Digital Commons Network^™

A Scoping Review Of Dominant Trends Of Using Music To Teach Phonemic Awareness From 1995 - 2021, Brandy Walthall

Theses and Dissertations

With reading being such an essential part of education, teachers need resources to help with instructional strategies. This scoping review will gather information on one such resource in teaching reading. It focuses on a scoping review of the information available on teachers using music to teach phonemic awareness. The scoping review will investigate the trends from 1995-2021 in teachers using music to teach phonemic awareness, trends in instructional strategies and research methods for teachers using music to teach phonemic awareness, and assessing or looking at the outcomes of teachers using music to teach phonemic awareness. The researcher used keywords for …

Teachers’ Perceptions On Implementing Read 180 During The Covid-19 Pandemic For Grade 3-5 Students In A Georgia Public School, Monika Nicole Whitmire

Theses and Dissertations

The problem addressed by the study was to examine the effectiveness of the implementation of the Read 180 Universal reading intervention program for students who struggle with reading during the COVID-19 pandemic. The purpose of this case study was to describe teachers’ perceptions of the effectiveness of the implementation of the Read 180 program for elementary students in a grades 3-5 Georgia elementary school during the COVID-19 pandemic. A qualitative research paradigm has been used in the research described below.

A case study involved semi- structured interviews of 12 general ELA teachers in grades 3, 4, and 5. A thematic …

Tidal Translations: Thinking-With Untranslatability In Craig Santos Perez's From Unincorporated Territory, Maryn Gardner

Theses and Dissertations

Craig Santos Perez's poetic series from Unincorporated Territory describes and decries the U.S. militarization, colonization, and environmental degradation of Guam in the Western Pacific through multilingual, excerpted, and series-long poems. Perez's writing style requires slow, careful reading with translations sometimes appearing on the same page, various pages later, or not at all. I describe this kind of elongated translation as slow translation, recalling translation theorist Michael Cronin's "Slow Language" movement. This thesis invites readers, especially multispecies ethnographers, to slow down the translation of nonhuman species and their stories by paying attention to moments of untranslatability in multispecies literature and interactions. …

Pinyin Facilitation Or Hindrance Of Character Acquisition For Beginning Chinese Learners, Yung-Wei Wang

Theses and Dissertations

The current research built on Yan, Miller, Li, and Shu’s (2008) eye-tracking study, which examined how second grade native Chinese speakers focused on Pinyin and Chinese characters while reading sentences. This research also used eye-tracking to examine how Chinese foreign Language learners (CFL) fixated on Pinyin and Chinese characters to determine if Pinyin facilitated or distracted from character learning. Two groups participated in this research: first semester university students enrolled in a beginning level Chinese class, and third, fourth, and fifth grade students enrolled in Chinese dual language immersion (DLI). All participants were asked to read eight sentences in Chinese …

Communities Of Water: An Examination Of Cooperation And Conflict In Water Management Practices In The Central Peruvian Andes, Sylvie D. Littledale

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores two examples of water management in the highland Peruvian villages, San Pedro de Llancha and San Antonio de Chinchina. One example is of cooperation and union between the two communities. The other is of conflict between the same two villages just 40 years prior. I examine ethnographic and ethnohistorical data from both the collaborative period and the conflictive period of these two communities’ relations over water. The data suggest that, while the outcomes of these two periods were drastically different, the processes through which these communities came into relation with one another were quite similar. Their communal …

Conceptualization Of Steam Education In The Elementary Classroom, Virginia Olmert Mccullough

Theses and Dissertations

Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics (STEAM) education is an instructional approach to education in which students demonstrate creative approaches in experiential, inquiry-based learning within the STEM disciplines. Despite the national focus on STEAM education, there exists considerable uncertainty as to what constitutes STEAM education and how classroom educators make sense of their conceptualization of STEAM in their classroom within the state of Georgia.

