Education Commons^™

“That Cross-Curricular Business”: The Engineering Design Process In Mathematics And Science Classrooms, Eugenia Vomvoridi-Ivanovic, Tonisha B. Lane, Leia K. Cain, Salam Ahmad, Selene Willis, Jonathan E. Gaines

The Qualitative Report

The engineering design process (EDP) is one tool teachers can use to facilitate STEM integration. As part of a larger three-year longitudinal research project regarding engineering identity development among middle school youth in a summer robotics outreach program, this study aims to understand teachers’ willingness to incorporate engineering design in their classrooms through an exploration of their perceptions of the EDP, its applications to their subject matter and classroom context, methods of enacting the EDP, and perceived challenges to and supports for doing so. We conducted a qualitative case study and drew our results from focus groups and semi-structured interviews …

The Intersection Of Culturally Responsive Pedagogy And Engineering Design In Secondary Stem, Mariam Manuel, Jessica Gottlieb, Gina Svarovsky, Rebecca Hite

Journal of Pre-College Engineering Education Research (J-PEER)

The instructional practices of the engineering design process and culturally responsive pedagogy have each garnered national attention and multiple decades of research. Findings from the respective literature bases call for educators and policymakers to integrate these two pedagogical approaches into K-12 classroom instruction. Scholars have argued that this integration would improve student engagement and academic achievement. There is a significant amount of research that supports the positive student outcomes associated with each approach, yet there remains a dearth of literature that addresses the integration of these two practices into the science and mathematics content areas. The movement around educational reform …

Agency Of In-Service Elementary Science Teachers During A Global Pandemic, Anica Miller-Rushing

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In-service teachers of science work with unique content and pedagogical experiences. Understanding teacher agency in these circumstances will help researchers understand the actions that these teachers take, actions that are consequential for shaping teaching patterns and supporting the development of students’ scientific practices. The purpose of this study was to understand how the agency of six elementary (K–5) in-service teachers was expressed discursively during a global pandemic. The teachers’ agency was qualitatively analyzed using a case study approach (Yin, 2012, 2017) that applied discourse analysis to identify the ways in which science teacher agency is conceptualized, afforded, and constrained through …

In An Era Of Soft Skills: Investigating Teamwork Skills In The Geosciences, Samuel Cornelius Nyarko

Dissertations

Geoscience employers have increasingly called for student competency in three sets of skills – technical, field and soft skills. One major soft skill identified by employers is teamwork, which is critical in laboratory and field-based activities. At the same time, educators seek to inculcate in students a stronger focus on the development of teamwork skills as they are useful for knowledge sharing and problem solving. This interconnected value of teamwork in both the workforce and academia means students’ preparation should include learning teamwork in the geoscience. However, before educators can design strategies that help students learn critical teamwork skills, we …

The North Carolina Teaching Fellows Program: A Case Study Of The Use Of Forgivable Loans In Recruiting Future Stem Teachers, Katie N. Smith

Journal of Student Financial Aid

In 2018-2019, North Carolina implemented a loan forgiveness program to recruit talented postsecondary students into teaching majors in needed subject areas. This qualitative case study analyzes the influence of the North Carolina Teaching Fellows Program (NCTFP) on 10 student participants’ college, major, and career plans in STEM education to understand how loan incentives shaped student interest in teaching careers in STEM subjects. Findings reveal that forgivable loan funding influenced college choice among those choosing institutions at the time of NCTFP acceptance. While the NCTFP was most appealing to participants who already planned to become STEM educators, there is also evidence …

Teacher Leadership: The Value Of Action Research In The Development Of Science Teacher Leaders, Vanessa Vernaza-Hernández

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The past few years have seen the establishment of many professional development programs for science teachers leaders aimed at improving the process of teaching and learning of science. One of these is the Robert Noyce Master Teacher Fellows (MTF) program, which is part of a research university in the southeastern United States. This is an extended teacher development program with the purpose of developing effective science and mathematics teachers into successful teacher leaders, professional development providers, curriculum developers, and formal mentors. One of the characteristics that distinguishes this MTF program is that, as part of the leadership development experiences, the …

Language Socialization Of Mainland Chinese Adolescents In U.S. Science Classrooms, Fang Yu

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Secondary schools in the United States are enrolling an increasing number of Mainland Chinese students, and this cohort of students is often seen as a “model minority” that can achieve academic success without much if any, extra support. However, many Chinese students encounter difficulties not only in learning English but in learning other content areas raising questions as to what they experience as the affordances and constraints to their learning.

