Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Navigating Cultural Identity In The Classroom, Caroline V. Phillips

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

As of 2016, ~25% of children in the United States are the children of immigrants (Nibbs & Brettell). Many of these youths struggle with the feeling that they belong neither to their parents’ cultural community nor to the locality in which they have been raised (Brockett, 2018). Furthermore, little academic research exists wherein these students share their experiences and engage in the processes of meaning making. This knowledge is essential for multicultural scholars and also for the (overwhelmingly white) population of K-6 teachers who help these youth construct personal identities. This project accomplishes the following:

1. I interview second-generation immigrants …

Pragmatics In Game Activities, Humor, And Technology In Second Language Learning, Zachary Brandon Brown

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This portfolio compiles work the author explored and developed during the Master of Second Language Teaching (MSLT) program at Utah State University (USU). It encompasses a range of experiences from teaching abroad and at USU, insights from the observation of other classrooms, and reflections from studies in the MSLT program.

Three distinct sections comprise the portfolio: teaching perspectives, research perspectives, and an annotated bibliography. The teaching perspectives detail beliefs regarding games, computer technology, humor, and pragmatics and how they influence second language learning based on the author’s personal experiences. The research perspectives and annotated bibliography elaborate further on those topics …

Exploiting A Grading Policy Shift As An Instrument To Estimate Impact Of Grading On Teacher Evaluations, Gavin Johnson

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Professors at a university plausibly have an incentive to give higher grades to students, and these higher grades will be reflected in student evaluations, which are used to assess teaching quality, which could have career impacts. This paper takes advantage of a policy shift at the business school at Utah State University that introduced suggested caps on the average course grades that teachers gave. This allowed instrumental variable analysis to correct for bias in OLS estimations of these impacts. The correlation between grades and students' evaluations of teachers was found to be positive suggesting that student evaluations of teachers are …

An Evaluation Of The Effects Of Behavioral Skills Training On A Mindfulness-Based Protocol, Chealsy Darby

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This evaluation examined the effects of behavioral skills training on the correct implementation of a mindfulness-based protocol by direct support staff who provide services to adults with intellectual disabilities in a community, residential setting. Participants included two direct support staff who provide services to two different adults with intellectual disabilities who have a mindfulness-based protocol as an intervention for problem behavior described in their behavior support plan. The participants were exposed to a behavioral skills training package and were required to demonstrate mastery criteria of the mindfulness-based protocol as part of their regular job duties. The results of this evaluation …

Using Video Modeling To Teach Staff How To Implement Preference Assessments, Megan Weaver

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Identification of reinforcers through preference assessments for individuals with disabilities is an important task because it increases the probability of skill development, including academic tasks, self-help skills, social skills, and behavior modification. Teachers of students with disabilities often experience problems with training paraprofessionals to implement preference assessments using written instructions alone. In this study, researchers will investigate whether video modeling will be more effective than written instruction to staff to implement preference assessments. Participants will include three to five paraprofessionals in a classroom setting with no previous behavior analysis training on preference assessments and three to five students in a …

From Theory To Practice: Establishing The Classroom As The Setting For Race Talk Through The Intentional Analysis And Discussion Of Poems By Authors Of Color, Cree Taylor

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Modern-day racism exists in mostly subtle ways and is often felt most keenly in the classroom. When schools began the legal integration process in 1954, Black teachers were fired, all-Black schools were closed, and Black students were bused to the formerly all-White schools. In this new environment, Black students and all Students of color were forced to accept and adapt to an educational system that favored Whites over all other racial groups. Today, White Supremacy in education affects the establishment of state and national standards, school and district boundaries, and the un-fair disciplinary action taken against Students of Color. In …

Student-Centered, Interaction-Based, Community-Driven Language Teaching, Sharon Lyman

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This portfolio is a compilation that highlights some of the author’s accomplished work while in the Master of Second Language Teaching (MSLT) program at Utah State University (USU). Organized into sections that reflect the author’s teaching and research perspectives as a MSLT graduate student and instructor, who taught intensive English reading, writing, and conversation courses for the Intensive English Language Institute (IELI).

In the first section, teaching perspectives, the author describes her desired professional environment, shares her personal teaching philosophy statement, and accounts for her professional development through classroom observations. In the second section, research perspectives, two research papers and …

“Get Tough!”: A Case Study On The Development Of The Sport Ethic In Youth Lacrosse, Ross Budziszewski

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

While participation in youth sport is often linked with positive psychosocial and physical outcomes (Holt et al., 2017), this context can also cultivate ideals that lead to the development of unethical beliefs as well as unsafe sport practices (Al-Yaarbi & Kavussanu, 2017). The sport ethic is described as the deviant overconformity by an athlete to fit societal expectations of a sport’s high-performance culture (Hughes & Coakley, 1991). Strong beliefs in the sport ethic can lead to moral disengagement, antisocial behavior, and viewing sport like warfare (Shields, Funk, & Bredemeier, 2015). Although the sport ethic has been examined in competitive adult …

Stories Behind The Berlin Wall: Lesson Modules, Nicholas Redmon

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

I have grappled with my primary collection just as scholars and popular authors have with bringing these stories together with political histories. My goal is to create a digital map and analysis on specific themes like education and guard duty from the lives lived behind the Wall and their discourse with the government. I would like to explore how the divide impacted lives in 1961, created a GDR Society, and produced a division still felt in Germany today. The target audience of this project is U.S. students in high school and higher education. Students will be able to access timely …

