-Ended Responses to Video Prompts
In this study, we explored the potential for machine scoring of short written responses to the Classroom-Video-Analysis (CVA) assessment, which is designed to measure teachers’ usable mathematics teaching knowledge. We created naïve Bayes classifiers for CVA scales assessing three different topic areas and compared computer-generated scores to those assigned by trained raters. Using cross-validation techniques, average correlations between rater-…
Cultural Psychology
Measuring Usable Knowledge
This study explores the relationships between teacher knowledge, teaching practice, and student learning in mathematics. It extends previous work that developed and evaluated an innovative approach to assessing teacher knowledge based on teachers’ analyses of classroom video clips. Teachers watched and commented on 13 fraction clips. These written analyses were coded using objective rubrics to yield a reliable and valid indicator of their usable …
Teachers' Analyses of Classroom Video Predict Student Learning of Mathematics
This study explores the relationship between teacher knowledge and student learning in the area of mathematics by developing and evaluating an innovative approach to assessing teacher knowledge. This approach is based on teachers' analyses of classroom video clips. Teachers watched 13 video clips of classroom instruction and then provided written comments on the interactions of the teacher, students, and content. The quality of teachers' analyses…
The role of lesson analysis in pre-service teacher education
Performing History
This study examines the influence of a dramatic art-based history program for fifth-grade students on both their learning and enjoyment of history. The program, called "Performing History," reflects theories of effective use of drama in the classroom as well as successful ways to teach history. The program presents historical information as part of a coherent story embedded in a musical drama that students rehearse and perform. Students who parti…
A Knowledge Base for the Teaching Profession
To improve classroom teaching in a steady, lasting way, the teaching profession needs a knowledge base that grows and improves. In spite of the continuing efforts of researchers, archived research knowledge has had little effect on the improvement of practice in the average classroom. We explore the possibility of building a useful knowledge base for teaching by beginning with practitioners’ knowledge. We outline key features of this knowledge an…
The Learning Gap
What Can We Learn from the Learning Gap
The Learning Gap
Contexts of Achievement
The major purpose of this study was to attempt to understand some of the reasons for the high academic achievement of Chinese and Japanese children compared to American children. The study was conducted with first and fifth graders attending elementary schools in the Minneapolis metropolitan area, Taipei (Taiwan), and Sendai (Japan). 1,440 children (240 first graders and 240 fifth graders in each city) were selected as target subjects in the stud…
Cultural psychology
"This collection of essays from leading scholars in anthropology, psychology, and linguistics is an outgrowth of the internationally known "Chicago Symposia on Culture and Human Development." It raises the idea of a new discipline of cultural psychology through the study of the relationship between psyche and culture, subject and object, person and world, with special reference to core areas of human development: cognition, learning, self, person…
Educational Achievement in Japan
Mathematics learning in Japanese, Chinese, and American classrooms
Differences across cultures in classroom instruction may contribute to superior performance by Asian children on mathematics achievement tests
Consequences of Skill
A general orientation toward the study of skills and their development is outlined, in which analyses of representation, transfer, and context are used to explore the consequences of developing a specific skill. This general approach is then applied to the study of abacus training and its implications for school achievement and cognitive development. Previous studies of abacus skill are reviewed, and two new studies are reported. Previous researc…
A Knowledge Base for the Teaching Profession
To improve classroom teaching in a steady, lasting way, the teaching profession needs a knowledge base that grows and improves. In spite of the continuing efforts of researchers, archived research knowledge has had little effect on the improvement of practice in the average classroom. We explore the possibility of building a useful knowledge base for teaching by beginning with practitioners’ knowledge. We outline key features of this knowledge an…
Measuring Usable Knowledge
This study explores the relationships between teacher knowledge, teaching practice, and student learning in mathematics. It extends previous work that developed and evaluated an innovative approach to assessing teacher knowledge based on teachers’ analyses of classroom video clips. Teachers watched and commented on 13 fraction clips. These written analyses were coded using objective rubrics to yield a reliable and valid indicator of their usable …
Teachers' Analyses of Classroom Video Predict Student Learning of Mathematics
