Digital Commons Network^™

Understanding Teacher Sense-Making Discourse During Collaborative Professional Development Of An Expansively-Framed Computer Science Curriculum, Courtney Stephens

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Elementary school teachers are being increasingly asked to teach computer science—something that most teacher certification programs do not prepare them for. In an attempt to study how elementary teachers learn to teach computer science, I analyzed the ways that teachers behaved during a professional development accompanying the implementation of a fifth-grade computer science curriculum. My findings suggest that teachers benefit from professional development that encourages collaboration and active participation in teachers through discussion and modeling. Furthermore, my findings suggest that teachers benefit from using curriculum that deliberately connects new concepts to content that they are already familiar and comfortable with—a …

When The Desert Meets The Classroom: A Mixed Methods Study On Experiential Learning And Andragogy For Design-Situated Curricula, Julie K. Lamarra

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This study’s significance examined how outdoor experience in place can influence students’ designs in the context of outdoor recreation. Historically, experiential education and outdoor education have been used widely across curricula but are not so commonly accepted in design education except in the form of internships. This study sought to examine how being in the place that activity occurs and learning about the cultural aspects of place, activity, and community impacted students’ designs.

This study looked at how existing theories such as Landscapes of Practice and the development of boundaries, knowledge, and identity are formed within communities of practice and …

Creating A Safe And Supportive School Climate For Transgender Students, Taylor Dewilde

Masters Projects

Research has shown that transgender students do not feel safe at school and as a result experience negative outcomes. An effective teacher training program on transgender students will help these students feel a greater sense of safety at school. Additionally, this project will explore inclusive curricular resources for educators. The research reviewed for this project includes the key findings for why transgender students feel unsafe that included bullying & harassment, untrained and unprepared staff, and unsafe spaces in school. It is imperative for transgender students to feel safe at school so they may have the same opportunities for success in …

Secondary Music Educators’ Perceptions Of And Relationships With Dominant Narratives Through Personal Philosophy, Pedagogy, And Practice, Kara Levchenko

Masters Theses, 2020-current

Recent calls for contemporary change in music education demand more than just an inclusive environment that prepares artistic citizens for lifelong music after public school. Our society has experienced overwhelming shifts since the introduction of music in the public schools in 1838. Yet, dominant narratives of secondary music ensemble education (SMEE) have been performed and expected as the norm since the establishment of large ensembles (e.g., bands, choirs, and orchestras), taking the stage to perform music of the traditional Western canon. The purpose of this explanatory sequential mixed methods study was to discover ways in which secondary music ensemble teachers …

New York Paid Family Leave: Private-Corporation Employer Perspectives In Western New York, Dr. Theresa M. Roma

Education Doctoral

The purpose of this descriptive, empirical, phenomenological qualitative study, using corporate social responsibility theory, was to gain insight on 15 private employers’ experience of mandated Paid Family Leave (PFL) policy within 17 counties in Western New York. Business leaders and human resource representatives were placed in focus groups, divided by industry. New York’s mandated PFL was implemented on January 1, 2018. The policy enhanced the federal Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) by (a) adding a paid component, (b) expanding the definition of family, and (c) providing easier eligibility for employee utilization. The empirical research showed the positive and negative outcomes …

The Effect Of Self-Efficacy On First-Generation African American College Students, Benita Lynn Cabbler

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

As students transition into college, some matriculate with more family, social, and academic support structures than others. Students who are the first in their families to attend college may not have the support necessary to help them succeed, influencing a need for more college resources to assist students with becoming academically successful. The purpose of this quantitative causal-comparative study was to determine if there were significant differences in perceived self-efficacy between first-generation and non-first-generation African American college students. The independent variable was African American college student status: first-generation African American college students and non-first-generation African American college students. The dependent …

Don't Kill Mockingbird: An Educator's Guide To Teaching To Kill A Mockingbird In The 21st Century, Rachel Mayes Allen

Masters Theses

While To Kill a Mockingbird is easy to misinterpret and difficult to read at times, today’s students are capable of appreciating the novel just as much as previous generations; we as teachers simply have to give them that chance. By grounding our students in the novel’s historical context, navigating controversies gracefully and rationally, and creating meaningful learning experiences around the novel, we can help our students see To Kill a Mockingbird for what it is.

Teaching In The Age Of Covid-19—1 Year Later, Sahar D. Sattarzadeh

Education Studies Faculty publications

No abstract provided.