Effectively Teaching A Second Language: Principles And Practices, Alexander Gatica

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This portfolio is the amalgamation of the author’s research and experience during his time in the Master of Second Language Teaching program. The first section contains the Teaching Philosophy, which centers on applying effective teaching methods, increasing learner motivation, and incorporating technology into the classroom. The next section consists of three artifacts in which the author further investigates specific aspects of language teaching. The language paper focuses on the effect that identity has on motivation to learn a language. The literacy paper discusses how to increase vocabulary acquisition via a mobile-assisted language learning application called Duolingo. The culture paper addresses …

Teaching Communication: Helping Students To Learn And To Love A New Language, Jacob Fredrickson

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This portfolio represents many hours spent in classrooms (as a student and as a teacher), in the library reading and writing, and spent in quiet contemplation. My views on teaching languages and on education in general have grown and changed. What a tragedy it would be to pass through a graduate program and not to have one’s views evolve and grow. Most importantly, this portfolio represents that growth and the ideal that, as an educator and as a human being, time on this earth ought to be spent growing, learning, and striving for something better.

Does Teaching Narrative Structure To Children With Language Impairments Improve Comprehension Of Expository Text?, Brynne Cook Evans

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Research has shown that knowledge of narrative text structure enhances students’ abilities to comprehend and produce narrative discourse. The current study was designed to determine if training in narrative text structure was associated with improved comprehension for expository passages that adhered to a narrative structure. Six children between the ages of 5:3 and 9:7 with language impairments participated. Children were matched by grade and randomly assigned to the intervention or control group. Participants in the intervention group received instruction 2 times a week for 45-minute sessions for a duration of 12 weeks from a graduate student in speech-language pathology with …

Maternal Language During Book-Sharing: Wordless Verses Print, Jessica Nielsen

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

The importance of adult linguistic responsiveness in facilitating language development in young children is well documented (e.g. Cross & Morris, 1980; Snow, 1994; Tamis-LeMonda, Bornstein, & Baumwell, 2001; Yoder, Warren, McCathern, & Leew, 1998). Research has shown that the use of responsive language by parents in the context of play is associated with greater child language productivity (Girolametto, Hoaken, Weitzman, & van Lieshout, 2000). Rocissano and Yatchmink (1983) found that when mother-child dyads utilized more joint attention, the toddlers demonstrated higher language skills and syntax abilities. Research has also shown that parent-child shared book reading contexts can be very beneficial …

Communicative Language Teaching: The Cornerstone Of Second Language Acquisition, Sierra Fischback

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

This portfolio is comprised of a compilation of papers written by the author while completing the Master of Second Language Teaching (MSLT) program at Utah State University. The focus of the portfolio is a teaching philosophy outlining the author’s beliefs on how to foster effective language teaching in the university foreign language classroom. Included as well are artifacts addressing coping with culture shock, effective forms of language learning, and reading in foreign language literature courses. These artifacts were chosen to reflect important areas of language teaching that have affected the author’s teaching philosophy. Finally, the author has incorporated an annotated …

Per Pupil Spending: How Much Difference Does A Dollar Make?, Nicole Anderson

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Education. The one thing everyone needs and no one thinks is good enough. Wherever students and policy makers turn there is the desire for something more, something better, coming out of the public education system. Over the years more and more funding has been poured into the education system in attempt to increase the student success rates and intellect of American students. However, American students are still behind internationally and more and more jobs are going to students from different countries. Is there a point when the money being funneled into education doesn’t make enough difference in student achievement and …

A River Runs Through Us: The Bear River Watershed Education Project, Robert M. Parrish

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Teachers have the difficult job of creating an educational climate in which subjects are linked and system are mutually dependent. Watershed education affords teachers thi s opportunity by using water quality monitoring as a basis for the study of any academic subject. A Ri ver Run Through Us: The Bear River Watershed Education Project (BRWEP) is a student-based program in Utah, Wyoming, and Idaho. The program aims to increase understanding and concern for the Bear River watershed by engaging students in water quality monitoring. Based on our experi ence in creating, managing, and evaluating this program, a process model for …

Description And Research Study Of Four Effective Teaching Methods, Gail Ryan

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

During my years in the public school system, I have felt that a basic deterrent to the child's personal and emotional growth has been the inability of educators to effectively communicate with children in the classroom. Gordon (1970, p. 298) states that teachers and other adults "lack the basic attitudes and skills to be effective training agents in an interpersonal relationship with a child or adolescent." Flanders (1971) feels that teachers, while behaviorally influencing children and determining the learning situation, actually have little knowledge about those methods of influence.

I am concerned with the need to train teachers to work …

An Examination Of Navaho Witchcraft And Its Influence On The Thoughts And Actions Of The Navaho People, Tarrel R. Palmer

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

In this paper, I will strive to bring together, both from literature and from my own experiences, pertinent information concerning Navaho witchcraft for the purpose of (1) presenting this information to the education staff at Wingate High School in the form of in-service training and (2) making this same information available to other Navaho high schools. It is hoped that this will help staff members to better understand the beliefs, fears, and emotional turmoils of the students with whom they are working and, thereby, be able to deal with them in a more knowledgeable and understanding manner.

The information presented …