Digital Commons Network^™

What I Taught My Stem Instructor About Teaching: What A Deaf Student Hears That Others Cannot, Annemarie Ross, Randy K. Yerrick

Journal of Science Education for Students with Disabilities

Overall, science teaching at the university level has remained in a relatively static state. There is much research and debate among university faculty regarding the most effective methods of teaching science. But it remains largely rhetoric. The traditional lecture model in STEM higher education is limping along in its march toward inclusion and equity. The NGSS and Common Core reform efforts do little to help university science teachers to change their orientation from largely lecture-driven practice with laboratory supplements. While it is impossible to address all diverse student groups, the need for accommodations tend to be overlooked. As a Deaf …

The Ed.D. As Investment In Professional Development: Cultivating Practitioner Knowledge, Margaret A. Macintyre Latta, Edmund T. Hamann, Susan Wunder

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

As teacher educators and participants in the US-based Carnegie Project for the Education Doctorate (CPED) initiative to differentiate the Ed.D/Ph.D., we have programmatic commitments to the centrality of practitioner knowledge for shaping professional development. Through CPED, we structure opportunities for local educators to develop their professional practices within their graduate studies toward an Ed.D, while maintaining full-time educational work commitments. Concurrently, we examine and document how CPED creates room, alongside concrete practice, to cultivate, promote, and value the voices, sensibilities, and capacities of practitioners engaged in advanced practices. In doing so, we confront marginalization of practitioners’ perspectives in the field …

Journal Of The National Collegiate Honors Council, Volume 16, Number 2, Fall/Winter 2015 (Complete Issue)

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

50th Anniversary Issue

Forum on the Value of Honors

with essays by James Herbert and by 39 college and university presidents:

Paul W. Ferguson, President of Ball State University; Honors Dean: James S. Ruebel

J. David Armstrong, Jr., President of Broward College; Honors Director: Sheila Jones

Soraya M. Coley, President of Cal Poly Pomona; Honors Director: Suketu P. Bhavsar

Elizabeth A. Dinndorf, President of Columbia College; Honors Director: John Zubizarreta

Quintin B. Bullock, President of Community College of Allegheny County; Honors Director: Julia Fennell

Michael T. Benson, President of Eastern Kentucky University; Interim Honors Director: David Coleman

Jake B. Schrum, …

A Correlation Analysis Of Faculty Interaction With Undergraduate Students In Online Courses And Student Course Completion Rates, Claudia Restiano

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The extent in which a teacher communicates with his or her students in an online setting may affect student course completion rates. The increased use of online courses and degree programs at the post-secondary level has fundamentally changed the way faculty members and students interact, and ultimately may impact student course completion rates. Course completion is an aspect of student retention. The purpose of this quantitative correlational research study was to analyze the correlation between faculty interaction with online undergraduate students in required introductory English composition courses and student completion rates in those courses. Blackboard is a learning management system …

Ecoscience + Art Initiative: Designing A New Paradigm For College Education, Scholarship, And Service, Changwoo Ahn

The Transdisciplinary STEAM+ Journal

The paper presents a new initiative, EcoScience + Art, which blooms at George Mason University. The creator explains the background, history, and recent activities of the initiative, and also introduces an on-going special project called “The Rain Project”, a student participatory project to design, construct, and monitor a green infrastructure (i.e., floating wetland) for sustainable stormwater management on campus. The special project is geared to design and present a new paradigm to integrate college education, scholarship, and service. The relevance of the initiative and the special project to STEAM education is discussed.

Book Review: Children, Film And Literacy, Yonty Friesem

Journal of Media Literacy Education

No abstract provided.

Media, Culture, And Education: One Teacher’S Journey Through The Mediated Intersections, Crystal L. Beach

Journal of Media Literacy Education

Today’s classrooms often have a plethora of new ways of reading and writing entering the room, but too often these new ways of “doing” are disregarded and checked at the door. For this reason, one educator shares her journey through the mediated intersections of media, culture, and education. In this piece, she explores how literacy transformations are impacting her classroom and her students’ lives, how she tries to make connections for her students, as well as noting what these mediated intersections might mean for the future of education.