56 Update: Second Round Gerc Certificate Proposal Application, University Of Northern Iowa. General Education Re-Envisioning Committee.

General Education Re-envisioning Committee Documents

The packet of materials for proposals for multi-disciplinary certificates in the second call for proposals in August of 2021.

55 Update: Second Round Gerc Course Proposal Application, University Of Northern Iowa. General Education Re-Envisioning Committee.

General Education Re-envisioning Committee Documents

The packet of materials to make course proposals in the second call for applications.

Understanding And Addressing Preservice Elementary Teachers’ Misconceptions In Science Education, Nicole Juliana Thomas

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Prior research has demonstrated that both children and adults alike hold misconceptions about various scientific phenomena (Snyder & Sullivan, 1995; Driver et al., 1985). These misconceptions range from a variety of different fields, including astronomy and space science, environmental biology, and geology, among others (Miller & Brewer, 2010; Wandersee et al., 1994; Ritger & Cummins, 1991). Research suggests that the vast majority of misconceptions are formed early in a students’ educational career, and these misconceptions could be held throughout adulthood unless they are sufficiently addressed (Coley & Tanner, 2012; Posner et al., 1982; Nehm & Reilly, 2007; Sadler et al., …

First-Year Seminar And Its Impact On Retention At A Small Liberal Arts College In South Carolina, Michael A. Smith

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

First-Year Seminar (FYS) courses have been the foundational building blocks for academic and nonacademic success for first-year college freshman since the late 1970s. With the focus on improving retention and persistence, FYS courses have been viewed as the resource that connects freshmen to the faculty, staff, student, and campus environment. Therefore, it is vital to see the impact that it has had on students and how it can further develop persistence through graduation. The researcher conducted this basic qualitative study to look for emerging themes of sophomore experience in the FYS courses and how that impacted their persistence and retention …

Defining Understanding: Perspectives From Biology Instructors & Biology Education Researchers, Jeremy L. Hsu, Stanley M. Lo, Brian K. Sato

Biology, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles and Research

Promoting student understanding of biological concepts is a key part of biology education, and the ability to “understand” a concept forms one of the six categories of the oft-used Bloom’s Taxonomy. Despite this, there remains no consensus as to what it means to understand a concept. While several formal definitions have been offered, we investigated how biology instructors and biology education researchers define the term and how they perceived the skill sets needed for a student to understand a concept in the context of assessments. We found that there was no agreement on the definition of understanding, and that responses …

Legacy Trail: Photovoice Of African American/Black Women Ces Doctoral Graduates Persistence, Andrea M. Garraway

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This qualitative study examined the retrospective experiences of seven African American/Black (AA/Black) women who graduated from a Counselor Education and Supervision (CES) doctoral program, accredited by the Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP). The purpose of the study was to investigate ancestral links to their persistence. This study obtained data from semi-structured individual interviews, a focus group, and PhotoVoice pursuit. Through these different methods of data collection, the validity of the study was increased. The research problem identified was that the CES doctoral degree attrition rate remains stagnated (approximately 50%) and the rate for AA/Black women …

Correlating Maslovian Need Satisfaction To Educational Attainment And Time Since Completion, Anthony Brandt Babbitt

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this quantitative, correlational research study was to investigate how accurately an individual’s needs satisfaction (i.e., the criterion variables) may be predicted from the combination of educational attainment and time since completion (i.e., the predictor variables). The present study addresses a gap in the literature regarding whether secondary education, post-secondary education, or both, correlate to the satisfaction of Maslow’s hierarchical needs across a broad spectrum sample of the United States population. A US-based quota sample of 245 paid adult participants operating on Prolific Academic’s online research platform provided the data within a Qualtrics-hosted version of the Five Need …

Empowering Learners Through Habits Of Mind And Personalized Pathways: An Ethnographic Study, Megan Amundson

Dissertations, Theses, and Projects

While teaching using a personalized learning concept, it was discovered that learners did not have the necessary social emotional skills that they needed in order to successfully make decisions for their learning. Throughout researching personalized learning, engagement, self-pacing, and empowered learning three different Habits of Mind, the school district’s social emotional learning program, were identified to teach to a small group of learners in grades three through six to help them better understand what personalized learning is and why they are doing it in order to take ownership of their learning. Therefore this research question was created: How does the …

