Digital Commons Network^™

Spanish Writing Learners’ Stances As Peer Reviewers, Emilia Illana-Mahiques, Carol Severino

Journal of Response to Writing

This study explores the attitudes and perceptions about online peer review of 18 Spanish learners enrolled in a third-year college Spanish writing course. Students participated in peer review training, wrote a personal narrative, and completed two online peer review sessions before submitting their final narrative. Using data from questionnaires, interviews, a peer review simulation task, and the first author’s journal, this qualitative study investigates students’ approaches to peer review and the different practices they employ when commenting on their peers’ drafts. Results show that even though students receive the same training, they interpret and enact that training differently. Students position …

The Predictive Role Of Grapho-Morphological Knowledge In Reading Comprehension For Beginning-Level L2 Chinese Learners, Tianxu Chen, Sihui Ke, Keiko Koda

Modern and Classical Languages, Literatures and Cultures Faculty Publications

Reading comprehension entails a set of distinct, yet interdependent cognitive, linguistic, and nonlinguistic processes. Previous second language (L2) Chinese studies have identified significant and positive impacts of grapho-morphological knowledge at the character and subcharacter (radical) levels on passage reading comprehension; however, little is known regarding how early L2 grapho-morphological knowledge at the character and radical levels jointly predict later L2 reading comprehension. This study aimed to fill this gap. One hundred and five beginning-level L2 Chinese collegiate learners were recruited, and completed two character-related and two radical-related tasks in Week 8, as well as one reading comprehension tasks in Week …

Teachers’ Beliefs And Practices Regarding Assessment In English As A Foreign Language Classrooms In Vietnam, Xuan Van Ha, Nam Giang Tran, Ngoc Hai Tran

The Qualitative Report

Task-based language teaching (TBLT) has generated worldwide popularity as a curriculum innovation, and extensive research has investigated various aspects of the approach. However, little is known about the implementation of classroom assessment in TBLT curricula. This study investigated high school English as a foreign language teachers’ beliefs and practices regarding assessment in a curriculum innovation context in Vietnam. Data comprised in-depth interviews with six teachers, as well as testing documents. The findings revealed a strong impact of the high-stakes exams on teachers’ testing beliefs in that they focused explicitly on linguistic items in the assessed content and forms of assessment. …

African American English-Speaking Children's Judgments Of Grammaticality: Effects Of Clinical Status And Grammatical Structures, Lori Elizabeth Vaughn

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

African American English (AAE)-speaking children’s ability to judge the grammaticality of sentences was evaluated by their clinical status and grammatical structure. The study originated from a need to understand more about the tense and agreement systems of AAE speakers with specific language impairment (SLI) relative to their typically developing (TD) AAE-speaking peers. Tense and agreement forms are typically excluded from the assessment and treatment of children who speak AAE in fear of misinterpreting a dialect difference as a language disorder. As a result, limited information exists about the tense and agreement systems of AAE-speaking children.

The data were archival and …

Testing Privilege: Coaching Bar Takers Towards “Minimum Competency” During The 2020 Pandemic, Benjamin Afton Cavanaugh

The Scholar: St. Mary's Law Review on Race and Social Justice

Abstract forthcoming.

The Experience Of A White Professor Teaching Diversity Courses In The Midwest, Corinne Brion

Educational Leadership Faculty Publications

Facilitators of diversity courses in higher education institutions face multiple challenges because these courses are emotionally charged for students and facilitators alike. To date, there is a limited number of recent papers that focus on the reflections of professors from the dominant culture who teach diversity online and face-to-face graduate courses. The present paper fills this gap by describing the experiences of a White, French assistant professor in the Midwest of the United States. This paper also provides recommendations for practitioners.

Difference In Reading Fluency Among Fifth Grade Students Attending Traditional, Stem-Related, Or Dli Programs During Soft School Closures, Patricia Daun Blanton

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this quantitative causal-comparative study was to raise awareness of the effects of soft school closures on student reading fluency in traditional, Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM)-related, or Dual Language Immersion (DLI) schools. There is little research on which type of school, whether traditional, (STEM)-related, or (DLI) program is the most effective at helping students retain or improve upon their reading fluency once those students have been in an extended soft school closure. The study used Acadience reading fluency scores from the students' fourth grade mid-year scores as the covariate and their fifth grade mid-year scores as …

Considering Who Has Opportunities For Training And Advancement, 21cleo Research Team

21CLEO Research Project Blog Posts

The three working learners featured in this blog post represent contrasting experiences that help us to understand the level and quality of support from such mediators as has become evident in our research, and the resu Its on the careers of these learners. Al I names used are pseudonyms.