The method of conceptualization is the internal processing of thoughts that produce new ideas or knowledge. This descriptive case study offers thoughtful new insights on how educators in a STEAM-certified elementary school in a school district …

Measuring The Effect Of Translator Training And Language Education On Translation Competence, Calvin J. Westfall

Theses and Dissertations

This study reviews concepts of bilingualism, summarizes various models of translation competency, and quantifies the difference of translation competency among students and graduates of Brigham Young University. By means of a survey about language history and a translation test from Spanish to English, data from 57 participants was collected and analyzed to measure the effect of formal language education and translation training. Despite numerous proposed models of translation competency (Wilss 1976, 1989; Koller, 1979; Krings, 1986; Lörscher, 1991; Toury, 1991; Pym, 1991, 1992, 2003, 2013; Kiraly, 1995; Fraser, 1996; Neubert, 2000; Kelly, 2005; Hague et al., 2011; Pietrzrak, 2015), few …

A Survey-Based Analysis On Adult Community Esl Learners: Perceptions Of Challenges, Online Learning, Resources, And Skills, Adriana Reeve

Theses and Dissertations

"One thing cannot be disputed: immigrants from all backgrounds and levels of cultural capital are drawn to noncredit ESL programs with high hopes of a brighter future and the attainment of the American dream" (Becker 2011). Adult ESL community learners are a fast-growing and diverse group of individuals. Previous studies demonstrate the many challenges this group faces in attending English classes (Tan, Nabb, Aagard, and Kim 2010; Tucker 2007) and the need for more online learning to better meet their needs (Eyring 2014; Reynard 2003). A survey was administered to 136 adult community ESL learners enrolled at the Provo, Utah …

Orienting Pacha: Value As Action In The Late Horizon Xauxa-Pachacamac Axis, Ridge C. Anderson

Theses and Dissertations

The Andean Late Horizon (ca. AD 1438–1532) was a period of exceptionally rapid and far-reaching cultural change. Over this short span of only a few generations, the Inka ethnic group established an empire that was greater in size than any other pre-colonial American polity. The Inka accomplished their expansion without the use of certain institutions (i.e., a standing army, formal writing system, monetary system, or price-setting markets) that the received anthropological wisdom has long held as being necessary preconditions to imperial expansion. Standard explanations of Late Horizon culture change tend to overemphasize the roles of environmental constraints, social evolution, and …

A Corpus-Based Comparison Between Coreferential Direct Object Nominal Clauses And Direct Object Infinitive Complements, Ethan C. Rutter

Theses and Dissertations

The objective of this thesis is to analyze the variation between two competing structures--on the one hand, a transitive verb that takes a finite nominal clause as its complement, and on the other hand, a transitive verb that takes an infinitive as its complement. This thesis seeks to address three questions: (1) Which semantic categories are more likely to use coreferential nominal clauses as complements? (2) How do coreferential finite nominal clauses compare with coreferential infinitive complements, in terms of frequency of usage? And (3) do the corpora show any variation among different countries? The corpora CREA and Web/Dialects were …

Student Perspectives On Feedback In A Spanish Medical Interpreting Course, Allison Rebecca Brimhall

Theses and Dissertations

Medical interpreter education is a fast-growing field in which learners sometimes receive inadequate feedback to help them improve their interpreting skills (Sultanić, 2021). This qualitative study focused on students’ perspectives on the different types of feedback given in a university Spanish medical interpreting course. Interviews and written reflections were analyzed to investigate what students personally considered to be the outcomes of the class and how feedback given in the course was associated with their development of interpreting skills and self-efficacy. Students reported that they found the most meaningful improvement through (1) guided self-assessment to discover gaps in their abilities, (2) …

Math Achievement Opportunity For American Mexican Children In Mexico: A Structural Equation Modeling Analysis Using Multilevel Data, Jimmy E. Hernandez

