Education Commons^™

Effectively Preparing Special Education Teachers: Success In Urban Environments, Gabrielle Siegenthaler

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

This literature review examines the level of preparedness of pre-service and novice special education teachers, specifically teachers pursuing education careers within urban school districts. Research studies were reviewed to indicate what teaching methods are regarded as effective in relation to behavior management. It was found that using culturally responsive teaching has been proven to be effective within urban settings. Studies were also examined to determine if first-year teachers were well prepared and what teacher preparation programs could possibly implement to ensure that future educators are well equipped to effectively teach and manage the growing special education population of students in …

The Importance Of A Strong Mathematical Foundation, Jasmine M. Wriston

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

The mathematical skills students learn from kindergarten through eighth grade are the foundational skills upon which all higher level mathematics courses build. It is highly beneficial that students master previous mathematics concepts, applications, and skills, prior to learning algebra and other higher level mathematical courses. Mastering elementary and middle level mathematics before learning algebra increases students’ chances for success when taking an algebra course. This study tested 39 ninth and tenth graders, from the college preparatory program Upward Bound, on the mathematical domains of fractions and ratios/proportions. Participants took one of two tests, each composed of three questions increasing in …

Reflections On Effectively Implementing Culture In The Foreign Language Classroom, Alyssa N. Petsche

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

The purpose of this research project is to explore the perceptions and attitudes of past and current foreign language students regarding the relevancy of culture within foreign language education. The first portion of this paper contains a literature review from a variety of international research articles discussing the necessity, implementation methods, and assessment techniques for implementing culture within the foreign language classroom setting. While the research from the literature review emphasizes for researchers and educators the importance of including culture within the foreign language curriculum, very little research has been recorded regarding the perceptions and beliefs of foreign language learners. …

School Gardens: Cultivating A Child’S Nutritional Habits, Environmental Knowledge, And Sustainability Practices, Jeffrey Meltzer

Honors Theses

School gardens have existed since the late nineteenth century and today are becoming increasingly popular in many parts of the world, including where I studied in Maine and Australia (AUS). Multiple organizations support school gardens in Maine, including the Maine School Garden Network, which has over 125 registered school gardens. In AUS, the Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation primarily supports the school garden movement and has over 800 registered school gardens. While many researchers have studied school gardens, few have compared two countries, focused on environmental sustainability, or investigated Maine in particular. This thesis combines information from literature reviews, and …

Young, Gifted, Black, And Blocked: A Critical Inquiry Of Barriers That Hinder Black Students' Participation In Gifted And Advanced Placement Programs, Elizabeth Anne Evans

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This inquiry explores the underrepresentation of Black students in the Gifted and Advanced Placement (AP) Program from the perspective of the student. This study focused primarily on the barriers students perceived that hindered their participation. In addition, I explored the role teachers and guidance counselors play in Black students’ decisions to enroll or drop out of AP classes, and how the history and institution of gifted educations has aid and excluded Black students. Five Black high school students, four male, and one female, were interviewed.

Theoretically, my study was grounded in two distinct inquiries; Critical Theory (Kincheloe & McLaren, 2008) …

Understanding A Sense Of School Membership For Students With Disabilities In Two Middle Schools, Heather Holland

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In today’s educational system, a conversation that is often deprioritized is the need to consider students’ affective skills. One such aspect of this domain is how students feel as a member of their school environment. This need to belong is a basic psychological need (Goodenow, 1993); however, this is a critical component for students who may be marginalized, such as students with disabilities (Hagborg, 1998b). Hagborg (1998b) projected during his study that SWDs would have a lower sense of school membership that their non-disabled peers due, but the results of his study found that SWDs had comparable rates. Hagborg concluded …

Teacher Influence On Elementary School Students’ Participation In Science, Technology, Engineering, And Mathematics, Courtney Hartman

Honors College Theses

The purpose of this study is to explore the influence of elementary school teachers on encouraging students’ interest and participation in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. The researcher sought to understand what methods teachers use in their classrooms to encourage students to participate in STEM subjects and programs. This mixed methods study consisted of a questionnaire to collect quantitative data, as well as an interview of selected teachers who participated in the questionnaire to collect qualitative data. The data was analyzed to determine the overall perceptions of teachers regarding the importance of encouraging students to participate in STEM. The qualitative …

Jamming As A Curriculum Of Resistance: Popular Music, Shared Intuitive Headspaces, And Rocking In The "Free" World, Mike Czech

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This project opens space for looking at the world in a musical way where “jamming” with music through playing and listening to it helps one resist a more standardized and dualistic way of seeing the world. Instead of having a traditional dissertation, this project is organized like a record album where each chapter is a Track that contains an original song that parallels and plays off the subject matter being discussed to make a more encompassing, multidimensional, holistic, improvisational, and critical statement as the songs and riffs move along together to tell why an arts-based musical way of being can …

Dr. Eugene Grigsby's Connections To Art, African American Life In The South, And Social Justice Education: Implications For Art Education Curriculum, Reggie A. Stephens Mr.