A Glimpse Into The Multilingual Experience: A Phenomenological Study On How Nonnative English-Speaking Students Leverage Personal And Academic Support In Completing The Doctoral Journey, John Pervez

Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this phenomenological study is to use Activity Theory to identify and describe the personal and academic supports of multilingual doctoral alumni at a private, non-profit university in California.

Methodology: This study was a phenomenological study that identified and described the lived experiences of 15 multilingual alumni that completed a doctorate program at a private, non-profit university. Participants were selected using criterion sampling. Data was collected, analyzed, and triangulated between interview data and artifacts. Data was then coded, themed, and organized with reference to Activity Theory.

Findings: Examination of the data found that multilingual …

Reimagining Early Childhood Classrooms As Sites Of Love: Humanizing Black Boys Through Head Rubs And “ Playin’ The Dozens ”, Nicole M. Madu

Occasional Paper Series

Black boys in American schools are often subjected to crisis narratives that negatively impact teacher-student relationships. However, two Black male early childhood teachers in New York City have reimagined teacher-student relationships which can be used to inform the future education of Black boys post-pandemic. Central to their reframing of teacher-student relationships between Black male teachers and Black boys is a focus on the importance of nurturing social and emotional health. This manuscript highlights how these two Black male teachers foster positive relationships with their young Black boys, empowering Black boys to see themselves as capable learners.

Refining Research Representations Through Fiction, Journalism, And Creative Non-Fiction Writing Ideas, Maria Lahman, Becky De Oliveira, Evan Engle-Newman, Mckayla Gorman, Tiana Johnson, Sean Kershaw, Thuy Phan, Karen Schweihs, David Shimokawa, Amy Switzer, John Sylvester, Summer Yoast

Journal of Educational Research and Innovation

Research accounts have been critiqued as boring and unreasonably difficult to read when the actual research process is deeply fascinating and should be accessible to many. Academic researchers should draw on the creative writing disciplines (e.g., fiction, creative nonfiction, journalism) in order to improve the quality of written research accounts, and there are numerous style guides that give guidance on how to improve the quality of writing. An understanding of different academic disciplines’ style expectations seems to be needed in order to Publish and Persevere, yet literary understandings of writing will allow us to enliven writing in engaging ways. It …

Improving Teaching Mathematics Using Communicative Competence In Primary Education, Jasur Amirddinovich Mardonkulov Researcher

Central Asian Journal of Education

Human society is unthinkable outside of communication. Communication is a necessary condition for the existence of people, without which it is impossible to fully form not only individual mental functions, processes and properties of a person, but also the personality as a whole. The reality and necessity of communication is determined by joint activity: in order to live, people are forced to interact. Always an active person communicates, whose activities intersect with the activities of other people. Communication allows you to organize social activities and enrich it with new connections and relationships between people.

Students’ And Faculty Members’ Perceptions And Experiences Of Classroom Assessment: A Case Study Of A Public University In Afghanistan, Sayed Ahmad Javid Mussawy, Gretchen Rossman, Sayed Abdul Qahar Haqiqat

Higher Learning Research Communications

Objective: The primary goal of the study was to examine students’ perceptions of classroom assessment at a public university in Afghanistan. Exploring current assessment practices focused on student and faculty members lived experiences was a secondary goal. The study also sought to collect evidence on whether or not the new assessment policy was effective in student achievement.

Method: Authors used an explanatory sequential mixed-methods design to conduct the study. Initially, we applied the Students Perceptions of Assessment Questionnaire (SPAQ), translated into Dari/Farsi and validated, to collect data from a random sample of 400 students from three colleges: Agriculture, Education, and …

The Rising Tide Of Child Poverty, Jane Beese, Melissa Mlakar

Journal of Educational Leadership in Action

Poverty is not a new struggle for families and students. Urban school districts have been plagued with high poverty rates for years, but now poverty is growing at substantial rates in suburban schools. Chronic absenteeism is one recurring problem that high poverty schools, of every typology, face on a regular basis. The case study presented here highlights the work of one urban principal in combating chronic absenteeism in her school. The purpose of this paper is to explore attendance problems in a high-poverty school. While this case study depicts a principal in a high-poverty school in an urban area, the …

Leadership Performance Of Dale Carnegie, Nelson Mandela And Lee Kwan Yew: Applications For Educators, Jean-Pierre Bongila

Journal of Educational Leadership in Action

A biographical comparison or prosopography of three leaders Dale Carnegie (1888-1955) (Bacila, 2013), Nelson Mandela (1918-2013) (Kendall, 2014), and Lee Kwan Yew (1923-2015) (Kwang et al., 2015) might seem postmodern because of the divergence of times and cultures where they lived and the social statuses from which they performed their leadership. While Dale Carnegie was born to a poor farming family in Maryville, Missouri at the end of the 19th century America, Nelson Mandela’s family had aristocratic origins since his great-grand father was a tribal chief in South Africa (Lodge, 2006), and Lee Kwan Yew was a well to do …