This study explores the relationship between teacher knowledge and student learning in the area of mathematics by developing and evaluating an innovative approach to assessing teacher knowledge. This approach is based on teachers' analyses of classroom video clips. Teachers watched 13 video clips of classroom instruction and then provided written comments on the interactions of the teacher, students, and content. The quality of teachers' analyses…
Teaching Versus Teachers as a Lever for Change
We examine the distinction between teaching and teachers as it relates to instructional improvement. Drawing from work outside of education on improvement systems and from analyzing the Japanese system of lesson study, we contend that a focus on teach ing can shape a coordinated system for improvement whereas a focus on teach ers, common in the United States, leads to elements that are uncoordinated and often work against the continuous, steady i…
The Learning Gap
Performing History
This study examines the influence of a dramatic art-based history program for fifth-grade students on both their learning and enjoyment of history. The program, called "Performing History," reflects theories of effective use of drama in the classroom as well as successful ways to teach history. The program presents historical information as part of a coherent story embedded in a musical drama that students rehearse and perform. Students who parti…
Consequences of Skill
A general orientation toward the study of skills and their development is outlined, in which analyses of representation, transfer, and context are used to explore the consequences of developing a specific skill. This general approach is then applied to the study of abacus training and its implications for school achievement and cognitive development. Previous studies of abacus skill are reviewed, and two new studies are reported. Previous researc…
Consequences of Skill
A general orientation toward the study of skills and their development is outlined, in which analyses of representation, transfer, and context are used to explore the consequences of developing a specific skill. This general approach is then applied to the study of abacus training and its implications for school achievement and cognitive development. Previous studies of abacus skill are reviewed, and two new studies are reported. Previous researc…
Mathematics learning in Japanese, Chinese, and American classrooms
Differences across cultures in classroom instruction may contribute to superior performance by Asian children on mathematics achievement tests
Educational Achievement in Japan
Contexts of Achievement
The major purpose of this study was to attempt to understand some of the reasons for the high academic achievement of Chinese and Japanese children compared to American children. The study was conducted with first and fifth graders attending elementary schools in the Minneapolis metropolitan area, Taipei (Taiwan), and Sendai (Japan). 1,440 children (240 first graders and 240 fifth graders in each city) were selected as target subjects in the stud…
Cultural psychology
"This collection of essays from leading scholars in anthropology, psychology, and linguistics is an outgrowth of the internationally known "Chicago Symposia on Culture and Human Development." It raises the idea of a new discipline of cultural psychology through the study of the relationship between psyche and culture, subject and object, person and world, with special reference to core areas of human development: cognition, learning, self, person…
The Learning Gap
What Can We Learn from the Learning Gap
The Learning Gap
A Knowledge Base for the Teaching Profession
To improve classroom teaching in a steady, lasting way, the teaching profession needs a knowledge base that grows and improves. In spite of the continuing efforts of researchers, archived research knowledge has had little effect on the improvement of practice in the average classroom. We explore the possibility of building a useful knowledge base for teaching by beginning with practitioners’ knowledge. We outline key features of this knowledge an…
Performing History
This study examines the influence of a dramatic art-based history program for fifth-grade students on both their learning and enjoyment of history. The program, called "Performing History," reflects theories of effective use of drama in the classroom as well as successful ways to teach history. The program presents historical information as part of a coherent story embedded in a musical drama that students rehearse and perform. Students who parti…
The role of lesson analysis in pre-service teacher education
Teachers' Analyses of Classroom Video Predict Student Learning of Mathematics
This study explores the relationship between teacher knowledge and student learning in the area of mathematics by developing and evaluating an innovative approach to assessing teacher knowledge. This approach is based on teachers' analyses of classroom video clips. Teachers watched 13 video clips of classroom instruction and then provided written comments on the interactions of the teacher, students, and content. The quality of teachers' analyses…
Cultural Psychology
Measuring Usable Knowledge
