ABSTRACT
There is still a considerable amount of confusion about the real impact of instruction on cognitive development. The goal of this chapter is to illustrate that very different judgments are made depending on different predictors and/or criteria used and the various mechanisms considered.
The first study demonstrates that the impact of school on cognitive development is indeed neglible when the sole criterion utilized is changing individual achievement differences within classrooms. The second study analyzed general, differential, and interactive effects of instruction on various cognitive and motivational outcomes after 1 and 2 years of instruction. The results of this study illustrate that, irrespective of stable individual differences in math achievement within classrooms, instruction has a variety of powerful effects.
