Education Commons^™

The Use Of Technology In Secondary Mathematics Classrooms: The Case Of One School District, Cononiah Latrece Watson

Master's Theses

Integration of technology into secondary education mathematics classes has been shown to increase student motivation and performance. In order for technology to be a component of students’ education, teachers must have training on various technologies available for their subjects of study. This research study surveys thirty-one 6-12^th grade teachers in the Lamar County School District in southern Mississippi regarding availability of technologies, use of technologies, and professional development needs concerning technology use.

Perceived Attributes And Factors Influencing Instructors’ Using E-Textbooks In Higher Education, Sirui Wang

Dissertations

As digital content, e-Textbooks display text on the screen, integrate multimedia within textual components, and allow reading on portable devices; which make learning highly interactive, flexible, and immediately accessible, increase students’ engagements in learning, and make learning content portable, transferrable, and searchable. Those advanced features did not bring prosperity in using e-Textbooks in education. The adoption of using e-Textbooks in higher education is still far from its confirmation stage. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between the perceived attributes of using e-Textbooks by instructors and their actual use of e-Textbooks in higher educational settings, to discuss …

The Relationship Between Students’ Applied Mathematics Skills And Students’ Attitudes Towards Mathematics, Taylor Andrew Kilman

Dissertations

Mathematics is a subject with which many students struggle. It has been noted that students’ attitudes towards mathematics can often affect their performance in related courses. The goal of this research is to explore the relationship between students’ basic applied mathematics skill and students’ attitudes towards mathematics. That is, do students, as they learn how to use mathematics in the real world, tend to develop a more favorable outlook towards mathematics? Or, on the other hand, do the attitudes towards mathematics of students remain unaffected as their ability to use mathematics in the real world increases? The current research seeks …

High School Culture, Graduation Rates, And Dropout Rates, Philip L. Pearson

Dissertations

High school graduation rates and dropout rates have been a source of concern for many years. A number of strategies have been studied that could improve graduation rates and reduce dropout rates. School culture has been touted as an area that affects student achievement. As the culture of schools improves, student achievement has been shown to improve. The research focus of this study was to determine if there is a relationship between high school culture in public high schools in Mississippi and the graduation and dropout rates. School culture was measured by the School Culture Survey (SCS). As scores on …

Leadership Practices Among Undergraduate Nursing Instructors, Melissa Martin Bryant

Dissertations

The purpose of this study is to identify leadership practices of nursing instructors in the southern U.S.; and to determine if instructor leadership practices differ from the ‘norm’ leadership practices reported by the LPI instrument (Posner 2008), or from the practices observed by their matched students (observer version). Further, the purpose is to determine the relationship between instructors self-reported leadership practices (self-version) and student observed practices based on institution type, and instructor education level. The consisted of a group of instructors and students that were primarily Caucasian and female. The demographics for the instructors and students were similar to the …

Preferences For Intrinsic And Extrinsic Sport Motivators Of Mississippi's Public Sschool Teachers, Jason Hugh Rayborn

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine if Mississippi’s teachers teach for the same motivational reasons that athletes practice their sport. Certified teachers (N=380) from Mississippi were asked to complete a modified version of the Sport Motivation Scale-II (SMS-II) survey. This modified version of the instrument, the SMS-II-ED, included 18 questions from 6 different extrinsic, intrinsic, and a-motivational subgroups and one qualitative question for a total of 19 questions. Preliminary demographic items included teacher’s grade level taught (K-5, 6-8, 9-12), years’ experience (1-10, 11-19, 20+), and previous high school or collegiate sport participation (yes or no).

Descriptive statistics were …

Novelty Or Knowledge? A Study Of Using A Student Response System In Non-Major Biology Courses At A Community College, Tasha Herrington Thames

Dissertations

The advancement in technology integration is laying the groundwork of a paradigm shift in the higher education system (Noonoo, 2011). The National Dropout Prevention Center (n.d.) [JS1] claims that technology offers some of the best opportunities for presenting instruction to engage students in meaningful education, addressing multiple intelligences, and adjusting to students’ various learning styles. The purpose of this study was to investigate if implementing clicker technology would have a statistically significant difference on student retention and student achievement, while controlling for learning styles, for students in non-major biology courses who were and were not subjected to the technology. This …

Assessment Of Student Knowledge Of The Weak And Strong Nuclear Forces, Pramila Shakya

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine if the use of active-learning activities to teach weak force and strong force to students enrolled in various courses at The University of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg campus and Gulf Park campus at different class times would increase their knowledge. There were eighty-six students that took part in this study. The study was conducted in the lab classes of an introductory astronomy survey course (AST 111), an introductory algebra-based physics course (PHY 112), and an introductory calculus-based physics course (PHY 202) during fall semester 2014. Each class was randomly assigned as active-learning or …

A Measure Of Soft Skill Gains Acquisition With Engagement In Baccalaureate Nursing Programs, Wendy J. Williams-Buenzli

Dissertations

This dissertation examined soft skill acquisition from engagement in baccalaureate nursing programs. Baccalaureate nursing programs prepare nurses to be the future leaders of nursing practice. Soft skills include critical thinking, interpersonal communications, and ethical decision-making. To explore the acquisition of soft skills, this research study analyzed data from the National Survey of Student Engagement to explore for gains in critical thinking, ethical decision-making, and critical thinking. After gains scores were identified, then correlations were run to identify key engagement indicators. The findings of the study found gains in soft skill behaviors from freshman year to senior year of baccalaureate education. …

Fay B. Kaigler Children's Book Festival, Karen Rowell, The University Of Southern Mississippi, The University Of Southern Mississippi's School Of Library And Information Science

Fay B. Kaigler Children's Book Festival Programs

The program for the forty-eighth annual Fay B. Kaigler Children's Book Festival held on the campus of The University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg, Mississippi in 2015.

Collecting Globe Data In Pascagoula Watershed, Sherry S. Herron

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Effective Computer Based Resources For Teaching Inquiry Based Science: The Globe Program, Sherry S. Herron

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

An Investigation Of Tree Biomass In The Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Skipper C, Stokley P, Sherry S. Herron

Faculty Publications

We determined the biomass (carbon storage) of four forest types in the Great Smokey Mountains National Park: pine/oak, cove hardwood, northern hardwood, and spruce/fir. Based on the GLOBE Programs land cover protocols (www.globe.gov), and the University of New Hampshire's GLOBE Carbon Cycle Program (http://globecarboncycle.unh.edu/), we knew that species and tree circumference would be the two most critical factors in determining biomass, but we also hypothesized that number of trees in a study site and the elevation of the site would impact biomass. We hypothesized that old growth forest would contain greater biomass than a young forest. …

End Of Year Ethical Considerations: 2015, Sheila P. Davis

Journal of Health Ethics

No abstract provided.