Education Commons^™

Translating Transformative Human Rights Education Through Visual Languages & Informal Spaces, Jazzmin Chizu Gota

Master's Projects and Capstones

This project examines methods, theories, and practices of translating human rights education through multiple vernaculars. Developed as a workshop in sociocultural syntax deconstruction and an educational human rights education website focused on the domestic population of the US, the project focuses on localizing human rights concepts to the public vernacular of the country. Human rights education (HRE) and media and information literacy (MIL) are expanded and redefined as social literacy, or the ability to navigate and decode the present, complex realities that both HRE and MIL were developed to address. Reframing media and visual arts as an archive of past …

Mother Tongue Interference In English Language Pronunciation Of The Chinese Immigrant In The United States, Chaowei Hu

Master's Projects and Capstones

English is one of the most widely used languages in the world. As an unofficial lingua franca, it serves a key role in cross-cultural communication. Chinese immigrants in the US will certainly encounter many difficulties in acquiring L2 proficiency. Some of these challenges are tied to 1) Chinese immigrants’ history in the US and the variety of Chinese dialects; 2) distinctions between Chinese and English phonological systems; 3) diversity among Chinese Americans; 3) mother tongue influence on English language learning; and 4) foreign language anxiety.

Building Awareness Of The Mental Health Issues Of Asian American College Women, Julie S. Baek

Master's Projects and Capstones

The purpose of this project is to build awareness of the mental health issues of Asian American college women. The National Alliance on Mental Illness (2009) reports among all women between the ages of 15 to 24, Asian Americans have the second highest suicide rates across all racial or ethnic groups whereas only 27 percent of them seek a professional help. Very little is known about what makes this population of students take their own lives at higher rates than their ethnic counterparts because of a model minority myth and lack of studies and attention. The project aims to develop …

A Literacy-Level Curriculum For Adult Spanish-Speaking English Language Learners With Limited Formal Education, Kirsten L. Keihl

Master's Projects and Capstones

Many Spanish-speaking adult immigrants in the United States face an immediate need to learn English, but also suffer from a lack of formal education as many did not complete middle school or high school. These learners need a curriculum that is tailored specifically to their needs. This project provides a communicative curriculum for teaching English and Spanish literacy, English speaking and listening skills, and basic classroom skills utilizing native language instruction when helpful using learning strategies and authentic materials that are appropriate for adults. It also addresses sociocultural and sociopolitical concerns of this population and utilizes culturally relevant materials.

Barriers Encountered By Nurses And Nursing Assistants That Prevent Purposeful Rounding, Mar Joseph B. Odias

Master's Projects and Capstones

Purpose: The aim of the study was to identify barriers encountered by registered nurses (RNs) and nursing assistants (NAs) that prevent purposeful (hourly) rounding.

Background: The literature has shown that purposeful rounding improves patient outcomes and safety. However, few studies show the barriers encountered by nursing staff that hinder the purposeful rounding process.

Methods: A pre-post test design was implemented on a 25-bed oncology, urology medical surgical unit with a staff of 38 RNs, 9 NAs, and 4 Unit Secretaries (US). A pre-implementation needs assessment survey was completed by 55% (21/38) of RNs, 33% (3/9) of NAs, and 100% (4/4) …

Developing Inter-Professional Oral Health Education: An Evaluation Of Educational Resources, Jordan A. Jew

Master's Projects and Capstones

As healthcare continues to evolve, providers will need to uphold the quality of patient care provided to patients. Traditional healthcare holds many gaps that do not recognize the unmet needs that exist within today’s society. To maximize the abilities of healthcare services, inter-professional education introduces a collaborative approach that develops a network of shared knowledge and clinical skills beyond the primary scope of practice.

In this project, oral health learning modules developed for family practice residents were introduced to first-year dental students at the Dugoni School of Dentistry to improve their knowledge and confidence to both educate and practice with …

Improved Satisfaction On Postpartum Unit By Implementing A Discharge Nurse Role, Nicole Ware Rn, Msn

Master's Projects and Capstones

A three-month time period was used to develop a postpartum education program change by designing a discharge nurse role on the postpartum unit at University of North Carolina Women’s Hospital. The goal of the education change is to increase patient satisfaction scores of discharged post-natal mothers on the postpartum unit by having HCAPS and Press Ganey to improve up to10% over the next 6 months.

