Digital Commons Network^™

Teacher Perception Of Student Engagement In An Arts-Integrated Classroom, Staci J. Baker

Dissertations

Student engagement is a prominent indicator of a student’s academic success (Harbour, Evanovich, Sweigart, & Hughes, 2015). Leavy (2015) continued the engagement dialogue by stating the arts can be highly engaging and a high-yield strategy leading to academic success. Research has been conducted on arts integration, but little research specifically aligns arts integration with student engagement (Mason, Thormann, & Steedly, 2004). Further, there is a lack of depth within arts-integration research on all of the “arts” (including music, visual arts, drama, and dance) (Mason et al., 2004). In this qualitative study, student engagement was viewed from teachers’ perspectives within one …

Gauging The Gain In English Oral And Written Communication Skills By Using Authentic Materials Of Arab College Students: A Case Study, Maha Omar Alhabbash

Dissertations

This case study aimed at gauging the gain in oral and written communication skills for 5 Arab college students through using authentic materials in the United Arab Emirates. An explanatory mixed method design was adopted to achieve the purpose of this case study. At the beginning of the study general information about the participants was collected through using a background questionnaire and a diagnostic test that serves the construction of pre and post-test and the program’s content design. In the first phase of the study, quantitative means were used by conducting a pre and a posttest after implementation of an …

Women And Men's Preferences For Delivery Services In Rural Ethiopia, Nancy K. Beam

Dissertations

This study aims to determine the combination of facility-based delivery care attributes preferred by women and men; if gender differences exist in attribute preferences; and key demographic factors associated with attribute preferences.

Examining Teacher Practices Related To Student-To-Student Discourse In The Middle School Classroom, April Dawn Craft

Dissertations

As schools strive to develop 21st century learners equipped with skills in critical thinking and communication, the use of research-based teaching strategies, such as student-to-student discourse, is a necessary component of highly effective instruction. Research has shown that the way in which a teacher facilitates discourse in the classroom has a powerful impact on student learning and achievement. This case study examines the beliefs and instructional practices of a middle grades science teacher as they pertain to the use of student-to-student discourse, or students' use of a set of common language patterns in order to construct meaning or to develop …

An Exploration Of Informed Student Goal Setting On Achievement In A Midwest Middle School, Laura Conley

Dissertations

This dissertation is a mixed-methods study that critically looked at peer-reviewed articles and empirical research findings about goal setting for middle school students and the possible effects that goal setting had on achievement. This project synthesized the information from articles about goal setting in general and, more specifically, the student informed goal-setting processes. The study spawned from the literature review and critically assessed one teacher’s use of the informed goal setting process to affect the achievement of her Midwestern middle school students. Students in the treatment group completed pre and post-questionnaires that assessed their understanding of goal setting and achievement. …

Action Research Using Entomological Research To Promote Hands-On Science Inquiry In A High-Poverty, Midwest Urban High School, Dustin Stockmann

Dissertations

The purpose of this mixed-methods action research study was to examine to what extent entomological research can promote students’ hands-on learning in a high-poverty, urban, secondary setting. In reviewing the literature, the researcher was not able to find a specific study that investigated how entomological research could promote the hands-on learning of students. The researcher did find evidence that research on learning in a secondary setting was important to student growth. It should also be noted that support was established for the implementation of hands-on science inquiry in the classroom setting. The study’s purpose was to aid educators in their …

A Qualitative Inquiry Into One Teacher’S Metacognitive Processes As They Influence Reading Instruction, Jennifer Antoniotti-Neal

Dissertations

Despite over 40 years of research on the importance of metacognitive strategy instruction for increased student reading achievement, minimal research has been conducted to explore teacher’s explicit awareness of their metacognition and their ability to think about, talk about, and write about their thinking (Block & Pressley, 2002). Therefore, this qualitative case study investigates one teacher’s understanding of metacognitive awareness and missed opportunities for metacognitive comprehension strategy instruction in a reading classroom. One fourth-grade reading teacher from a proficient rural elementary school participated in this study. The data analysis results suggest that the participant’s metacognitive knowledge was limited and comprehension …

An Effort Toward Collaborative Problem Solving In Teacher Candidates’ Practicum: Reflection In Action, Jerome Christopher Bollato

Dissertations

This qualitative study explores my role as the clinical educator of a university practicum field experience at a public elementary and middle school. Nine teacher candidates participated in this action research that focused on changes implemented over the course of a semester to improve collaborative problem-solving inquiry and discussion. The primary data sources include audio-taped transcripts of purposely selected seminars, pre and post observation conferences, online student discussion board posts on the Learning Management System (LMS) and researcher’s field notes. Findings reveal that, through integration of multiple sources of student input, a clinical educator may develop a more complete feedback …