This study explores the relationships between teacher knowledge, teaching practice, and student learning in mathematics. It extends previous work that developed and evaluated an innovative approach to assessing teacher knowledge based on teachers’ analyses of classroom video clips. Teachers watched and commented on 13 fraction clips. These written analyses were coded using objective rubrics to yield a reliable and valid indicator of their usable …
Automated Scoring of Teachers’ Open-Ended Responses to Video Prompts
In this study, we explored the potential for machine scoring of short written responses to the Classroom-Video-Analysis (CVA) assessment, which is designed to measure teachers’ usable mathematics teaching knowledge. We created naïve Bayes classifiers for CVA scales assessing three different topic areas and compared computer-generated scores to those assigned by trained raters. Using cross-validation techniques, average correlations between rater-…
Teaching Versus Teachers as a Lever for Change
We examine the distinction between teaching and teachers as it relates to instructional improvement. Drawing from work outside of education on improvement systems and from analyzing the Japanese system of lesson study, we contend that a focus on teach ing can shape a coordinated system for improvement whereas a focus on teach ers, common in the United States, leads to elements that are uncoordinated and often work against the continuous, steady i…
The Better Book Approach for Education Research and Development
Background/Context Despite advances in the learning sciences, a persistent gap remains between research and practice. Purpose/Objective/Research Question/Focus of Study In this project, we develop and try out a new approach to education research and development in which researchers, designers/ developers, and instructors collaborate to continuously improve an online interactive textbook. Intervention/Program/Practice Using a “learn by doing” stra…
Watching a hands-on activity improves students’ understanding of randomness
Introductory statistics students struggle to understand randomness as a data generating process, and especially its application to the practice of data analysis. Although modern computational techniques for data analysis such as simulation, randomization, and bootstrapping have the potential to make the idea of randomness more concrete, representing such random processes with R code is not as easy for students to understand as is something like a…
The “Better Book” Approach to Addressing Equity in Statistics
Although improving racial equity in critical college courses such as introductory statistics is a laudable goal, making research-based progress toward that aim in a scalable manner remains a challenge. To translate psychological insights to benefit racially marginalized students, we implemented the “Better Book” approach, where instructors, researchers, and developers work together to improve an online textbook used in introductory statistics. Th…
Status in a psychological statistics class
Great effort has been invested in increasing STEM achievement among students, but feelings of low status among underrepresented or otherwise vulnerable students may be creating additional challenges. The present study assessed how perceptions of social status within the classroom—termed subjective social status—aligned with objective course performance and differed by sex, first-generation status, work status, and race/ethnicity among 713 student…
The Role of Prior Knowledge in Effects of Embodied Pedagogies on Learning
Background: Embodied learning pedagogies are increasingly popular, but our understanding of how embodied pedagogies enhance learning of complex concepts in higher education over longer periods of time remains nascent, particularly how learners’ prior knowledge might interact with different types of embodied pedagogies. We propose the Performing First Hypothesis as an organizing framework, which posits that learners with lower prior knowledge, bec…
Modelability as a Strategy for Improving the Generalizability and Scalability of Predictive Models
Learning analytics has the potential to enhance education through data-informed decision-making, but persistent challenges around generalizability and scalability continue to limit its real-world impact. In this paper, we introduce the concept of a modelable world: a learning ecosystem purposefully designed to support the development of predictive models that generalize across diverse contexts. We outline three core design principles of modelabil…
Curiosity as a catalyst for conceptual change
Curiosity is widely recognized as a driver of exploration and learning, yet existing theories often under-specify the mechanisms through which curiosity transforms knowledge over time. This paper introduces the Schema Expansion and Error-driven Knowledge-building (SEEK) model, a novel, process-based framework that positions curiosity as a cognitive engine of long-term knowledge development. Drawing on schema theory, SEEK conceptualizes learning a…
Psychology (19 works) · Mathematics education (15 works) · Pedagogy (11 works) · Computer Science (8 works) · Teaching method (6 works) · Mathematics Education and Teaching Techniques (5 works) · Sociology (4 works) · Statistics Education and Methodologies (4 works) · Teacher Education and Leadership Studies (4 works) · Artificial Intelligence (3 works)