Curriculum and Instruction Commons^™

Between And Behind The Lines: The Life Of High School Coaches, Mary Davis

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

In this study, I write about the emotional journey of high school athletic coaches’ experiences as they move through their day as teachers, coaches, and spouses/parents. The examination of the emotions and transitions high school coaches experience has been largely unresearched. There have been examinations of teachers, the impact coaches have on athletes, and a coach as a parent, but there is not extensive research on all three roles experienced by one person. High school athletics is a tremendous part of high school, and coaches have a tremendous impact not only on their players, but on the students they teach …

Re-Establishing The Value Of Family And Consumer Science In The General Middle School Curriculum, Cassidy Wallace

West Chester University Master’s Theses

Family and consumer science is a subject that carries a complex cultural legacy. Beginning as a response to the social upheaval of the industrial revolution, family and consumer started as home economics, and was split between elevating the importance of the domestic arts and applying science to traditionally domestic tasks to both improve homelife and create new fields of academic research. While second goal was reached, and we now have food science, sanitation engineering, and materials research, among others, family and consumer science is still often relegated to domestic associations. However, family and consumer science is still relevant and powerful …

Re-Forging Democracy In Schools Through The History Of American Social Movements, Jonathan Privado

West Chester University Master’s Theses

Democratic virtue and spirit are severely lacking in the traditional school setting. With so many threats to the planet, the nation, and democracy as a whole, direct action, and active civic engagement are more important than ever. The traditional social studies and history curriculums of schools, both sanitized and passive, often claim to prepare students for citizenry, but are actually ill preparing students for the challenge and the necessity of genuine civic engagement. In particular, one of the most egregious offenders within the domain of the social studies is the traditional American history curriculum. In most cases, as this study …

Student's Perceptions Of Smartphone Use At Home And At A High School Regarding A New Smartphone Policy: A Case Study, Ana Zurita

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

The new generation raised in the digital era continues to present unresolved challenges for both parents and teachers. The purpose of this case study is to analyze students' usage of their smartphones in their lives, and understand the success of a new school policy on smartphone use at an arts school in the U.S. For this qualitative research, I interviewed ten participants from the high school. The literary review informs us that smartphones are potentially addictive, with negative effects for healthy mental, emotional and social child development, as well as a source of misleading information. As a consequence, smartphones in …

How The Change To Online Learning Affected Chinese Language Teaching In California Schools Due To The 2020 Covid-19 Pandemic, Jing Ren

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

This research study investigates how Chinese language teachers in California made the change from in-person learning to distance learning during the COVID-19 pandemic, how they set up and taught virtual classes and what their reactions were to the online transitions. Teachers utilized various interactive tools and strategies to teach students in their virtual classrooms. Parental involvement with the child’s education at home increased. Some public school district polices caused greater reductions in student participation than others. Teachers applied various communication strategies to engage students in creative ways while teaching online. This together with curriculum development and assessment design required that …

Scaffolding Development Of Clinical Supervisors: Learning To Be A Liaison, Jennifer Snow, Hannah Carter, Sherry A. Dismuke, Angel Larson, Stefanie Shebley

Curriculum, Instruction, and Foundational Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Teacher education as a field has embraced the idea that clinically-based teacher education will better support teacher candidate learning and the learning of their future preK-12 students (AACTE, 2018; NCATE, 2010). Likewise, teacher education scholars have emphasized the importance of learning to teach well in clinical practice (Darling-Hammond, 2014). We five women teacher educators engaged in a collaborative self-study to investigate our different perspectives and our institution’s hope for mentoring and preparing new liaisons. Our collaborative self-study focused on the research question: What are the key factors that play a part in influencing the developmental trajectory of a liaison? Through …

Analyzing The Cognitive Demand Of Enacted Examples In Precalculus: A Comparative Case Study Of Graduate Student Instructors, Erica R. Miller

