Education Commons^™

Diversity Education: Are We Preparing Teachers To Teach All Learners?, Lindi Andreasen

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Five hundred twenty-three preservice teachers from six different preparation programs completed the diversity and multicultural perspectives portion of the Professional Teaching Knowledge and Skills Survey (PTKSS) to determine their feelings of multicultural efficacy at the end of their program and again after their first year of teaching. Statistical analysis revealed that preservice teachers rate their capability to teach diverse students as "adequate" to "well" on a 5 point Likert type scale (M=35.28, possible Range=0-50), with no significant drop in self-efficacy after one year of teaching (M=34.09). However, individual item means did drop consistently between the preservice and inservice stages, and …

After-Schools Programs And Their Influence On Parent Involvement With Children At Home, Marci Malone

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Eight-year-old Victoria, with hands on hips and chin stuck up, defiantly said, "No mom, I want to stay for After-School Club. I don't care about the dentist." Her mother patiently responded by telling Victoria, "I know you want to stay but we have to leave now or we will be late for our appointment." The little girl, seeming to know from experience that her mother would not budge, stomped her foot as she began leaving the school saying, "I hate when I have to miss After-School Club!"

Teaching Children About Social Justice Through Picture Books, Brooke C. Sorenson

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

"Boys can't play with dolls!" "A girl can't be a doctor!" "Those people look weird!" "He's to dumb to play with us!" "My mommy says I can't play with you!" Unfortunately, phrases like this can be heard on a typical elementary school playground. As teachers, we have the difficult task of teaching about social justice and working to uproot prejudice and discrimination.

A Parent's Guide To Assisting Learning Disabled Children At Home, Sandra Elaine Baker

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Our schools are overcrowded, teachers are spread too thin, and often children with learning disabilities are left alone to get by in school (Rosner, 1993). Many of them end up falling through the cracks in the floor by middle school. Learning disabilities are not manifest in physical ways necessarily and many times go unnoticed and/or untreated (Bloom, 1996). This can be very damaging to a child both in an academic sense and in an affective sense. Self-esteem is lowered and sometimes continued failure in one scholastic area can mean failure in other areas such as reading which in tum affects …

Using Empathy As A Tool To Reduce Prejudice, Traci Lloyd

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Children are not born with prejudices. However, they are born with a natural inclination to categorize people and situations (Byrnes, 1988). As early as two years of age, children may begin asking questions concerning the differences and similarities they observe in the people around them (Derman-Sparks, 1993). Children may develop negative beliefs about these differences from a variety of sources. Parents and extended family may, through their words and actions, play a major role in the attitudes children develop about differences. Teachers, peers, television, books and movies also make large contributions (Byrnes, 1988; Derman-Sparks, 1993).

Teaching History Through Children's Literature: An Integrated Approach For The Fifth Grade Classroom, Tamara Gayle Crook

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

During my teacher education training I have become fascinated with the idea of teaching social studies through historical novels. As a result of this fascination, I chose curriculum development pertaining to this idea as the subject of my honors project. The purpose of this project was for me to develop, teach, and evaluate an integrated unit using historical novels to teach social studies and a variety of other subjects. I selected the American Revolution as the theme of my unit.

In this paper I have included a brief overview of my review of the literature on this topic, the procedures …

Parental Attitudes Toward Using Inventive Spelling With Kindergarten Age Children, Sue Dearden

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Across the United States millions of children are reciting spelling lists, participating in Spelling Bees, and taking spelling tests. In fact, a significant portion of an elementary child's school day is devoted to learning to spell words traditionally or correctly. With such an emphasis being placed on spelling, it is logical to assume spelling traditionally is valued in our society. However, a different philosophy, Whole Language, takes an opposite approach on how writing and spelling should be incorporated in the classroom. Whole Language focuses on children learning to write and read at the same time. The focus is not on …