The Activity Of Abstraction In Physical Chemistry Problem Solving And Instruction, Jessica M. Karch

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

Productive problem solving, concept construction, and sense making occur through the core process of abstraction. Although the capacity for domain-general abstraction is developed at a young age, the role of abstraction in increasingly complex and disciplinary environments, such as those encountered in undergraduate STEM education, is not well understood. Undergraduate physical chemistry relies particularly heavily on abstraction because it uses many overlapping and imperfect mathematical models to represent and interpret phenomena occurring on multiple scales. To reconcile these models, extract meaning from them, and recognize when to apply them in problem solving requires processes of abstraction. This dissertation aims to …

The Resilience Of Black Female Leaders In Higher Education And Racial Microaggression, Simone P. Flowers-Taylor

All Theses And Dissertations

This study explored the experiences of Black female leaders in higher education and their encounters with racial microaggression. Additionally, the opportunity to understand the effects of racial slights within the workplace as either a mid to senior level leadership was also explored. Regardless of the multiple diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) trainings within higher education, Black female leaders are experiencing their share of racial inequality based on their race, gender, or both (DeCuir-Gunby et al., 2019). The unique experiences of racial microaggression encountered by Black women, aligned with the framework of both the Black feminist theory and intersectionality theory respectively. …

Mental Health Awareness Training Manual: For Faculty To Help Students, Ricardo Vega

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Mental health issues and stigma can affect students in many ways. The teacher-student relationship can be affected by the fear and inconsistent thoughts to be successful in college settings caused by mental health issues. First-generation college students face mental health issues due to support, education degree expectations, inhibition of uncertainty, and resources (Pascarella et al., 2004). This project is about providing communication strategies for faculty to help reduce stigma and provide students with resources to support their mental health.

Contributions To The Teaching And Learning Of Fluid Mechanics, Ashwin Vaidya

Department of Mathematics Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

This issue showcases a compilation of papers on fluid mechanics (FM) education, covering different sub topics of the subject. The success of the first volume [1] prompted us to consider another follow-up special issue on the topic, which has also been very successful in garnering an impressive variety of submissions.

As a classical branch of science, the beauty and complexity of fluid dynamics cannot be overemphasized. This is an extremely well-studied subject which has now become a significant component of several major scientific disciplines ranging from aerospace engineering, astrophysics, atmospheric science (including climate modeling), biological and biomedical science …

Goal Orientation, Regulation Of Motivation, And Academic Achievement In Pharmacy Students, Krystal L. Ward

Individual, Family, and Community Education ETDs

This study examined goal orientation in Doctor of Pharmacy Students and its relationship with regulation of motivation and academic achievement. Research questions included: 1) Do student cohorts (first-year, second-year, and third-year students) differ in their initial goal orientation? Do students’ goal orientation vary across time (from fall to spring)? 2) How does change in goal orientation impact changes in regulation of motivation? 3) How does change in goal orientation impact changes in academic achievement? 4) Which factor, regulation of motivation or academic achievement, has the strongest relationship with goal orientation?

178 participants completed survey instruments in the fall and spring …

Characterizing Biology Education Research: Perspectives From Practitioners And Scholars In The Field, Jeremy L. Hsu, Audrey Chen, Eduardo Cruz-Hinojoza, Duyen Dinh-Dang, Elizabeth A. Roth-Johnson, Brian K. Sato, Stanley M. Lo

Biology, Chemistry, and Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles and Research

Biology education research (BER) is a recently emerging field mainly focused on the learning and teaching of biology in postsecondary education. As BER continues to grow, exploring what goals, questions, and scholarship the field encompasses will provide an opportunity for the community to reflect on what new lines of inquiry could be pursued in the future. There have been top-down approaches at characterizing BER, such as aims and scope provided by professional societies or peer-reviewed journals, and literature analyses with evidence for current and historical research trends. However, there have not been previous attempts with a bottom-up approach at characterizing …

School Of Medicine Celebrates New Endowed Chairs And Professors, Jane Longshore

Browse All News

No abstract provided.