Theses and Dissertations

Since the U.S. Recession of 2008, more Mexicans are leaving than coming to the United States. Many Mexican families return to Mexico with their U.S.-born--or American Mexican--children and youth. Approximately 700,000 American Mexican children and youth are now living and attending K-12 schools throughout Mexico (Gándara & Jensen, 2021; Jacobo-Suárez, 2017; Jensen et al., 2017; Passel et al., 2012). They are part of a broader category of students who have educational experiences on both sides of the border often referred to as transnational students. Return migration to Mexico presents both challenges and opportunities that affect their adaptation to Mexican schools. …

The World, Rebecca Dawn Billings

Theses and Dissertations

A poem comes into the world when an obsession takes hold of a person who must write about it. These twenty-eight original poems are products of obsession and pleasure.

The Proposal For The Development Of A Minimal Viable Product (Mvp) Repository Website Containing Authentic Texts In Video Format For The Use Of Language Teachers In The Twenty-First Century, Rute Maria Baptista

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis project proposed the building of a website as a repository of authentic texts in video format for teaching foreign or second languages. The project planned the building of a minimal viable product or MVP with authentic videos both in English and Spanish, organized by the ACTFL levels with particular attention to the Intermediate level. Data were collected from a survey of 42 respondents in the United States and 89 combined from Spain and Mexico. The responses collected suggest that there is a need for this MVP. Additionally, the data indicated which features were most wanted by these teachers. …

Cambios En Las Actitudes Estudiantiles Por Medio De Implementación De La Enseñanza Intercultural En Clases De Español, Ana Victoria Madrigal

Theses and Dissertations

In recent years, research in the pedagogical field has focused on the relationship between linguistic and intercultural competence. Through various studies, the connection and interdependence that exists between the teaching of language and culture as part of foreign language classes has been recognized. The following action-research study focuses on the implementation of cultured based instruction as well as the learning and teaching of Latin American culture through specific, clear, and direct cultural lesson plans and assignments. The cultural lesson plans and assignments helped activate a more explicit cultural pedagogical instruction. The cultural lesson plans and assignments implemented in the study …

Mutants, Sentinels, And Cerebro: Messages About Technology And Society In Science Fiction Films, Paige Marie Lee

Theses and Dissertations

Technology plays a significant role in society and in entertainment. People hold an ambivalent attitude about technology that is often illustrated in science fiction films. Much like myth telling stories to teach a lesson, science fiction films caution viewers of the effects of powerful technology usage in culture today. This thesis examines X-Men to show how relevant principles found in myth continue to be relevant to media consumption. Using media ecology to inform the reader about the technological environment (Mumford, 1944), this analysis of technology portrayed in X-Men shows the implications real world technology, such as radiation, weapons, and artificial …

Positive Psychology Interventions In An Sla Context: A Semester-Long Study Of The Impact Of Positive Psychology On The Well-Being And Language Development Of English Language Learners, Carolee Rogers

Theses and Dissertations

This article reports on a study investigating the effectiveness of positive psychology interventions (PPIs) in an Intensive English Program (IEP) for non-matriculated university students. Interventions based on the PERMA model for wellbeing (positive emotion, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment) were implemented through weekly 65-minute lessons and short daily activities. Each lesson introduced an aspect of the PERMA model such as positive emotion or achievement. Along with this focused instruction, students concurrently engaged in language learning activities. Teachers also provided short daily activities for reinforcement throughout the week. Six classes received these interventions, while three classes served as a control group …

The Effects Of Dialogic Reading On The Oral Language Ofâ Diverse Kindergarten Students, Abigail Figgins

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine if dialogic reading involving diverse kindergarten students would significantly affect narrative language. Various studies have corroborated the effectiveness of dialogic reading instruction on the expressive vocabulary of monolingual children. However, few studies have examined oral narrative language outcomes, especially with diverse students. A total of 142 kindergarten students were randomly assigned to a treatment group or control group. Each child in the treatment group received 14 weeks of whole-class dialogic reading instruction from their kindergarten teacher two times per week for 20 minutes each session in their classroom. The dialogic reading program …