An observational assessment revealed a fragmented and antiquated discharge process. This process was paper based and difficult to complete in light of the short stay and high volume patient population. Informal nurse feedback as well …

Digital Lessons For Enhancing Communicative Skills: A Handbook For Turkish Efl Teachers, Hale H. Demirel

Master's Projects and Capstones

It is necessary for English teachers who are interested in exposing their students to the authentic and communicative use of English to have access to model instructional materials. This project sought to develop a handbook and an accompanying website for teachers of English working with intermediate ESL/EFL students at university level. The handbook includes two theme-based lessons that emphasize the development of communicative competence with the help of engaging free digital tools. The content of the handbook can be improvised or modified and adapted to meet the needs of unique teaching-learning situations in case of need.

Social Emotional Learning And Mindfulness: Learning To Be Human, Jena-Lee Rogers

Master's Projects and Capstones

I am a teacher. I always have been and always will be. As a little girl, I developed a passionate need to see fairness and justice in my world, which of course outside of my family of origin revolved around my life at school. If one of my friends could not understand something, even if I was not totally sure about it myself, I would endeavor to help them learn it in a way that made sense to them. A small act of friendship helped me learn and develop my own a belief in the oneness that connects all of …

Enhancing Education Of Medication Side Effects To Improve Patient Outcomes, Kyle R. Woolley

Master's Projects and Capstones

Patient satisfaction scores regarding how effectively staff educates patients about possible side effects of new medications are not consistently above the national average at a large metropolitan hospital in California (MHC). The results of these patient satisfaction scores shed light on the need for evidence-based strategies to improve a patient’s perception of the medication education provided to them. The basis of the incentive to improve care is ultimately increased safety and better patient outcomes. From the Root Cause Analysis, it became apparent that a few common barriers need to be addressed, but the one most frequently reported by everyone that …

Enhancing Esl Instruction Through Reflective Teaching: A Resource Guide For Administrators Of Intensive English Programs, Wesley Weston

Master's Projects and Capstones

Reflective teaching practices are meaningful and practical ways for administrators to support and encourage ongoing professional development among ESL teachers. Today, the global demand for English instruction has greatly surpassed the supply of qualified and experienced teachers. Many ESL teachers, therefore, can benefit significantly from continuous professional development, especially at Intensive English Programs preparing international students for higher education in the US.

Administrators can help further teacher development through the implementation of microteaching, peer observations, and surveys. These methods effectively foster professional growth by stimulating reflective inquiry, which promotes personal learning, behavior modification, and better performance. Furthermore, these practices help …

Beyond Access To Education: Using Collaborative Learning To Promote Agency In Unauthorized Latinos Entering Community College, Amanda C. Price

Master's Projects and Capstones

The US is widely recognized as a nation of immigrants; however, when an estimated 70,000 unaccompanied child migrants arrived from Central America in 2014, unauthorized immigration became a full-blown humanitarian crisis. Unauthorized immigrants, 71% of whom come from Mexico and Central America, make up an increasingly significant portion of the population. This is particularly true in California, where 28% of unauthorized immigrants reside. However, despite the overwhelming consensus that command of English is paramount to a successful life in the US, an alarming 51% of unauthorized immigrants speak English “not well” or “not at all”.

Unauthorized immigrants face unique challenges …

Supplementing Esl Classroom Activities With Social Media For Young Adult Learners, Clair M. Yeo

Master's Projects and Capstones

The classroom material currently utilized in English as a second language (ESL) classrooms is often disconnected from the real world. Publishers of ESL instructional materials often attempt to bridge this gap by including topics on popular news, films, songs, and famous persons at the time of printing. However, these are often outdated as quickly as they can be printed. As such, many ESL teachers face the challenge of keeping ESL classroom material relevant to the real world while seeking to maintain students’ interests in what they are learning.

The purpose of the project is to make use of social networking …

A Deeper Semiotic Richness: Empowering English Language Students Through Digital Storytelling, Karah Parks

Master's Projects and Capstones

The current philosophies underpinning TESOL higher education curricula and classroom practices still reinforce the essentialized narrative of the native speaker and teach English as an objective, disinterested, linguistic system of static signs (Blommaert, 2010; Kramsch, 2009; Larsen-Freeman, 2015; Pennycook, 1997). This has significantly limited the development students’ identities, and agency within English language speaking communities. To address this issue, this project contains a supplemental, online digital storytelling curriculum for intermediate to advanced adult learners at the university level in U.S. colleges as a means of scaffolding intentional identity development through multimodal, symbolic competence in the English language. Entitled Creative ESOL: …