Addressing The Poor Reading Performance Of Filipino Learners: Beyond Curricular And Instructional Interventions, Rochelle Irene Lucas, Macario O. Cordell Ii, Jude Michael Teves, Sashimir A. Yap, Unisse Chua Ms., Allan B.I. Bernardo

Angelo King Institute for Economic and Business Studies (AKI)

In the 2018 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), 15-year old Filipino students ranked last in reading proficiency among all countries/territories, with only 19% meeting the minimum (Level 2) standard. It is important to understand the different factors that contribute to the low reading performance and proficiency of these students, specifically the interventions that may help address this learning problem. Based on the result of a study using machine learning approaches, specifically binary classification methods, to identify the variables that best predict low (Level 1b and lower) vs. higher (Level 1a or better) reading proficiency using the Philippine PISA data, …

Making Scientific And Technical Materials Pervasively Accessible, Jason J.G. White

Journal of Science Education for Students with Disabilities

In this paper, the question is explored of what policies, standards and practices are desirable to ensure that hardware, software and publications in the sciences and associated disciplines are created from the outset to be accessible to people with disabilities. Insight into this question can be obtained by considering the unique accessibility challenges that these materials pose, including complexities of notation, language, and graphical representation.

Having analyzed what sets this problem apart from broader issues of accessibility, the advantages and limitations of current international standards are reviewed, and contemporary developments in standards and policies are considered from a strategic perspective. …

The Challenge Of Water Entries, Andrea S. Andrews, Shayne D. Baker

International Journal of Aquatic Research and Education

The authors presented a poster at the International Life Saving Foundation's World Conference on Drowning Prevention 2019 in Durban, South Africa titled, "Finding an Aquatic Voice," that was the basis for this article. The conference theme was "Growing Global Drowning Prevention Capacity,” and the aim of our poster’s contribution to the conference was to explore internal reasons for the variable capacity of water-wary persons to engage in water experiences which often manifest as a “water entry and exit conundrum." The paper provides critical decision points associated with these issues to encourage further reflective practice by aquatic professionals. The …

Not Suspended But Not Protected: Challenging School Discipline Reform In The Name Of Restorative Justice For Young Adult Black Girls, Iesha Jackson

Teaching and Learning Faculty Research

This interpretive case study examines the impact of one high school’s mediation process, which is intended to be a restorative practice, on the schooling experiences of three “overage, under-credited," young adult Black girls. Using critical race theory, this study explicates how the school’s approach to mediation fails to protect these students from both physical and structural violence. While it is important that the findings lay a foundation for understanding the contexts of anti-Blackness in restorative practices in schools, insights from this study can also help establish culturally and contextually specific approaches to mediation for young adult Black girls in high …

Evidence Of Impact Underpinning Life Education Programs, Katherine Dix, Syeda Kashfee Ahmed, Toby Carslake, Shani Sniedze

Wellbeing

This rapid evaluation of core Life Education programs conducted by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) in June 2021 is an independent investigation that demonstrates the evidence base underpinning Life Education programs in primary schools Australia-wide. It presents a national snapshot by drawing upon existing Life Education-specific evaluation data, existing ACER student wellbeing data, and accepted best practice in the field of student health and wellbeing education. The project addressed the key evaluation questions: How are core Life Education programs underpinned by evidence-based best practice, and how are core Life Education programs impacting primary-aged student wellbeing outcomes that align …

Exploring The Experiences And Effectiveness Of Student Loan Entrance Counseling, Manoj Thekkadathu Oommen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Student loan debt is one of the most pressing issues in the United States today. The rate of student loan debt in the United States continues to rise year after year, and the country is experiencing a crisis of increased student loan debt. A program that started with a budget of $15 million in 1965 to expand access to higher education has increased exponentially to over $1.5 trillion in student loan debt today. Students are ushered into the college experience often without possessing a firm grasp of basic financial literacy skills. Federal legislation mandates borrowers to take a 30-minute counseling …

Supporting Science Teaching Practice With Learning Progressions, Erin Furtak

2021-2030 ACER Research Conferences

Learning progressions are often used as foundations for curriculum and assessment. At the same time, as representations of the development of student ideas and practices, they can also serve as maps to support teachers during instruction. This paper describes a program of research in which my colleagues and I have investigated how learning progressions can support high school science teachers in cycles of co-designing formative assessments.

