Education Commons^™

Perceived Barriers To The National Board For Professional Teaching Standards Certification., Jan Woodard Moore

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Since its conception in 1987, much money and effort have been expended establishing the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. Although 16,038 educators in 45 states and the District of Columbia have obtained National Board Certification, there are over 1,200 teachers in the East Tennessee counties of Cocke and Sevier who are eligible for National Board Certification, but have not obtained this certification. This study sought to identify the barriers that discouraged this population from attempting to gain National Board Certification.

The research design was inferential and utilized data from a survey instrument constructed by the researcher. A pilot test …

Inside Unlv, Diane Russell, Gian Galassi, Richard Jensen

Inside UNLV

No abstract provided.

After Turning Points: Evidence Of The Adoption Of Middle School Reforms In The United States 1987-2000., Nancy Barnes Mansberger

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore the adoption by U.S. middle schools of key practices recommended by the 1989 Turning Points report. Three questions were examined: (1) To what extent have the organizational practices identified by research to impact the development of "small learning communities" been adopted by U.S. middle schools? (2) To what extent do the instructional practices of U.S. middle school teachers reflect developmentally responsive or traditional/bureaucratic methods?, and (3) Do the instructional practices of U.S. middle school teachers differ between those who teach in schools with developmentally responsive organizational practices and those who teach in …

Inside Unlv, Diane Russell, Mae Worthey-Flennoy, Cate Weeks, Gian Galassi

Inside UNLV

No abstract provided.

The Library As Laboratory, Patricia A. Iannuzzi, Diane Harvey

Library Faculty Presentations

Overview of Issues:

— Improving the Quality of Undergraduate Research

- Working with students and faculty
- Curricular and Extracurricular models

— Advancing the Undergraduate Research Agenda on Campus

- strategies
- partners
- projects

Teachers' Authentic E-Learning, Judi Harris, Neal Grandgenett

School of Education Articles

If professional development is understood to be teachers’professional learning, then authentic professional development occurs when we actively learn—and reflect on that learning, both individually and collaboratively—as we teach. What might characterize authentic learning for teachers—especially as it applies to using Internet tools and resources in the classroom? A series of research studies we have been doing provides some interesting insights into and potential answers to this question.

Belonging In Parent-School Partnerships: Perspectives Of Parents Of Middle School Students With Autism, Michael Wayne Riley

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this study is to contribute to understandings of parent-school relationships involving parents of students with autism by exploring notions of belonging with a small group of parents. The purpose of the study is to describe the experiences of middle school parents of children with autism. From these descriptions, I examined how parents of students with autism might contribute to understandings of belonging in school-family partnerships and enable schools and families to collaborate more effectively. This study addresses an apparent gap in understandings of belonging of parents of children with autism in their relationships with their child's school. …

Confederate Operations In The Jackson Purchase: A History Of Camp Beauregard, Kentucky, Dieter C. Ullrich

Faculty Research at Morehead State University

No abstract provided.

The Academic Workplace (Fall/Winter 2002): The Politics Of Civic Engagement, New England Resource Center For Higher Education At The University Of Massachusetts Boston, Harry C. Boyte, Deborah Hirsch, Melvin Wade

The Academic Workplace

No abstract provided.

Inside Unlv, Diane Russell, Gian Galassi, Cate Weeks

Inside UNLV

No abstract provided.

Bringing Female Scientists Into The Elementary Classroom: Confronting The Strength Of Elementary Students' Stereotypical Images Of Scientists, Gayle A. Buck, Diandra Leslie-Pelecky, Susan K. Kirby

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

This study explored the effectiveness of bringing female scientists into the elementary classrooms on promoting changes in the stereotypical images of scientists. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected and analyzed to illuminate changes in stereotypical images of scientists. Results indicate that despite the efforts of the scientists to encourage the students to question their image of a scientist, the students held on to stereotypical images. Instead, the students questioned the true identity of the scientists, categorizing them as teachers. The results led to questions of the strength of the image and the extent of efforts needed for students to question …

Grade-Span Configurations: The (Limited) Evidence Regarding Effects On Academic Achievement, Theodore Coladarci, Jullie Hancock

Maine Education Policy Research Institute

No abstract provided.