Health Hub Program Evaluation, Natalie Macias

Master's Projects and Capstones

This paper examines and evaluates the work of LIFT-Levántate a non-profit organization in San Rafael, California on their school-based nutritional education “health hub,” through health promotion interventions with adolescents. The James B. Davidson Middle School health hub educates students on topics related to nutrition and physical activity with the goal of providing access and increasing consumption of fruits and vegetables while lowering students’ intake of high-fat and sugary processed foods. Through research and observations of the students and families in this community, the data seems to indicate apparent disparities which vary by ethnicity, socioeconomic status and access. Underserved populations, including …

Using American Pop Songs In Efl Classrooms, Mihea Oh

Master's Projects and Capstones

This project has an aim to provide effective learning environment through music resources by reducing negative feeling. Student will get away from boring classroom and have some positive energy to boost motivation on language acquisition during learning activities because music is a power to make more fun atmosphere in the classrooms.

Developing A Student-Centered Curriculum For High Intermediate And Advanced Writing Community College Esl Students To Promote Their Discovery Of Campus Resources, Sandra S. Fonseca Gardiner

Master's Projects and Capstones

Non-native speaker students in California community colleges face several challenges beyond the linguistic objectives they must achieve in their ESL courses. Many students come to the classroom with previous experiences of discrimination within the educational system. This is especially true of undocumented students. Income level is also often an obstacle to gaining access to an education, as is the previous educational experiences students have had in their own countries. While overcoming language barriers should be one of the main goal of ESL classes, attitudes toward non-native speakers can affect students’ learning because of perceived limitations in communication outside of the …

Encouraging Esl Teachers To Empower Their Students To Read, Rachael M. Van Liefde

Master's Projects and Capstones

In the US, thousands of international students are studying, or are preparing to study, at institutions of higher education. Unfortunately, the below satisfactory English skills of these students are a concern worldwide. One of the most critical factors affecting their academic progress is their reading skills.

It is widely accepted that a successful student in higher education must be able to read and comprehend assigned readings quickly. However, reading speed and comprehension pose a significant obstacle for ESL students who are pursuing these goals. How can ESL teachers assist their students at the high beginning, intermediate or advanced levels in …

Teaching English In Saudi Arabia Through The Use Of Multimedia, Linah A. Sofi

Master's Projects and Capstones

The purpose of this project is to design model lesson plans which will require the use of available modern technology and movies, songs and graphic novels, etc, to enhance students’ communicative competence and motivate critical thinking. In fact, The project will be constructed to implement the use of technology in the Saudi Arabian traditional classrooms. It will serve as a model for teachers to build their own lesson plans accordingly, using a communicative language teaching approach. Finally, it is hoped that with this handbook, Saudi Arabian English language learners will develop critical thinking skills and enhance higher communicative competence in …

Strategies To Reduce Foreign Language Anxiety In Adult Efl Students Of The European Union, Kathleen Hershner

Master's Projects and Capstones

One of paradoxes in adult foreign language learning is that older learners must communicate in the very language, in this case English, they struggle to acquire. The discomfort that arises from needing to use deficient or non-existent skills in a new language is more acutely felt in adults than children. Adults approach learning new languages with an assumed level of control over themselves and their environment and can easily become frustrated when they're unable to maintain their usual levels of confidence and competence, which can lead to foreign language anxiety. FLA is a specific kind of anxiety defined as an …

Incorporating Community Cultural Wealth In A Community-Based Organization, Henriette S. Ako-Asare

Master's Projects and Capstones

This project examined how Hack the Hood, a Bay Area non-profit organization, successfully works with low-income youth of color in an outside of school context using technological skills to empower them. Critical Race Theory, community cultural wealth, and the many studies on academic success provided a model through which to examine the efficacy and cultural relevance of Hack the Hood programming using interviews and data already gathered on the organization. Based on the analysis of Hack the Hood and the promising findings related to how their work advance several of the tenets of the community cultural wealth model, this project …

Effective Techniques For Teaching Phrasal Verbs To Improve Communicate Competence Of Chinese English Learners, Guohua Fu

Master's Projects and Capstones

Effective Techniques for Teaching Phrasal Verbs to Improve Communicate Competence of Chinese English learners

Teaching Reading Comprehension Skills To Saudi Female Students At The University Levels: A Handbook For Teachers, Dina Sofi

Master's Projects and Capstones

By using innovative language teaching techniques and methodologies based on Communicative Language Teaching Approach and Multiple Intelligences Theory , the author of this project aimed to develop a handbook for EFL female teachers in Saudi Arabia. The handbook serves as a guide for teaching reading comprehension to Saudi female students at the university levels. The handbook illustrates different teaching methods that activate different learning modalities. It also include sample units with reading passages and activities that model teaching reading, integrate different language skills and enhance the students’ communicative skills.