Development Of An Online General Biology Open Educational Resource (Oer) Laboratory Manual, Dmitry Y. Brogun, Azure N. Faucette, Kristin Polizzotto, Farshad Tamari

Publications and Research

Currently, many academic institutions are using one or more variations of online modalities due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and science educators face a unique challenge with distance-learning laboratories. Many resources to engage students in virtual, interactive laboratory activities exist, but we found that high costs and/or overlooked content left gaps for several topics typically taught in a general, introductory biology course for undergraduate biology majors (e.g., organismal biology). Additionally, resources for an online lab must be identified and curated from multiple sources, requiring intense demands on the instructors’ time. To meet this need and to overcome the financial burden of …

2021 Summer Undergraduate Research Program, University Of Northern Iowa. Summer Undergraduate Research Program.

Summer Undergraduate Research Program (SURP) Symposium Programs

The program for the Summer Undergraduate Research Symposium of the College of Humanities, Arts and Sciences.

Persistent Miscalibration For Low And High Achievers Despite Practice Test Feedback In An Introductory Biology Course, Jennifer L. Osterhage

Biology Faculty Publications

Students' ability to accurately judge their knowledge is crucial for effective learning. However, students' perception of their current knowledge is often misaligned with their actual performance. The relationship between learners' perception of their performance and their actual performance on a task is defined as calibration. Previous studies have shown significant student miscalibration in an introductory biology course: students' predicted exam scores were, on average, significantly higher than their actual scores. The goal of this study was to determine whether completion of a practice test before exams would result in better performance and calibration. The hypothesis was that students who completed …

The Math Games Seminar: A Mathematical Learning Community, Anthony Delegge, Ellen Ziliak

Journal of Humanistic Mathematics

Learning communities can be an effective means of engaging university students across disciplines. Games have always been a source of both enjoyment and interesting mathematics. Based on our own interest in games, and the deep, strategic discussions we found ourselves having with students when we played games with them, we decided to design a learning community around the mathematics of games. We hoped in particular that such a community could be a great pathway to introducing mathematical thinking to students not majoring in mathematics, and that they would gain a greater appreciation for our field. In this paper, we describe …

An Interdisciplinary Rendezvous Between Mathematics And Literature: Reflections On Beauty As A Perspective In Comparative Disciplinary Didactics And A Thematic Approach To Interdisciplinary Work In Upper Secondary School, Uffe Thomas Jankvist, Helle Rørbech, Jesper Bremholm

Journal of Humanistic Mathematics

In this paper we propose a thematic focus on aesthetics in the context of an interdisciplinary collaboration between mathematics and literature (Language Arts) as a way to further students’ reflections on and deeper understanding of what characterizes the two subjects. Furthermore, we argue that approaching aesthetics through the perspective of literacy can potentially strengthen students’ understanding of ways of thinking particular to specific (academic) disciplines; ways of thinking that are otherwise often hidden when teaching focuses on more pragmatic aspects. G. H. Hardy’s A Mathematician’s Apology from 1940 serves as the recurring illustrative example in our discussions of the pedagogical …

Body Mass-Normalized Moderate Dose Of Dietary Nitrate Intake Improves Endothelial Function And Walking Capacity In Patients With Peripheral Artery Disease, Elizabeth J. Pekas, Tesean Wooden, Santosh K. Yadav, Song-Young Park

Health and Kinesiology Faculty Publications

Peripheral artery disease (PAD) is characterized by the accumulation of atherosclerotic plaques in the lower extremity conduit arteries, which impairs blood flow and walking capacity. Dietary nitrate has been used to reduce blood pressure (BP) and improve walking capacity in PAD. However, a standardized dose for PAD has not been determined. Therefore, we sought to determine the effects of a body mass-normalized moderate dose of nitrate (0.11 mmol nitrate/kg) as beetroot juice on serum nitrate/nitrite, vascular function, walking capacity, and tissue oxygen utilization capacity in patients with PAD. A total of 11 patients with PAD received either nitrate supplement or …

The Level That Comprises The Features Of Scientific Inquiry In The Science Subjects Textbooks For The Eleventh Grade In Jordan, Ahmed Al-Ayasrah

Jerash for Research and Studies Journal مجلة جرش للبحوث والدراسات

This study aimed at investigating the level of inclusion of the scientific inquiry features in physics, chemistry, Biology, and earth and environment sciences textbooks for the eleventh grades (experimental edition/ 2016) in Jordan. The study sample consisted of all scientific activities which require a practical work to be performed in these textbooks, which was (74) activities. The descriptive analytical method was followed by using an analysis tool which was developed, and its validity and reliability were verified. The features of inquiry represent analysis types, and the scientific activity is analysis unit, where the estimation was been according to three levels …