Digital Commons Network^™

A Phenomenological Study Of Traditional Public High School Graduates' Experiences While Taking Their First Online Course In College, David B. Warner

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to understand the shared lived experiences of traditional high school graduates while taking an online course for the first time. Many colleges and universities provide online courses as part of their regular instructional program. Some colleges and universities require students to take an online course early in their post-secondary education. However, there are a limited number of k-12 public-school districts in the United States that provide opportunities for high school students to take online courses as part of the regular curriculum. This phenomenological study was designed to investigate the perceptions of traditional high …

Parenting A Child With Autism Spectrum Disorder: Perspective Of Jordanian Mothers, Khulood Kayed Shattnawi, Wafa'a M. Bani, Saeed, Ahlam Al-Natour, Mohammed M. Al-Hammouri, Manar Al-Azzam, Rachel Joseph

Faculty Publications and Presentations

Introduction: Parenting a child diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is challenging for mothers because of concerns related to behavior, difficulties in accessing specialized care, and lack of community acceptance, yet their stories in Jordanian context are still unknown. Common challenges in Jordan include financial burdens, lack of public awareness, and lack of specialized knowledge even among health care providers, which may lead to delays in obtaining the diagnosis and interventions for ASD.

Method: A phenomenological descriptive approach was used to explore and understand the mothers’ everyday lived experiences of raising a child with ASD. Semistructured interviews were conducted with …

A Phenomenological Study Of The Use Of Humor As A Teaching Tool By Middle And High School Teachers, Chad Michael Brown

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this transcendental phenomenological study was to understand perceptions of instructional classroom humor used to help students learn and master new material, among teachers at middle and high schools in rural Appalachia districts. Using humor in the classroom is generally defined as deliberate planning and utilization of subject relevant humor in an attempt to improve students’ learning outcomes. Rural Appalachia was defined as the area geographically located in or near the Appalachian Mountain range, and the dominant socioeconomic culture found there. The theories guiding this study were (a) Bandura’s social learning theory, as it describes the way students …

The Quest Of Love: A Liturgical Reading Of The Pilgrim's Progress, Matthew Charles Fox

Masters Theses

John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress has been enjoyed for its imaginative story by a wide variety of readers since its publication in 1678, but criticism has long treated Bunyan’s imaginative story-telling as separate from and at odds with his Puritanism. If this were the case and expositing theological doctrine was Bunyan’s main purpose, then why would he write a fiction? Using James K. A. Smith idea of “liturgical pedagogy” from his Cultural Liturgies series, this thesis argues that Bunyan’s story does more than vividly convey theological doctrine to the reader’s mind; rather, it captures the imagination of the reader’s heart, …

Tying Wellness Into Action: A Phenomenological Study Of Graduate Counseling Fieldwork Students At A Christian University, Daniel E. Reyes

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Mental health professionals take more days off for illness than other health-care professionals do, and many practicing counselors perceive their colleagues as stressed, distressed, and even impaired. Hence, counselor-education programs should focus on equipping future practitioners to practice better self-care when dealing with work-related stress. There appear to be numerous gaps in the literature on encouraging wellness in counselors-in-training (CITs), and no rigorous empirical study has been conducted on CITs’ wellness at a faith-based institution. This phenomenological study focused on investigating the lived wellness experiences of seven graduate counseling students at a Christian university, in a program accredited by the …

A Phenomenological Study Of Assistant Principals' Shared Experiences Of Restructuring In Virginia Schools, Lisa Whitmore Rath

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this transcendental phenomenology study was to describe the experiences of assistant principals before, during, and after restructuring in Virginia. Restructuring is defined as the transition or movement from one setting to another. Schlossberg’s transitional theory was used as the theoretical framework for this study, answering the essential question: How do assistant principals describe their experiences associated with being restructuring? The sub-questions explored the experiences of the assistant principal before, during, and after the restructuring. Sub-questions inquired as to what the experiences were before the restructuring, during the restructuring, and after the restructuring occurred. The research design used …

The Origins Beliefs Of Christian College Students, Emily Wilkinson

Senior Honors Theses

Many studies have focused on creation and evolution in academia, origins beliefs and biblical interpretation, and how students respond to origins challenges. The author then conducted a phenomenology of Christian college students’ origins beliefs, factors that influence those beliefs, and impacts that the beliefs have on students’ lives. Methods included a 44-Item Big Five Inventory and semi-structured interviews. Participants were eight residential undergraduate students at a Christian university who were currently or previously in a creation studies course. Results indicated that all participants held to young-earth creationism, and that family, Christian faith, education, personality, and academic major influenced the development …

A Phenomenological Study Of North Carolina Elementary Teachers' Lived Experiences With Google Classroom Integration, Hilary Elizabeth Dodson

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this transcendental phenomenological study was to understand North Carolina elementary school teachers’ perceptions of Google Classroom technology integration as a lived experience. Google Classroom is a learning management system and component of the technology integration that many teachers use to organize their classroom content. The discovery learning theory by Bruner guided this study. The problem of this study was North Carolina elementary teachers experience difficulties integrating technology, using applications like Google Classroom, in combination with more traditional curriculum and instructional strategies. The central research question was: What are North Carolina elementary teachers’ perceptions of the ways in …

A Phenomenological Study Of The Role Of Institutional Debt In The Mid-America Region Of Acsi, John Robert Beck

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to inductively explore and understand how school leadership’s views on institutional debt impacted its use at Christian kindergarten-twelfth grade (K-12) schools in the Mid-America Region of the Association of Christian Schools International (MAR-ACSI). Institutional debt was generally defined as large and reoccurring expenses such as mortgages for school buildings. The qualitative research theory guiding this study was transcendental phenomenological reduction articulated by Clark Moustakas (1994) in his Phenomenological Research Methods. The Moustakas model provided an effective way to explore the gap in the literature found about how institutional debt impacted the planning and …