Experience Of The Neophyte Science Teachers: Through Their Eyes, David Thornton

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A variety of lenses were used to examine the world of the novice science teacher. A degree of agency was provided by looking through the eyes of the beginning teacher. Previous studies focused on researcher or program’s orientation, the successes of various educator preparation programs, or were limited in scope to elementary teachers of science. This study was conducted to better understand and appreciate the high school novice science teacher’s view of science, teaching, and teaching science in the today’s contextual setting. Experiences encountered during the initial year of teaching high school science and as perceived by teachers without previous …

Teachers’ Incorporation Of Argumentation To Support Engineering Learning In Stem Integration Curricula, Corey A. Mathis, Emilie A. Siverling, Aran W. Glancy, Tamara J. Moore

Journal of Pre-College Engineering Education Research (J-PEER)

One of the fundamental practices identified in Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) is argumentation, which has been researched in P-12 science education for the previous two decades but has yet to be studied within the context of P-12 engineering education. This research explores how elementary and middle school science teachers incorporated argumentation into engineering design-based STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) integration curricular units they developed during a professional development program. To gain a better understanding of how teachers included argumentation in their curricula, a multiple case study approach was conducted using four STEM integration units. While evidence of argumentation …

Pedagogical Moves As Characteristics Of One Instructor’S Instrumental Orchestrations With Tinkerplots And The Ti-73 Explorer: A Case Study, James L. Kratky

Dissertations

Those supporting contemporary reform efforts for mathematics education in the United States have called for increased use of technologies to support student-centered learning of mathematical concepts and skills. There is a need for more research and professional development to support teachers in transitioning their instruction to better meet the goals of such reform efforts.

Instrumental approaches to conceptualizing technology use in mathematics education, arising out of the theoretical and empirical work in France and other European nations, show promise for use to frame studies on school mathematics in the United States. Instrumental genesis is used to describe the bidirectional and …

Putting Physics First: Three Case Studies Of High School Science Department And Course Sequence Reorganization, Douglas B. Larkin

Douglas B. Larkin

Teaching For Students' Confident Transition From Number To Algebra, Christina Lang Lee

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

The adoption by all states and territories of the national curriculum by 2013 saw students in schools across the country taught introductory algebraic concepts from Year Five. In the twenty first century the need to be algebraically competent has become a necessity much as computation was in the previous centuries.

The Researcher has found from experience that students who have struggled with number and number operations will then most probably make poor progress in their study of algebra. The transition from number to algebra requires a robust understanding of number and number operations

This study investigated the balance of instructional …

A Case Study Of Culturally Responsive Teaching In Middle School Mathematics, Rosanne Fulton

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is a case study of culturally responsive teaching in middle school mathematics. The study contributes to the emerging definition of learning experiences in mathematics that support all middle school students through the use of culturally responsive teaching strategies. These experiences are organized to actualize the balance between accommodating the individual student’s culture, needs and interests and supporting the attainment of appropriate mathematics learning goals.

The research site was chosen because of its diverse and changing student demographics, and because of the achievement and growth rates of these students. Data collected from classroom observations of three middle school mathematics …

Uncovering Transformative Experiences: A Case Study Of The Transformations Made By One Teacher In A Mathematics Professional Development Program, Rachelle Myler Orsak

Theses and Dissertations

Effective professional development is vital for improving mathematics teaching (National Council of Teachers of Mathematics [NCTM], 2007), so studying effective professional development programs is important to the field of mathematics education. This case study presents findings on one teacher, Rebecca, and her experiences in a five-semester mathematics professional development for elementary teachers. The participants in this professional development engaged in collaborative problem solving of challenging mathematical tasks over extended periods of time. I used qualitative research methods based on grounded theory methodology (Charmaz, 2006) to analyze Rebecca's entrance and exit surveys, video data of Rebecca's individual interviews, and video data …