Language and Literacy Education Commons^™

Writing For The Web: Twitter As A Starting Point For Breaking News, Sue Burzynski Bullard, Michelle Carr Hassler

College of Journalism and Mass Communications: Faculty Publications

Students enrolled in a multimedia reporting course use Twitter to cover breaking news events as they unfold, capitalizing on the immediacy of the social media network and the Web. Using cellphones or laptops, they learn to tell stories 140 characters at a time. The second half of this assignment requires students to build on their Twitter stories by posting follow-up stories and photographs to a class website. The follow- ups, written within six hours of events, must include additional reporting. The assignment marries traditional writing and reporting skills with digital tools increasingly being used in the real world.

Book Review: Mcgraw-Hill's Chinese Dictionary & Guide To 20,000 Essential Words, Hong Zhan

Publications

Chinese Dictionary & Guide to 20,000 Essential Words is a concise dictionary specially designed for learners of Chinese as a foreign or a second language. This dictionary distinguishes itself from other Chinese language dictionaries by its unconventional character look-up system, a system that searches for a character by counting the total number of “broken marks” (not linked or unlinked strokes) of each character.

Special Issues In Engaging And Collaborating With Families Of English Language Learners, Stephanie Allison Strouse

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Research demonstrates positive outcomes associated with family involvement (Fl), but little exists specific to English Language Learners' (ELLs) FI. Factors impacting FI are identified, but it is unclear which educators view as most significant and what practices are implemented to address them. This study utilized survey data to examine educators' attitudes within an Iowa Area Education Agency regarding FI of ELLs, current practices, perceptions of practices' effectiveness, and professional development (PD) related to ELLs. Participants reported positive relationships with families of ELLs and that ELL families value education, yet only moderate satisfaction with ELL FI. Results indicate incongruity between common …

Leadership Distinctions : The Impact Of Leadership On Teachers Of Second Chance Reading, Rebecca Sue Williams

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Second Chance Reading (SCR), an instructional framework that targets and supports struggling adolescent readers and determined to be a sound and viably researched framework, can assist teachers in building and supporting proficient and lifelong learners when implemented as intended. This study examined educators from five unique communities who recently implemented the program. Four key questions guided the research and became the focus during semi-structured purposive interviews. (1) What was the relationship between Second Chance Reading teachers and principal leadership? (2) What leadership qualities were necessary to support Second Chance Reading teachers? (3) What barriers were preventing teachers from accomplishing their …

Student-Centered Literacy Instruction: An Examination Of An Elementary Teacher's Experience, Carolyn Marie Wiezorek

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

In this qualitative study, I examined and interpreted the literacy instruction of a fourth grade instructor who identified herself as a student-centered teacher. I sought to understand and interpret the beliefs and attitudes of my participant, Julie. Through seven unstructured interviews and five observations, I collected, and simultaneously interpreted, data. Julie freely shared her beliefs, successes, challenges, and frustrations regarding her literacy instruction.

Because of the contextual nature of the study I sought emerging themes through analysis and reflection. Four themes surfaced: attitude and philosophy, environment, instructional practices, and impact on students. Julie possessed an attitude that all students could …

What You Should Know (And Probably Don’T) About Teaching Ells, Nicole Sanchez

The Utah English Journal

As an intern teacher at a middle school in Payson, I struggled on a daily basis to juggle all the balls a teacher keeps in the air: trying to come up with engaging lesson plans, differentiated instruction, classroom management, connecting with parents, and so on. In January, just as I was finally getting to a point where I felt somewhat confident, Ana arrived. She had just moved to Utah from Mexico and was a brand new English Language Learner (ELL). Her vocabulary consisted entirely of “hi” and “good.” I was baffled as to what I could do. How could I …

Teachers’ Perceptions Of Integrating Information And Communication Technologies Into Literacy Instruction: A National Survey In The United States, David Reinking, Amy Hutchison

Publications

In this commentary, we argue that literacy research would be more productive if researchers had a clearer, more nuanced understanding of theory. Specifically, we argue that theory in a practice-oriented field is most fundamentally productive when it provides instrumental guidance for literacy beyond academic understanding about literacy. Premises for that argument are presented, as well as how productivity connects to an instrumental view of theory within the philosophy of science. We provide examples from authoritative sources and relevant studies suggesting that conceptions and uses of theory in literacy research are ambiguous, diffuse, and incoherent. We argue that productivity could be …