Aiding Semantic Memory Creation With Navigational Context, Thomas Benjamin Lyle Wasden

Theses and Dissertations

While we have traditionally understood the hippocampus to be involved in memory and navigation, it also appears that it has a role in language processing, creation and prediction. An obvious explanation for this is that language is impossible if linguistic signs cannot be remembered and retrieved. Because linguistic signs are definitionally biologically neutral or arbitrary, we must use the brain's apparatus for learning and storing information from the external world to store and retrieve them. Although plausible, this explanation fails to take into account the hippocampus' role in navigation as a contributing element in the processing, storage and retrieval of …

Reading Fluency Development And Science In A Fourth Grade Dual Language Immersion Classroom, Talia A. Casares

Theses and Dissertations

Students from dual language immersion (DLI) classrooms are required to learn the language through content. However, some students have not yet developed these abilities by the time they start fourth grade. Thus, to fully comprehend content such as science, students need stronger reading and writing abilities in the second language (L2). To help stakeholders have a better understanding on how to effectively help students throughout this process, this action research studied the effectiveness of integrating literacy with science and mobile assisted language learning (MALL). Findings showed that the integrations of literacy, science and MALL were effective with statistically significant results …

How She Sleeps At Night, Alexandra Malouf

Theses and Dissertations

How She Sleeps at Night is a collection of lyric poetry constellated around experiences of disability, trauma, and womanhood. A critical essay introduces the collection by elucidating the experiences and theoretical underpinnings that shaped the body of these poems. The introductory essay distills the principles that informed my cardinal poetic goals as I wrote: to create poems that can be read again and again over a lifetime, which connect with readers' common humanity, and which acknowledge the nuances and complexities of being alive.

Satanic Injustice: A Pentadic Rhetorical Analysis Of State Of Arkansas V Echols And Baldwin, Shaelee Bryne Erickson

Theses and Dissertations

Injustice continues to be a highly discussed topic in many scholarly disciplines, including rhetoric and law. Scholars in both fields are exploring how language in legal discourse contributes to systematic inequality, discrimination, and unfairness--racial and nonracial. This rise in scholarly interest correlates with civic concern, as there have been many court cases in the last few decades that have captured public and media attention. One of these cases involved Damien Echols and Jason Baldwin, two teenage boys who were convicted for murdering three 8-year-old boys. Echols and Baldwin were tried during the late 20th-century satanic panic, a well-documented social phenomenon …

Cherry Red Greenwashing: The Rhetoric Behind Corporate Recycling Narratives, Jessica Wallace Haws

Theses and Dissertations

As the public becomes more aware of environmental issues, corporations are pressed to consider and address the sustainability of their practices. Unwilling to drastically change business models, many corporations turn to greenwashing in an attempt to construct an environmentally friendly image while doing little to nothing to address sustainability issues. Using Kenneth Burke's work on identification and terministic screens, I analyze The Coca-Cola Company's "2020 World Without Waste Report" to illuminate how consumers come to believe in and identify with corporate greenwashing tactics. In line with Burke's theories related to identification, I argue that Coca-Cola's greenwashing strategies can be categorized …

Chameleon: A Collection Of Poems, Daniel Albert Daw

Theses and Dissertations

Chameleon is a collection of poetry that largely springs from John Keats' notion of the chameleon poet, which posits that poets can and should be able to speak with any voice or perspective in their work. A critical essay introduces the collection by putting Keats in conversation with other poets and scholars, such as Paisley Rekdal, Philip Sidney, and Fernando Pessoa, who also have much to say regarding the nature of voice in poetry. The essay further explores some of my most recurring strategies in poetry as well as what I consider to be some of the touchstones of great …