Making Excellent Progress In Early Reading: How Can The Identification Of Essential Skills And Concepts Help?, Dara Ramalingam, Prue Anderson, Sandra Knowles, Danielle Anzai, Greta Rollo

2021-2030 ACER Research Conferences

The ability to read and understand text is fundamental to full participation in modern adult life (Olson, 1977; Elwert, 2001). It is essential to educational progress across domains, but increased literacy levels are also linked to positive outcomes in terms of employment and health. Given its critical role both in the facilitation of learning in all domains, and in many aspects of life beyond school, it is imperative that we give students the best possible chance to develop their reading skills. This paper uses early reading as a case study for examining how the identification and explication of essential skills …

Implementing Process Pedagogy In The High School Classroom: How To Improve Student Writing While Helping Students Enjoy Writing, Laura Mahaney

English Theses

Traditionally and currently, teachers also focus on the product and not the process in their own classroom. They will assign a paper with a final due date, students turn in their papers without having anyone else look at it beforehand, and students will get a final grade on what is their first draft. This way of teaching writing does not show students how to improve their writing. With this type of assessment, the natural processes of a person’s mind while writing is ignored; students are expected to have everything in their paper in the first draft and without support. Process …

Empirical Drawings: Utilizing Comic Essays In The Social Studies Classroom To Teach Citizenship, Angelo Letizia

SANE journal: Sequential Art Narrative in Education

This article posits that the comic medium, wedded with traditional essay assignments, may be a powerful tool for social studies teachers, those who prepare social studies teachers at the collegiate level and other teachers and professors who desire to teach about citizenship in an era of "fake news" and alternative facts.

Interpreting School Neuropsychology Reports For Educators, Robert H. Martin

University of South Florida (USF) M3 Publishing

School neuropsychology is a field of study that is seeing rapid growth in institutions of higher learning, and subsequently in public and private schools. School neuropsychology assessments are substantially more extensive than traditional psychoeducational assessments reports. The reports are discussed at the student’s Individual Educational Plan (IEP) meeting and school educators need to be present at the meeting. Educators have often expressed that it is extremely difficult to understand the complicated reports. It is often viewed as too complex to grasp and too overwhelming. The purposes of this paper are to help educators understand and interpret the information that comes …

Admitting Smarter: Refining The Admission Process Through Professional Dispositions, Catherine Snyder

University of South Florida (USF) M3 Publishing

Since 2018, news agencies have shifted from reporting teacher layoffs to teacher shortages. This swift shift in the industry left many floundering to recruit enough teachers to fill classrooms. Even in the midst of the Covid-19 crisis, there is still a demand for teachers, now with added online teaching skills. This article addresses one program’s admissions improvement process: an analysis of the acceptance process, improvements and changes in the process with the goal of reducing attrition, and improving the quality of candidates admitted. Several improvements were made, specifically related to introducing dispositional tools and standardizing the acceptance process across the …

Response To Intervention 2 Easycbm And Aimsweb Intervention Programs How They Relate To Student Growth, George T. Hopson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This researcher aimed to determine how data collected from computer-based assessment programs, specifically EasyCBM and AIMSweb, was used in data-driven instruction and used to identify risk levels in math and reading areas proficiency. Data from intervention programs were collected from six participating high schools. The data collection included math and reading universal screening scores and levels of risk indicators from Tier 2 and Tier 3 levels of their response to intervention (RTI) programs. Section A included math data within a baseline score and a risk indicator level. Section B had reading scores with a baseline score and a risk indicator …

Differential Item Functioning Among English Language Learners On A Large-Scale Mathematics Assessment, Ruixue Liu, Kelly D. Bradley

Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation Faculty Publications

The current study research showed the nature and potential sources of the gaps in mathematics achievement between English language learners (ELLs) and non-English language learners (non-ELLs). The nature of achievement gap was examined using three DIF methodologies: including Mantel-Haenszel procedure, Rasch model, and Hierarchical Generalized Linear Model (HGLM). These were conducted at the item level in contrast to total test level. Results revealed that the three DIF approaches identified 10 common items. These 10 items demonstrated in favor of non-ELLs. Findings from this study will help educational researchers, administrators, and policymakers understand the nature of the achievement gap in mathematics …

The Use Of An Elicited Imitation Test To Measure Global Oral Proficiency Of L2 Chinese At The Postsecondary Classroom, I-Huei Lee

Chinese Language Teaching Methodology and Technology

With a growing number of foreign language studies on proficiency outcomes, it is imperative to address the challenge of measuring students’ proficiency development in a language program where standardized proficiency testing is not readily available. This article reports administering a Chinese elicited imitation test (EIT) by an instructor to track students’ global oral proficiency development in a small language program in a mid-size U.S. public university. The test results from the EIT of second language (L2) Chinese suggest that this tool can provide the instructor with valuable insights into students’ oral proficiency. This study also discusses the potential practical value …