Vagabond: Returning To Autoethnography As A Doctoral Nomad, Karyn Mcelroy

Dissertations

Vagabond: Returning to Autoethnography as a Doctoral Nomad is a journey into what is described as a purposeful and rhizomatic inquiry of spaces and places in knowing. It prompts questioning within the author such as, “What has this doctoral journey come to mean, and where do I go now as I step outside the roots which have planted in me this need to wander? How do I navigate this struggle?” The work is a coming-to-terms piece. It is a hopeful wandering and documented artifact capturing an organic process of unlearning, relearning, and examining locations of being, while recognizing the emergent …

School Connectedness, Language Acquisition And Academic Success: A Study Of English Language Learners' Experiences At A Comprehensive High School, Philip M. Alfano

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore differences in perceptions of school connectedness among Long Term English Learner (LTEL) students and Redesignated Fluent English Proficient (RFEP) students in a comprehensive high school setting. The study also seeks to determine whether or not there is a relationship between English language acquisition and perceptions of school connectedness among these two groups.

The target population was LTEL and RFEP students enrolled in grades 6-12 in public schools in Stanislaus County. Delimiting characteristics were applied to both the target population and the population sample to reduce variability. Quantitative data including artifacts and scaled …

Structural Exploration And Inference Of The Network, Ruihua Cheng

Dissertations

This dissertation consists of two parts. In the first part, a learning-based method for classification of online reviews that achieves better classification accuracy is extended. Automatic sentiment classification is becoming a popular and effective way to help online users or companies to process and make sense of customer reviews. The method combines two recent developments. First, valence shifters and individual opinion words are combined as bigrams to use in an ordinal margin classifier. Second, relational information between unigrams expressed in the form of a graph is used to constrain the parameters of the classifier. By combining these two components, it …

“Mind The Gap”: The Standardization Of Master-Level Education Competencies Among Humanitarian And International Development Professionals, Polina Kadatska

Dissertations

Quality education of international development/humanitarian professionals is of high importance due to increased donor demands for projects’ transparency, accountability, and efficiency. However, there is a lack of standardization of learning outcomes among the educational institutions that train the workforce for the non-profit sector. The purpose of this quantitative survey study was to describe how humanitarian professional alumni think their Master’s program aligned with the Core Humanitarian Competencies Framework (CHCF) and how these competencies assisted them in their current work. Additionally, the study explored what NGO employers think of applicability of the Framework’s competencies in their organizations and the preparedness of …

The Story In The Standards: Creating Counter-Narratives In The Common Core State Standards, Jarret Alexander Smith

Dissertations

The research question guiding this study is: How might educators create counter-narratives, particularly related to the diversity of texts, experiences and knowledge bases represented in the CCSS? The purpose of this study is to determine the impact of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy on the engagement in literacy acquisition of African American students in middle and high school. The basic framework for this study is situated within and informed by Critical Race Theory (CRT) and Culturally Relevant Pedagogy (CRP). The study focuses on creating counter-narratives for African American students in spite of the silence of the Common Core State Standards on cultural …

Classroom Comics: A Five-Part Narrative Recounting A Teacher Action Research Study Using Comics To Teach Academic Vocabulary In The Middle Grades, Charles Michael Phoenix

Dissertations

A series of five, serially produced, self-published comic books presents the genesis, execution, and subsequent analysis and discussion of a teacher action-research study using the multimodal affordance of comics in a formal, qualitative research study designed to teach highly-valued, state-tested academic vocabulary words to 8th grade middle school students in an urban K-8 setting, where 96 percent of the population was eligible for free and reduced-price lunch, and 80 percent of the school population were children of color. Building upon a socio-cultural view of literacy the author/researcher employs the narrative affordance of the comics medium ironically -- to demonstrate the …

Taking The “Squeeze” Off Of Social Studies: A Phenomenological Study Of Teacher “Curricular” Autonomy And Its Effects On Social Studies Instructional Time, Jerri Antoinette Johnson

Dissertations

The state of social studies instruction in US schools has become dismal. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to gain an understanding of the impact of high stakes testing on social studies teaching when it is not tested by the state. I examined the elementary teacher’s “curricular” autonomy (curricular/instructional decision making) within the context of social studies teaching in a suburban low performing, urban demographic, school. Participants were asked to describe the experience of making instructional decisions regarding social studies education. The specific aims of this study were to: 1. reveal the meaning of teacher autonomy for teachers in …

An Evaluation Of The Implementation Process Of A Response To Intervention (Rti) Model Among Grade Three Students And Their Study Of One Topic Of Mathematics In An Elementary School, Leola Lawrence