Plan Your Work And Work Your Plan: A Manual For Supporting And Enhancing The Academic Progress Of Black Male Student-Athletes, Frederic Benjamin

Master's Projects and Capstones

College sports have a profoundly positive effect on the vast majority of student-athletes who go on to pursue careers in something other than sports but this phenomenon has not translated equitably to the Black Male Student Athlete. Between 2007 and 2010, Black men were only 2.8% of full-time, degree-seeking undergraduate students but comprised 57.1% of football teams and 64.3% of basketball teams; The NCAA’s ongoing campaign to highlight the positive outcomes of participating in collegiate athletics has failed to address many of the underlying issues affecting Black male student-athletes. Specifically, there is perpetuation of the “myth that the road to …

Incorporating Digital Storytelling In The English Language Class For Korean University Students, Hyun Il Choi

Master's Projects and Capstones

The purpose of this project is to suggest practical ways to incorporate digital storytelling in the English classroom at the university level. To be specific, this project provides curriculum which includes set of practical activities and free digital media resources teachers can adapt. Using such devices for learning in a classroom will increase the students’ motivation for learning (Hagood & Skinner, 2008; Reinders, 2011). Each activity and lesson is focused on students being able to create their own digital story. Student will select a topic for their digital story and each lesson outlines how to develop the story using a …

Effective Techniques For Teaching Phrasal Verbs To Improve The Communicative Competence Of Chinese English Learners, Guohua Fu

Master's Projects and Capstones

This project provides a teaching guidebook for both English as a Second Language (ESL) students and teachers. Most learners do not know how to use phrasal verbs in their daily conversation even if they have already learned them. Moreover, it is hard for students to remember phrasal verbs they learned if they don’t practice them in meaningful contexts. This project will address the problem of the ineffective instruction of English in China and the exclusion of two-word verbs from the Chinese curriculum. Due to the differences in linguistic and education backgrounds, ESL teachers and students desire a guidebook that is …

Queering Social Justice Curricula Within Higher Education, Kate P. Cabot

Master's Projects and Capstones

Within higher education, social justice education has gained significant ground. While issues of gender, race, and class are increasingly addressed and incorporated into classes there remains a lack in inclusive curricula and pedagogies within colleges and universities when it comes to issues of gender and sexual identity. The social construction of gender and sexualities remains overlooked on the majority of college and university campuses, as well as the discrimination faced by Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Intersex, and Asexual (LGBTQIA) students unaddressed within curricula. The representation of the LGBTQIA community can be attended to within classrooms, campuses, and curriculums in …

The Effective Ways Of Teaching Vocabulary To Korean Students As A Second Language Learners, Sujin Kang

Master's Projects and Capstones

The purpose of this project is to create a handbook for EFL teachers in South Korea to help them teach vocabulary more effectively and to help solve the following question: what are the most effective ways of vocabulary teaching by focusing on vocabulary knowledge and speaking production. The goal is to suggests activities that could narrow the gap between learners’ vocabulary knowledge and their communicative competence. For this purpose, this project involves the development of a handbook suggestions for an EFL curriculum and authentic teaching materials, including textbooks, PowerPoint slides and handouts. The primary audience is EFL teachers working with …

Teaching Respect, Inclusion, And Acceptance In Ethnically And Culturally Diverse Early Childhood Classrooms, Romina S. Sapinoso

Master's Projects and Capstones

Given the increasingly diverse demographics of American public schools, it is necessary for teachers who are interested in exposing their students to concepts of inclusion, respect, and acceptance to have access to a resource guide and model for implementing a curriculum that is culturally and ethnically inclusive. This project sought to develop a resource guide for teachers of early childhood in schools to teach about inclusion, respect, and acceptance in a diverse classroom setting. This resource will be useful for teachers in grades Transitional Kindergarten, Kindergarten, first and second in creating a safe space to celebrate students’ differences and increase …