Critical Media Literacy And Gender: Teaching Middle School Students About Gender Stereotypes And Occupations, Laurel Puchner, Linda Markowitz, Mark Hedley

Journal of Media Literacy Education

This study examined the effectiveness of the implementation of a small-scale critical media literacy curriculum unit focused on gender stereotypes, especially as they pertain to occupations. The research question was whether students exposed to the critical media literacy (CML) curriculum were more likely than students not exposed to believe: that women experience discrimination in the workplace; that the media constructs stereotypical messages about women and men, especially regarding occupations; and that the media influences people’s thinking. Participants were students in 5 seventh grade classes, who were exposed to a 4-workshop curriculum, and students in 5 eighth grades classes, who were …

Defining Primary And Academic Discourse Through Instructional Methods In A Single Junior High Classroom, Ashley Nicole Gerhardson

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this study, I examine the use of academic discourse in the school setting and discuss the relation of the primary discourse to academic discourse. I focus on the verbal exchanges between a teacher and her students as these students acquire the academic discourse of the English classroom. The study focuses on the ideas of primary discourse and secondary or academic discourse as presented by Gee (1996) and focuses on his idea of Social languages.

Using a microethnographic study, I develop the idea of how the teacher related to her students and how a single educator felt about the purpose …

Making All Children Count: Teach For All And The Universalizing Appeal Of Data, Daniel Friedrich, Mia Walter, Erica Eva Colmenares

Faculty Research, Scholarly, and Creative Activity

In this paper, we argue that in order to bind Teach For All’s universal/izing statement of problems and solutions to the specificities and the special conditions of member programs’ local contexts, what is needed is a shared set of discursive practices, a way of bringing together the commonalities found in each country while separating the noise of particular politics and histories. That common set of discursive practices is shaped around the notion of data. This paper is structured as follows: First, we contextualize Teach for All by (briefly) juxtaposing the universal and specific elements of the network, including the organization’s …

An Insurmountable Gap: Can We Balance Incoming And Outgoing Erasmus Exchanges Among Engineering Students?, Susan O'Shaughnessy

Stream 2: Curriculum

Because of the global power of English and being situated in an English-speaking country, Irish higher education institutions do not have to try very hard to attract Erasmus students from across Europe. However, persuading Irish students, particularly students of engineering, to undertake an Erasmus exchange in another European country is a much more difficult process. This paper outlines the recent history of Erasmus exchanges of engineering students to and from the Technological University Dublin and examines the push and pulls factors that affect these exchanges. It presents the results of a small-scale research project into the factors that encourage or …

Waking Dormant Researchers: Student Co-Research As Writing Research Methodology And Pedagogy, Angela Renee Sheets

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores the ways that students took up writing researcher skills, knowledges, and identities through a teacher-student co-research investigation of writing in an online writing research course. The following questions guided this study:

* How did literate activity occur in an online Composition as Critical Inquiry Course?

* What writing research skills, knowledges, and identities did the students take up and demonstrate as they participated in a co-research project?

The study also examined the efficacy of co-research as a methodology and pedagogy.

Chapter 1 reviews literature from the relevant English studies fields. Central topics include the rationale for writing …

Developing Media Literacy: Managing Fear And Moving Beyond, Katherine G. Fry

Journal of Media Literacy Education

One way to view the development of the media literacy movement is through the various different ways in which strains of media literacy education have been called on to allay fears that accompanying new media technologies. This article focuses on how one media literacy organization,The LAMP, deals with two very different arenas —the internet safety arena and the news literacy arena--where fear of digital media has created narrow pockets of concern seeking narrow solutions. As media literacy grows and develops the hope is that these fears subside, a perception of separateness dissolves, and a broader media literacy vision advances.