Dissertations

Implementing a Response to Intervention (RTI) system in a third grade mathematics classroom includes several variables, among them the process utilized to identify students who may benefit from RTI, the professionals involved with implementation, and differentiated practices particular to RTI at Tier 2 or 3. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the implementation process of the Response to Intervention (RTI) system on a group of third grade students in an elementary school during their study of one mathematics topic. The study evaluated how the RTI practices of the responsible parties, (i.e., the teacher, district instructional facilitator, and campus …

Classroom Communities Of Practice, Angela Marie Muse

Dissertations

Are classrooms preparing students with the literacy skills they need for school, work, and life? When students don't meet expectations, educators tend to seek answers in innovative programs or research-based practices that promise success. The practices teachers use, however, are neither selected nor enacted in a vacuum. To fully understand what is happening in a classroom, one needs to consider not only the instructional practices teachers use but also the context in which teachers select and enact these practices and the effect these practices have on our students. The impetus for this study came from a broader desire to dig …

Your Words Or Mine: Discourse Conflicts For Speakers Of African American English, Tamara D. Wells

Dissertations

This qualitative action research study captured the voices of middle school students as they talked about being first language speakers of AAE and their efforts to appropriate SAE as a marker of school success. The following compelling questions were at the forefront of this study: How do middle school students use talk and other modalities to construct and represent meaning related to the use of African American English and Standard American English? In what ways are the complexities of African American youths’ identities revealed through their use of African American English and Standard American English? How does social interaction during …

Instructor-Student Classroom Interactions: An Experimental Study Of Language, Sex-Differences, And Student Perceptions Of Instructors, Carl Joseph Brown

Dissertations

Higher education instructors must establish meaningful relationships with students in order to be effective. Student ratings of instructor dynamism, approachability, and credibility impact overall evaluations of instructors. Instructor use of strategic language choices, such as slang use in the classroom, impact these student evaluations. Here, the outcome of language choices’ impact on student evaluations is explored. To do so, both instructor and student sex main effects and interactions are tested. Last, specific methods, findings, as well as meaning and application are covered. Overall, instructor use of slang impacts student evaluations.

Stakeholders’ Perceptions And Practice Of Culturally Responsive Pedagogy In A Private School, Elizabeth Maria Franklin

Dissertations

Many culturally responsive theorists support culturally responsive pedagogy for closing the achievement gap in the rapidly changing demographics of America’s education system. The purpose of this case study was to examine stakeholders’ perceptions and practice of culturally responsive pedagogy in St. Andrew Academy (pseudonym), a Catholic NativityMiguel school located in a Midwest metropolitan area. The goals were: (a) to examine middle school teachers’ and the principal’s perceptions of culturally responsive pedagogy and extent of culturally responsive teaching implemented in the school, (b) to examine how parents perceived culturally responsive caring relationships with teachers and the principal, and (c) to examine …

Culturally Relevant Education For Rural Schools: Creating Relevancy In Rural America, Joshua J. Anderson

Dissertations

In this dissertation, I investigate the ways in which culturally relevant pedagogy is conceptualized and implemented by two secondary English Language Arts educators in one school district with a strong sense of rural identity. Culturally relevant pedagogy is considered by many professionals in the field of education to be an effective philosophy to inform instructional practices for narrowing the achievement gap of historically marginalized groups (Cummins, 1990; Gay, 2000; Ladson-Billings, 1994, 2000). A careful review of the literature on culturally relevant pedagogy reveals the discourse surrounding culturally relevant pedagogy has largely been dominated by urban voices (Cochran-Smith, 2003; Esposito & …

Liberating Dialogue: Literature Discussions Of Sociopolitical Texts Among African American Students In An Inner-City School, Elizabeth Kearney

Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Although the Common Core State Standards have the potential to guide teachers toward literacy practices that emphasize authentic literature and its use in discussions, high-stakes testing associated with the CCSS has prompted some educators to implement curricula that mirrors the tests. Standards that address authentic literature and discussions are often pushed to the background. Teachers now have access to a plethora of quality young adult novels with sociopolitical themes; that is, themes like gender, culture, abled-ness, immigration, economics, social class, poverty, racism, oppression, and peace. Discussions about such themes can lead to liberating dialogue, which presupposes social action …

Rebuilding Security And Peace For Women: Exploring Women’S Security Challenges And Activism For Security And Peace Building In Northeast India, Rubi Devi

Dissertations

Women have been affected by violence and conflicts ever since the wars were first waged on earth. Woman as a grieving mother or widow is a common portrayal of war and conflict. However, the common portrayal of women as passive victims does not recount the whole story of women’s experience in conflict/post conflict scenario. Women face countless security challenges in the form of physical, psychological abuses, economic burden and most importantly sexual violence- rape, murder, molestation, kidnapping and sex trafficking. The gendered nature of conflict, thus, increases women’s security challenges and places them at a critical juncture of experiencing and …