Using Authentic Materials To Enhance Reading And Speaking Tasks At The Novice And Intermediate Levels For High School Spanish Instruction, Cinthya Tumlison

Theses and Dissertations

The popularity of authentic materials provides foreign language teachers with more resources to practice communicative language teaching. Finding authentic materials in the target language has become very accessible. Used appropriately, authentic materials can provide students with greater access to the target language and culture. Nevertheless, creating activities using authentic materials without editing the text can be very challenging and time consuming. Sometimes teachers perceive authentic materials to be too difficult and complicated to use for novice learners and would rather only use edited or simplified texts provided by their textbook curriculum. The focus of this thesis is to determine whether …

Postsecondary Reading Instruction For Students Enrolled In College-Preparatory Reading Courses, Melanie Marie Campos

Student Theses and Dissertations

This thesis investigates ways in which practical, research-based skills and instructional strategies can be the basis of teaching struggling adult readers enrolled in college preparatory reading courses. This research follows two cohorts of developmental reading students through semester coursework and instructional methodologies used along the way. While these students were enrolled in the college preparatory reading course, they were administered reading assessments in the areas of decoding, vocabulary, and comprehension. Based on these assessments, they received specific reading instruction to build their strengths as readers. After completion of the course, while enrolled in subsequent content area college courses, these students …

Technologically-Mediated Collaborative Learning Activities For The University Level Intermediate Spanish Classroom, Alyssa Jean Hepburn

Theses and Dissertations

Due to the availability of a collaborative technologically enhanced classroom in the second language department of Harding University and a desire to closer align teaching practices with the aims of the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages, the author conducted research on using technology in various ways in a collaborative-style classroom. Her aims were to provide greater authenticity, as well as to focus on the three modes of communication, interpretive, interpersonal, and presentational. The author conducted research on the communicative model and how collaborative learning can be used to make the classroom more proficiency-based. Technology is a useful …

Using Authentic Videos To Enhance Language And Culture Instruction In A Formal English Language Learning Setting: Ten Videos And Accompanying Lessons, Rebecca Noelle Norris

Theses and Dissertations

English Language Learners benefit from exposure to English as it is spoken in everyday life by native speakers. This thesis explores the positive aspects of combining the visual and auditory modes to present authentic samples of contextualized language and culture through video. The ten videos, materials, and accompanying tasks provide authentic means for beginning English Language Learners to gain exposure to, and learn to use, the English language as it is spoken by native-speakers in the local setting. The videos, materials, and tasks also highlight varied cultural themes and may be used to supplement the existing texts for the Foundations …

Basic Writers Writing In Their Zone Of Proximal Development Through Intertextual Links, Cynda Alexander

Theses and Dissertations

Students in Basic Writing classes are separated from their peers who are mainstreamed into regular composition classes, stigmatizing them as having substandard skills. Preconditioned to question their ability to write, they arrive in class with zero confidence and varying degrees of ability to construct meaning. Students rely on their prior knowledge to fill in the gaps between texts. Their ability to accommodate and assimilate new information to their prior knowledge is dependent on their ability to link with it. Since semiotician Julia Kristeva first used the term intertextuality in 1967, there has been a great deal of interest in intertextuality, …

Characteristics Of Effective Literacy Coaching Programs: A Case Study Of Six Middle Schools, Nancy Katherine Hopkins

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of the study was to examine the relationships between literacy coaching versus non-literacy coaching in six middle schools and the literacy achievement of middle school students. A secondary purpose was to identify the characteristics of effective literacy coaches. The study used a mixed method design to answer the research uestions. The data were examined for relationships between the quantative data (three years of test scores) and the middle school teacher's knowledge about litercy (as related to professional development). In addition to achievement data, the study identified qualitative patterns that emerged from interview data with the middle school teachers.The …

Literacy And Numeracy Learning: Lessons From The Longitudinal Literacy And Numeracy Study For Indigenous Students, Nola Purdie, Kate Reid, Tracey Frigo, Alison Stone, Elizabeth Kleinhenz

ACER Research Monographs

In 2000, ACER commenced the Longitudinal Literacy and Numeracy Surveys for Indigenous Students (ILLANS), which set out to track the development of English literacy and numeracy skills in a group of Indigenous students from school entry through the early years of schooling and beyond, to establish a data-rich picture of educational opportunities for Indigenous students. Phase 1 of ILLANS collected data from Indigenous students at 13 schools across Australia that had been nominated by education systems as examples of good practice in education for Indigenous students. The first three years of the study were reported in the monograph Supporting …