Puppets On A String? How Young Adolescents Explore Gender And Health In Advertising, Deborah L. Begoray, Elizabeth M. Banister, Joan Wharf Higgins, Robin Wilmot

Journal of Media Literacy Education

This article presents qualitative research on young adolescents’ abilities in communicating and evaluating health messages in advertising especially how they understand and create gendered identities. A group of grade 6-8 students learned about media techniques and movie making. In groups divided by gender, they created iMovie advertisements for health activities in their school. They represented themselves in these advertisements by creating stick puppets. Observations during lessons, examination of movies and puppets, and interviews with students and their teacher revealed that young adolescents were neither completely manipulated by media nor were they completely in charge of their responses to media’s messages …

Dusty But Mighty: Using Radio In The Critical Media Literacy Classroom, Miglena S. Todorova

Journal of Media Literacy Education

In a culture dominated by images, what is the capacity of radio-making to enact the ideals and meet the objectives of critical medial literacy education that empowers learners and expands democracy? This article conceptualizes a radio-based critical media literacy approach drawing upon a course project called “Borderless Radio,” where fifty-two students in a large urban Canadian university produced short radio programs narrating how they view and experience “multiculturalism.” Radio making in the classroom is soundscaping that politicizes intimacy, disrupts hegemonic discourses, and allows for teaching and learning to transgress; yet it also illuminates the ways in which self-positionality poses limitations …

Bailamos Juntos: Salsa En Los E.E.U.U. Y El Mundo, Betty Tran

First-Gen Voices: Creative and Critical Narratives on the First-Generation College Experience

This composition traces the history of Cuban-American cultural identity formation through the lens of music and dance. As the author explains, Cuban immigrants cultivated a rich music and dance culture in New York City by creating a series of Latin and Afro-Cuban music genres and dances that brought diverse groups of people together. As a Vietnamese-American woman, Tran sees several connections between her family’s Vietnamese heritage and the cultural histories of Cubans who came to the United States as refugees seeking asylum from political oppression. As a first-generation college student, Tran believes it is important to share this composition as …

A Tres Pasos De La Muerte, Samuel Temblador

First-Gen Voices: Creative and Critical Narratives on the First-Generation College Experience

"A Tres Pasos de la Muerte" tells the story of a son of Mexican immigrants and his search for his roots. Here, Temblador attempts to communicate a bicultural experience through the frame of border literature (Literatura Fronteriza) born out of the intersection between Mexican and American culture.

Applications For Dummies, Carla M. Sanchez

First-Gen Voices: Creative and Critical Narratives on the First-Generation College Experience

This poem discusses the overwhelming pressure that is put on students to justify their right to be admitted into universities or to receive scholarships based on their extracurricular activities. Many working-class, first-generation college students are unable to participate in organizations and programs that offer students a more well-rounded college experience. This can lead first-gen students, like the author, to feel isolated, inadequate, or illegitimate. "Applications for Dummies" expresses Sanchez's incessant fear that she will never be able to compete with other students who were given the opportunity to build more worldly resumes, despite her strong academic commitment and intellectual potential.

It's Not Just A Leave, Genesis L. Montalvo

First-Gen Voices: Creative and Critical Narratives on the First-Generation College Experience

In this piece, the author sets out to explore the first-generation college identity through a gothic lens. In the early stages of this project, Montalvo had considered doing research on narratives from other first-gen college students as a way to trace the uncanny and the abject in their experiences. However, as she began reflecting on her own personal history, she realized that in a matter of only two years she had already experienced moments of distance, uncanniness, and confusion, which are recorded here. In presenting these installments in non-chronological order, Montalvo intends to insert a gothic element of disorder, which …

Flashlight, Min-Jung Kim

First-Gen Voices: Creative and Critical Narratives on the First-Generation College Experience

This poem illustrates the struggle of an undergraduate first-generation college student who knew little about the first-gen identity or the experiences she would encounter until she became a First To Go Scholar at Loyola Marymount University. The poet represents the First To Go Program as a flashlight that has helped her to navigate a once dark and unfamiliar environment.

Experiences Of Computer Science Curriculum Design: A Phenomenological Study, Art Sloan, Brian Bowe

Articles

This paper presents a qualitative study of twelve computer science lecturers’ experiences of curriculum design of several degree programmes during a time of transition from year-long to semesterised courses, due to institutional policy change. The background to the study is outlined, as are the reasons for choosing the research methodology. The main findings are presented and the implications of the study described. The methodology chosen was hermeneutic phenomenology. The data were the texts of interview transcripts of the twelve participant lecturers. The experiences that emerged from analysis of the data grouped naturally in identifiable and presentable themes and these themes …

Ua45 2015-2016 Four-Year Degree Paths, Wku Registrar

WKU Administration Documents

An addendum to the 2015-2016 Undergraduate Catalog

The purpose of the Four-Year Degree Path is to assist undergraduate students in determining a timeline for completion of their undergraduate degree program. Each path displayed within this website provides students with the anticipated order in which a degree would typically be completed in a timely fashion at Western Kentucky University.