Journal of Mathematics and Science: Collaborative Explorations

The cognitive demand of mathematical tasks is an important aspect of analyzing the impact of instruction on student learning. The purpose of this study was to examine the instructional examples enacted by graduate student precalculus instructors in order to answer the following questions: What is the cognitive demand of the enacted examples? What does a high cognitive demand example look like when an instructor uses direct instruction? And how are examples drawn from the written curriculum enacted in different ways? Using both random and purposeful sampling of precalculus lessons, I conducted classroom observations as well as pre- and post-observation interviews …

Social Studies Instruction And Integration, Morgan Wood

Masters Theses

Social studies education has been on the decline for many years. With a big part of the blame on standardized testing, it’s important to find ways to utilize the growing reading instructional time to make connections to history. This research utilized a variety of primary sources in social studies lessons. This allowed for the teacher to be able to meet many different standards across content areas in one lesson. Student motivation and engagement was heightened through cross-curricular lessons. The research conducted was completed in a small, rural school; one limitation being there were only 15 students included in the research. …

Stability Of The Learning Behaviors Scale, Nikki Davidson

Masters Theses

Learning behaviors are observable actions, habits, and manifestations of attitudes that facilitate learning, such as persevering at difficult tasks, showing interest in academic subjects, demonstrating care and concern about classwork, and graciously accepting feedback (Buchanan, McDermott, & Schaefer, 1998). Assessment of these learning behaviors is an essential first step to effective intervention. It is important to know which learning behaviors to target and the degree of deficit in order to remediate learning problems. The present study examined the medium length (two-month) stability of scores obtained from the Learning Behaviors Scale (McDermott, Green, Francis, & Stott, 1999). Fifty K-8 teacher rater …

Analyzing Students' Historical Thinking Skills At Different Grade Levels, Aaron Callaway

Masters Theses

The purpose of this research study is to compare and contrast the historical thinking abilities of students in distinct age-groups through their use of disciplinary literacy skills. This was accomplished by having eight total subjects from four distinct student age-groups participate in a guided inquiry activity about the beginning of the Korean War. As they engaged in the inquiry activity, the participants’ cognitive process and responses to the researcher’s questions were recorded and transcribed and later analyzed. These transcriptions were juxtaposed with one another in search of any major patterns that emerged during the inquiries. Several patterns were identified including …

The Impact Of Shared Reading On 1st Graders’ Writing Using Author’S Craft, Kelsey Bolin

Masters Theses

This study was conducted in a first grade classroom with twenty participants. This study took place over five and a half weeks, where students were introduced to three mentor texts in a shared reading setting. The students asked and answered questions about the texts and participated in extension writing activities. Students were given opportunities to engage with the mentor texts and writing in whole group settings as well as individual settings. Students were expected to write a final assignment using the form of author craft portrayed in the final mentor text, which students were able to complete successfully.

Students practiced …

Mobility Matters: Interdisciplinary Partnerships To Create More Accessible Cities, Amy T. Parker

Special Education Faculty Publications and Presentations

History of the Mobility Matters, Portland State University’s annual summit on transportation accessibility.

Conceptual Paper For Re-Validating The Teacher Of Deafblind And Intervener Competencies, Susan Bruce, Cathy Nelson, Amy T. Parker, Debbie Sanders, Adam Graves, Carol Rimka

Special Education Faculty Publications and Presentations

An overview of the standards for the role of Teacher of the Deafblind (TBD) and the paraprofessional Intervener.