Understanding Fourth Graders' Decline In Reading Motivation From Students' And Teachers' Perspectives, Christine A. Hebert

Teaching & Learning Theses & Dissertations

Previous research by Chall and Jacobs (2003) documented the phenomena of the fourth grade slump, a period in which students switch from learning to read to reading to learn and the subsequent loss of motivation to read. The purpose of this research is to present a phenomenological qualitative study of whether a sample of fourth grade students, low-achieving readers and average achieving readers, exhibited a loss in their motivation to read. Students' responses to a standardized conversational survey and questionnaire, the Motivation to Read Profile (Gambrell, Palmer, Codling & Mazzoni, 2007) and teachers' responses to a researcher-developed questionnaire were examined …

Effects Of Poverty Funding On Math And Literacy Achievement In Arkansas, Karen L. Cushman

College of Education Dissertations

This research project was designed to provide a foundational study of the effectiveness of a state categorical fund directed at poverty students called NSLA funding on literacy and math achievement in Arkansas. Poverty funding for students in Arkansas is realatively new and there have not been any studies to examine the impact of this funding to date. Literacy and math achievement scaled scores were evaluated for one year for fourth, sixth, and eighth grades by four NSLA levels, NSLA level 1, NSLA level 2, NSLA level 3, and NSLA level 4.

This causal comparative study was conducted with data from …

The Effects Of Content Enhancement Routines By Gender On Literacy Achievement In Arkansas Schools, Kimberly Renee Calhoon

College of Education Dissertations

This research project was intended to provide further insight into the impact of the methodologies utilized in the Arkansas Adolescent Literacy Intervention (AALI) on student achievement and teachers‘ practices. The purpose of this study was to determine by gender the effects of classes whose teachers utilized the Content Enhancement Routines versus classes whose teachers did not utilize the Routines on literacy achievement for sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students in three regions of Arkansas. In addition, another purpose of this study was to determine how teachers feel about using the routines in their classrooms and how effective they felt the …

A Case Study Of Spanish Language Use In A Texas Border Colonia, Maria E. Diaz

Theses and Dissertations - UTB/UTPA

This case study reveals a Spanish language marginalization in a South Texas community of mostly Latinos, who are the fastest growing group in the U.S. (Colombi & Roca, 2003); furthermore, approximately 77% of English language learners (ELLs) have Spanish as their heritage language (Hopstock & Stephenson, 2003). Nevertheless, ELLs do not receive much academic literacy support in their first language in many schools (Zehler et al., 2003). Thus, out-of- school social practices play an important role on maintaining a native language (e.g., Burrows-Goodwill, 2009; Reyes, 2006). However, researchers have not explored this phenomenon in Texas border colonias, or unincorporated areas …

Where The Wild Things Are And Why They Will Endure: An Analysis Of The Longevity Of Maurice Sendak's Work, Ana Appel

Graduate Student Independent Studies

This study looks to explain why Maurice Sendak's works have achieved a place in the classic cannon of children's literature. It starts by discussing children's literary theory and looks at the era of children's literature within which Sendak wrote, his illustrations, and his writing. The study then looks at psychoanalytic themes in his work. It analyzes the use of the conscious, unconscious, id, and ego. It further describes the use of archetypes of the collective unconscious in Sendak's work and why this connects to many readers. Then, the study describes bibliotherapy, books as therapeutic aids, and discusses how Sendak's books …

Bridging Professional Development And Context: Integrating Mathematics And Academic Language In A District Facing Takeover, Patricia Swanson, David Whitenack

Faculty Publications

This quasi-experimental, multi-phase study uses mixed methods to evaluate a professional development initiative focused on integrating mathematics and academic language. The context is a highly diverse urban district facing state takeover. The professional development focused on the understanding of key mathematics concepts and developing content-specific academic language. It linked explicitly to district-adopted texts and prescribed lesson formats. Teachers perceived the strategies to be feasible and beneficial to student learning, and had high rates of implementation. Nonetheless, pacing guides pressuring teachers to quickly cover content pose challenges for continued implementation. Implications for (1) professional development focusing on integrating subject-matter content and …