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

DR. EUGENE GRIGSBY’S CONNECTIONS TO ART, AFRICAN AMERICAN LIFE IN THE SOUTH, AND SOCIAL JUSTICE EDUCATION: IMPLICATIONS FOR ART EDUCATION CURRICULUM by REGINALD STEPHENS (Under the Direction of Dr. Sabrina Ross) ABSTRACT Building on concepts of double consciousness (Dubois, 1903/1994), the negative effects of a lack of visibility in curricula (Woodson, 2010), critical race theory, and the notion that artists’ lived experiences of oppression encourage actions and art that challenge injustice (Bey, 2011), this study sought to demonstrate that the lives and works of Black artists from the South in the early 20th Century are pedagogical. Inspired by the critical …

Classroom Modifications With Improved Acoustics Modeled For Cehic, A School For The Deaf, In Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, Polwatte Krishantha Silva

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The purpose of this study was to model a typical classroom in a school for the Deaf inKelaniya,Sri Lanka. Intense effort by teachers provides intervention for students with significant hearing impairment. The school is an oral school, and the philosophy is to utilize the residual hearing of each student through the use of high-powered hearing aids. Like many schools inSri Lanka, the Centre for Education of Hearing-Impaired Children (CEHIC) has many classrooms that have both high ambient noise with long reverberation times. Both noise and reverberation interfere with the sound signal, the teacher’s voice, and provide a poor learning environment …

Divergent Summers: Measuring The Effect-Size Of Summer Vacation On Reading And Mathematics Achievement Scores For Different Populations Of Maine Students, Brian I. Mazjanis Phd

All Student Scholarship

This quantitative study of summer learning for Maine students in grades three through grades eight analyzed changes in academic achievement level in mathematics and reading that occurred during the summer recess of 2009. The patterns of learning exposed in this study have meaningful implications for policymakers attempting to close the achievement gap.

I See A Spark And Blow On It: Drama Practice In Year 1 And The New Australian Curriculum In The Arts, Christine Lovering

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

New educational directives have an effect on the practice of teachers in schools. This study is propelled by the introduction of a national Australian Curriculum and subsequent changes to the Arts curriculum. As one of the five arts subjects, drama has been included in the primary school curriculum in Western Australia since 1997, however, its inclusion and the teaching of drama has not been consistently realised.

Teacher perspectives and beliefs about specific Learning Areas influence their planning and practice; often this is related to past experiences. This study aims to determine Year 1 teachers’ perspectives of, and practices in, drama. …

Educative Curricula And Improving The Science Pck Of Teachers In Middle School Settings In Rural And Remote Australia, Arthur Townsend

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Science is one of seven-mandated Key Learning Areas (KLAs) Foundation to Year 10 of the new Australian National Curriculum (ACARA, 2012). Not only, therefore, is science to be offered in every school as part of the curriculum, there is also the expectation that science is to be taught well to all students regardless of location, gender, cultural background or socio-economic status (ACARA, 2012). Studying science provides benefits to individuals by developing their scientific literacy skills (Goodrum, Hackling & Rennie, 2001; Hackling & Prain, 2008). Its study also benefits the national economy by equipping students with the innovative, inventive, and creative …

Exploring The Impact Of Teacher Collaboration On Teacher Learning And Development, Tami Burton

Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative study explored the impact that teacher collaboration has on teacher learning and development. Through data collection and analysis of teacher questionnaires, observations, a focus group, and interviews, collaboration was investigated for its impact on how teachers build on their unique pedagogies. The study included 22 participants in a rural elementary school in South Carolina. Three common themes were identified and explored for their relation to teacher learning and development. An in-depth look at the participant’s perceptions was provided. The findings of this qualitative study demonstrated that effective teacher collaboration incorporates having shared or common goals, teacher efficacy, and …

Investigating The Influence Of Professional Development On Teacher Perceptions Of Engineering Self Efficacy, Stephen D. Marquis Phd

All Student Scholarship

This mixed-methods study examines the influence of a professional-development intervention to support educators in the integration of engineering education at the elementary level. Particular consideration focused on the evolution of teachers' perceptions of engineering self-efficacy following engagement in professional development intended to support the introduction of engineering in selected grade-five classrooms.

What We Know, What We Do And What We Could Do: Creating An Understanding Of The Delivery Of Health Education In Lower Secondary Government Schools In Western Australia, Donna Michelle Barwood

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Australian health data indicates that childhood is a significant time for young Australians to develop health and well-being issues. Concurrently, health advocates herald in-school delivery of skills-based participatory health education as making significant contributions to developing behaviour change and supporting health enhancing dispositions in children and young people. In Western Australia (WA), skillsbased participatory health education is characterised by linking knowledge and understandings of what it means to be safer, healthier and more physically active to skills that action these states. Skills-based is a preferred approach to teaching and learning in the Health and Physical Education Learning Area (HPE LA), …

Knowing And Teaching: The Impact Of Teachers’ Knowledge On Students’ Early Literacy Achievement, Janet Hunter

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Children in rural and remote schools typically underperform in measures of literacy achievement (e.g., NAPLAN) from as early as year three. Data collected over time indicate that as children get older, the gap increases between those students who meet the national benchmarks and those who do not. Additionally, Indigenous children are overrepresented in this group of students who are underperforming in measures of literacy achievement. This study seeks to explore the conditions surrounding this phenomenon and to tease out the complexities present in rural and remote contexts that might contribute to this underachievement.

One remote and six remote‐rural schools in …

Transformative Participation In A Professional Community: A Holistic Case Study Of One Experienced Teacher’S Evolving Practice, Kim Zeidler-Watters

Theses and Dissertations--Curriculum and Instruction

This descriptive, holistic, single case study focuses on how an experienced teacher with 21 years of teaching was able to negotiate participation in a community of practice (CoP). The study applies Wenger’s (1998) Community of Practice framework as a lens through which to gain insight into the subject’s professional transformation. Wenger’s multilayered theoretical approach, including the four components of his social learning model, provides a common language to describe participation.

The specific research questions that frame this inquiry are: 1) How did an experienced secondary mathematics teacher, involved in an ongoing and dual-faceted professional development project, negotiate meaningful participation in …