Personalized Learning: An Engagement Strategy For At-Risk Student Populations, Abbigail Morris

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Personalized learning in the United States experienced a resurgence in the educational landscape as a result of increased technology access and computing power. The availability of affordable technology, software solutions, and access to the Internet led to the infiltration of technology into personalized learning approaches and provided a new platform for personalized learning advocates. Engagement and student agency were components of personalized learning attracting many educators to reinvest in personalized learning opportunities. This study focused on a rural, western Kentucky school district that piloted personalized learning through a blended learning environment. The study sought to measure engagement levels of both …

Understanding Educators’ Experiences During Long-Term School Closures, Jessica Pryor, Jessica Pryor

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

In the spring of 2020, many public places closed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Most public schools in the United States suddenly closed buildings as educators and students scrambled to adapt to distance education. This phenomenological, qualitative study holistically explores elementary educators’ experiences during the extended school closures. The 18current elementary educators who participated in individual interviews, served rural, elementary students. Individual interviews allowed participants to discuss and explain their experiences concerning methods, materials, time commitments, and communication with colleagues, parents, and students. They also discussed how they used feedback to alter their teaching. The interviews were conducted during …

Portraits Of Professional Collaboration: Faculty-Librarian Teaching Partnerships, Carrie L. Forbes

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Many regional accrediting organizations for higher education have embraced information literacy as a key component for both student success and student learning outcomes. Through embedded librarianship practices, librarians are now taking a leading role in developing and promoting users’ information literacy skills and in adopting an active classroom teaching approach. Faculty-librarian team teaching is a best practice for integrating information literacy into the higher education curricula, but the extant research has largely focused on the barriers to collaboration. Using Walsh and Kahn’s (2010) model of “collaborative working” as a conceptual framework, this dissertation explores the qualities and characteristics of four …

Encouraging Healthy Eating Among Older Adults Using The Transtheoretical Model: An Evaluation Of A Pilot Intervention, Lauren Brinkman Roberson

Theses and Dissertations--Communication

Older adults, defined as those age 60 and above, are at an increased risk for many health-related complications that are directly related to nutrition (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2015). This study highlights the lack of nutrition education material developed for older adults in Kentucky. Such material has great potential to influence the health of older adults (Chernoff, 2001). This study evaluated an intervention developed, by means of formative research, to teach older adults nutrition basics. Both direct and indirect measures related to stages of change for healthy eating behaviors were collected six weeks pre-intervention and then immediately post-intervention. …

Trifecta Of Student Engagement: A Framework For Engaging Students In Online Courses, Heather J. Leslie Phd

Learning Design Center: Staff Scholarship

This chapter describes a framework adapted from Michael Moore's three essential areas: student-content interaction, student-student interaction, and student-instructor interaction for engaging students in online courses. To be fully engaged in an online course, students need to be engaged with the course curriculum content, with their peers, and with their instructor. When students are engaged in all three areas, it is referred to as the Trifecta of Student Engagement. This chapter incorporates literature on each area of the Trifecta of Student Engagement: student-to-content engagement, student-to-student engagement, and student-to-instructor engagement as well as some suggested synchronous and asynchronous digital tools.

Technology-Based Culturally Relevant Chemistry Education (Crce), Mercy Adoma Fosu

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The relevance of chemistry concepts and principles remains a challenge for most students enrolled in college chemistry courses. Part of this problem is the disconnect with what students experience in their every-day lives, and how the material, specifically chemistry content is presented via textbooks, lectures, and laboratory teaching. Moreover, the teaching of general chemistry has traditionally focused on traditional, instructor-centric expository delivery of course materials, that treats students as empty vessels devoid of prior knowledge. Students prior knowledge and experiences are crucial in shaping their understanding of scientific concepts and principles. Even students with relatively low expectations for success in …

Participatory Action Research In Schools: Unpacking The Lived Inequities Of High Stakes Testing, Tiffany A. Dejaynes, Tabatha Cortes, Israt Hoque

Publications and Research

Purpose – This paper aims to examine a school-based Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) project on educational inequity and high stakes testing.

Design/methodology/approach – A former high school teacher (currently a university professor) and two former students (currently research assistants and university students) take up a youth studies framework to collaboratively resee multimodal artifacts from a tenth-grade course in qualitative research.

Findings – Findings illustrate the power of finding allies in peers and educators; the transformative power of deep participation; and the longitudinal nature of social change and action. Thus, this research demonstrates that when students are positioned as researchers, …