A Randomized Control Trial Examining The Effects Of A Multi-Tiered Oral Narrative Language Intervention On Kindergarten Expository Writing, Shaylee Rae Woods

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of the current study was to examine the effects of a multi-tiered oral narrative language intervention on kindergarten students' written expository discourse. The participants included 270 participants from a larger sample of 686 kindergarten students from four school districts in the upper Midwest geographical region of the United States. Participants received contextualized language intervention using Story Champs narrative intervention procedures. Tier-1 treatment groups received large group instruction from their classroom teacher who followed Story Champs procedures. Students whose oral narrative retell scores did not improve following the initial four weeks of treatment were assigned to receive additional small …

Russell Means' Use Of The Universal Ecosystem Metaphor As An Act Of Indigenous Resistance, Clarissa Mcintire

Theses and Dissertations

Studies of American Indian protest rhetoric often define American Indian opposition either by its resistance or its conformity to non-Native institutional discursive norms, suggesting that only one of the two can be considered authentic to American Indian cultures and identities. Addressing this debate, this thesis examines an instance of Native opposition which successfully blends the two approaches: Russell Means' 1989 statement to the United States Senate. Means employs the mode of story to effectively shift discursive authority from the Senate committee members to pan-Indigenous peoples. I call this shift rhetorical occupation, or the appropriation of rhetorical space. Through rhetorical occupation, …

The Intersection Of Fashion And Politics: A Semiotic Analysis Of Vogue Magazine Covers Surrounding Election Seasons, Megan M. Vincent

Theses and Dissertations

This study explores the political messages framed within the cover of Vogue magazines by reviewing the published issues that surround election season. By focusing on the intersection of politics and fashion through the visual representation provided by a prestigious, globally known fashion magazine, the research will observe the potential increase and growth of political involvement within influence of the fashion industry. This study will begin with the October, November, and December covers from the 2016 and 2020 presidential election. These will be accompanied by the January, February, and March covers of the following years. Guided by semiotic analysis and visual …

Using Item-Response Analysis To Evaluate The Task-Demands Of A Pictural-Response Based Test Of Word Reading, Michael Eason

Theses and Dissertations

While some children’s reading difficulties are a consequence of socio-economic factors and inadequate instruction, other children have extreme difficulties learning to read despite having adequate educational opportunity and adequate levels of intelligence. These children are classified under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) as having a learning disability specific to reading (SLD-R). The identification of children with SLD-R is costly on time, personnel, and other school resources, and due to an insufficient number of resources generally available to schools, the methods implemented for identifying children are alarmingly inconsistent. The aim of the current study is to investigate the task …

No One Is Ever Going To Acknowledge The Language That You Speak”: A Discourse Historical Approach To The Construction Of English Learners’ Identity In Federal Policy, Nicoleta Hodis

Theses and Dissertations

Using the discourse historical approach (DHA), this thesis examined how actors from diverse educational settings (federal, state, and districts) discursively constructed the identity of the English learners (ELs) during the appropriation of new educational policy (i.e., ESSA of 2015). This study intended to understand how both “human” and “non-human” educational actors (i.e., the texts of the educational policy and the key actors responsible for the appropriation of the ESSA of 2015) construct and position the identity of ELs in relations of power and knowledge and how the macro-policy discourse shapes how policies are interpreted at the meso- and micro-level. …

The Variation Of Metaphor Processing Strategies And The Effects On Reading Skills In L2 English Learners, Shana Scucchi

Theses and Dissertations

Metaphor use and meaning is deeply tied to the culturally-determined conventional use of language. To date, most research regarding metaphor comprehension exists within the realm of first language (L1) acquisition, with little research that examines how learners interpret metaphor in their second language (L2). Thus, little is known about how learners process metaphor constructions in their L2, or how these processing strategies may affect other L2 skills, such as reading abilities.

Gentner (1988) investigated how metaphors are comprehended at various ages using the nominal metaphor X is Y, where Y is the base of the metaphor and X is the …