The Degree Paths show appropriate timing and spacing of general education, core course requirements, elective suggestions, prerequisites and displays how each of these requirements may be met during a four-year time frame.

The Degree Path is simply a guideline and might not …

Interrogating The "Collapse" Of The Roman Empire: Historiography And Instruction, Jon Pesner

History - Master of Arts in Teaching

No abstract provided.

Examining Variations In Technology Use For K-12 Students Of Different Gender And Socioeconomic Status, Nikki Lyons

Graduate Research Papers

The purpose of this paper is to review the literature currently published on how members of different genders and socioeconomic classes use technology to suit their needs in and out of the classroom learning environment. It will focus on the use of digital technologies by students in elementary, middle, and high schools. This was done by examining 30 research-based, peer-reviewed journal articles, books, published papers, documents, and observational analyses. The research indicates there are clear differences in how members of different subpopulations such as gender and socioeconomic groups choose to use technology to suit their communication, collaboration, instructional, and entertainment …

Learn Languages, Explore Cultures, Transform Lives, Aleidine Kramer Moeller

Department of Teaching, Learning, and Teacher Education: Faculty Publications

Selected Papers from the 2015 Central States Conference on the Teaching of Foreign Languages

Aleidine J. Moeller, Editor

1. Creating a Culture-driven Classroom One Activity at a Time — Sharon Wilkinson, Patricia Calkins, & Tracy Dinesen

2. The Flipped German Classroom — Theresa R. Bell

3. Engaging Learners in Culturally Authentic Virtual Interactions —Diane Ceo-Francesco

4. Jouney to Global Competence: Learning Languages, Exploring Cultures, Transforming Lives — J. S. Orozco-Domoe

5. Strangers in a Strange Land: Perceptions of Culture in a First-year French Class — Rebecca L. Chism

6. 21st Century World Language Classrooms: Technology to Support Cultural Competence — …

Scribblescholar Was Here: Confessional Notes Of A Vandal Academic, Clay Shields

Theses and Dissertations--English

As a (former) vandal-punk in the academy, I often fear succumbing to Ivory Tower Stockholm syndrome. The identities I perform, vandal-punk and scholar, ideologically clash to the point that they often feel irreconcilable. By codemeshing the high-low discourses associated with these adopted cultures, I attempt to disrupt any hierarchal privileging of either, instead searching for a way to live with and harness both.

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. …

Navigating Discourses Of Cultural Literacy In Teacher Education, Kelsey Halbert, Philemon Chigeza

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Pre-service teachers’ understandings, skills and dispositions as global, culturally literate citizens and agents of change have arguably never been more important. Professional standards, systemic policies and frameworks and a broad range of scholarly perspectives on culture position pre-service teachers to take up cultural education in sometimes conflicting ways. It is these orientations to culture within a teacher education program and how they sit alongside potentially incongruent policies, practices and worldviews that are the focus of this paper. The practitioner research draws on cultural identity theories, policies and student experiences in the teaching and learning of an undergraduate education subject entitled …

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 …

Teaching Digital Humanities In Romania, Mădălina Nicolaescu, Adriana Mihai

CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture

In their article "Teaching Digital Humanities in Romania" Mădălina Nicolaescu and Adriana Mihai describe a research project that sets out to promote digital humanities with an internet based platform in Shakespeare studies at the University of Bucharest. Texts have been collected and catalogued and the platform's technical construction is in construction. Based on the Shakespeare platform's content and presentation, Nicolaescu and Mihai propose participation strategies for involvement in the creation of a digital database that is both a research tool and a digital storytelling environment. The database is a collection of digitized translations of Shakespeare in Romanian followed by participants' …