The Effect Of Stereoscopic Three-Dimensional Images On Recall Of Second Language Vocabulary, Regina Kaplan-Rakowski

Dissertations

The purpose of this experimental study was to investigate the effect of stereoscopic three-dimensional (S3D) images on productive and receptive recall of foreign language vocabulary. S3D images are highly-realistic and differ from non-stereoscopic three-dimensional (NS3D) images in that they provide the impression of the added third dimension of depth. This within-subject study exposed the participants (N = 82) in a controlled setting to a series of carefully designed and randomly distributed NS3D and S3D images. The subjects were then given immediate productive and receptive tests of foreign language vocabulary items that were represented by NS3D and S3D images. Quantitative data …

Unbiasing Information Search And Processing Through Personal And Social Identity Mechanisms, Benjamin A. Lyons

Dissertations

Group commitments such as partisanship and religion can bias the way individuals seek information and weigh evidence. This psychological process can lead to distorted views of reality and polarization between opposing social groups. Substantial research confirms the existence and persistence of numerous identity-driven divides in society, but means of attenuating them remain elusive. However, because identity-protective cognition is driven by a need to maintain global and not domain specific integrity, researchers have found that affirming an unrelated core aspect of the self can eliminate the need for ego defense and result in more evenhanded evaluation. This study proposes a competing …

Multi-Sensory Emotion Recognition With Speech And Facial Expression, Qingmei Yao

Dissertations

Emotion plays an important role in human beings’ daily lives. Understanding emotions and recognizing how to react to others’ feelings are fundamental to engaging in successful social interactions. Currently, emotion recognition is not only significant in human beings’ daily lives, but also a hot topic in academic research, as new techniques such as emotion recognition from speech context inspires us as to how emotions are related to the content we are uttering.

The demand and importance of emotion recognition have highly increased in many applications in recent years, such as video games, human computer interaction, cognitive computing, and affective computing. …

Sine Qua Non: Emotional Intelligence As The Key Ingredient To Effective Principal, Kelly P. Davids

Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this empirical, descriptive case study was to explore and describe the importance of Emotional Intelligence as perceived by California public school (K-12) superintendents when hiring and recruiting new school site principals.

Methodology: Convenience purposeful sampling was used to identify 12 superintendents throughout the California public education system at unified (K-12) school districts with a minimum of eight schools. An empirical, descriptive case study was used to collect data from superintendents through a survey and semi-structured interviews. Superintendents grouped domains of self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship management, and general characteristics as essential, important, desirable or no value …

More Than Whoever Made You Suffer: A Culturally-Informed Trauma-Focused Intervention For Latina Adolescents, Katherine Helena Valadez-Sanchez

Dissertations

This dissertation study explored how the integration of common Latino cultural values within Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT) influenced the treatment outcomes of Latina adolescents with a history of trauma. Latino adolescents and their parents often experience great difficulties in attempting to access effective mental health services that are sensitive to their cultural needs. Therefore, the present study sought to understand the impact of participation in Culturally-Modified Trauma-Focused Treatment (CM-TFT) on working alliance, therapeutic engagement, and overall posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptomatology. In this mixed methods study, four adolescents and two mothers participated in CM-TFT. A self-report scale to measure …

Promoting Healthy Family Transition And Support In Somali Refugee Parents: Outcomes Of A Community-Based Program, Vanja Pejic

Dissertations

Refugee families encounter significant acculturative and resettlement stressors as they attempt to rebuild their lives in the host country. These stressors are exacerbated by histories of trauma, violence, and loss making them highly vulnerable to psychological distress. The Somali Parent Program was a culturally specific, 8-week parent program designed to empower mothers to increase their family resilience by engaging in cultural and social exchange, adapting their parenting strategies to their host country, and learning about community resources. Ten Somali refugee mothers were recruited to participate in weekly 2-hour sessions that incorporated a psycho-educational lesson, an experiential activity, and a closing …

Saudi Teachers’ Experiences And Attitudes Toward Integrating Video Games For Learning: Affordances And Constraints Of Using Video Games In Saudi Arabian Classrooms, Mohammed Awad Alqurashi

Dissertations

The effectiveness of integrating educational video games into classrooms depends on teachers’ attitudes toward video games. This descriptive study investigates Saudi teachers’ experiences playing video games and their attitudes about integrating video games into their classrooms in Saudi Arabia. A total of 930 Saudi teachers completed an electronic survey developed by the researcher. Overall, the results of this study showed Saudi teachers’ attitudes toward video games were fairly positive despite a low level of play. Analysis found a relationship between teachers’ philosophy of teaching and their perspectives toward using video games in their classroom for learning. A moderate negative correlation …