Editorial Introduction, Gordon Wells

Networks: An Online Journal for Teacher Research

This issue of Networks is the last in a year that has seen a tightening of constraints, both political and educational, in response to the increasing violence that has characterized relationships between nations, cultures, religions and economic classes. In education, in almost all the richer countries, there has been a tighter focus on "basic skills" and the memorization of an increasingly large body of "core knowledge", assessed through standardized tests, and a concomitant narrowing of the opportunities for student initiative, choice, and sustained investigation of questions and issues that they find personally significant. Teachers feel harried and hurried, with little …

The Definition Of Enlightenment - Lighten Up: My Use Of Humor In Social Work Education And Practice, Rich Furman

Networks: An Online Journal for Teacher Research

In this narrative, I discuss how humor has become a central "tool" of my practice as a social work educator and social worker. I describe how I use humor as a conscious means of achieving student learning. In a very real sense, calling humor a tool is a misnomer as it is a central feature of my personality. Each of us possesses certain personality characteristics that, if nurtured and cherished, can become powerful allies in the processes of teaching and helping.

My Introspective Time Capsule, Michele Stafford-Levy

Networks: An Online Journal for Teacher Research

This study takes place in the southwestern part of the United States on the Mexican-American border and is a narrative about a teacher's journey of self-discovery about her own teaching practices through reflection. Dr. Myriam Torres (New Mexico State University) and Michele Stafford-Levy ventured into the typical professor-student relationship. The professor guided her graduate student through a journey of self-discovery and how to document the process of self-reflection and action in her own classroom. By sharing these events from her professional life through autobiography, the student strives to serve as a model for both pre-service and in-service teachers to reflect, …

Learning From Others: Literacy Perspectives Of Middle-School English Teachers, Cynthia A. Lassonde

Networks: An Online Journal for Teacher Research

At the center of this interview-based study, middle-school English teachers talk and write about their literacy development, their teaching philosophies, and their curriculum, as they reflect upon their teaching. Portraits of their perspectives of literacy emerge. Using these portraits to reflect upon teaching practices, the author suggests we can effectively examine our own educational philosophies, contributing to our efforts to become increasingly competent educators.

Inside Unlv, Diane Russell

Inside UNLV

No abstract provided.

Expecting, Accepting, And Respecting Difference In Middle School, Lori Olafson, Margaret A. Macintyre Latta

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

The curriculum need not fight young adolescents’ need to engage in identity formation. It can assist that process when students are given the opportunity to address issues that matter to them through their school work.

Adolescence is a time when key questions of identity assume central importance in the lives of children (Brumberg, 1997). It is often a particularly traumatic time for girls as they negotiate through the quagmire of adolescent experience (Harper, 1997). During the time we spent researching and teaching in middle schools, we found that the voices of adolescent girls echoed this fragile and vulnerable sense of …

Preservice Elementary Teachers' Perceptions After Visiting An Interactive Science Center, David H. Palmer

Networks: An Online Journal for Teacher Research

This paper reports an action research study involving preservice elementary teachers enrolled in a college science methods course (ie. the course focussed on how to teach science at elementary school). There was an interactive science center nearby which many local elementary classes regularly visited, so I decided to set my students the task of visiting the center and reporting on it. However, I was unsure as to what outcomes the students would gain from the experience. I therefore asked the students to each write a short passage explaining what they had learnt from the experience. According to their responses, the …

"You Don't Need To Time It, You Just Need To See It": Racing In Children's Science, Richard Frazier

Networks: An Online Journal for Teacher Research

The work I present here arose from a number of biases, several of which are described [in the introduction]. Prominent among the biases is extensive experience of teaching science with an averred emphasis on activity and inquiry. Along with the perspective of practitioner is the belief that children's ideas in science are worthy of scrutiny. Fascination with the research into children's conceptions and practices was tempered, however, by puzzlement over the actions teachers ought to take. Reflections on the gap between children's science and standard science came while straddling the gap between my perspective as a teacher of children and …

Teacher Research: Learning To Listen, Jennifer Moore

Networks: An Online Journal for Teacher Research

When friends from out of town visit, I often take them jogging around my hometown. I have routes I have run hundreds of times; they are so familiar, I run as if on automatic pilot. I seem to forget, though, that my guest has no idea that this is where I turn left, and that is the place where I cross the street to run on the other side. On more than one occasion, I have nudged a friend off the sidewalk or run right into them in my single-minded routine. I forget to ask questions, to explain, to direct, …

Four Criteria For Engaging Girls In The Middle Level Classroom, Gayle A. Buck, Nancy Ehlers

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

Authenticity, choice, conceptual understanding, and motivation all play a role in engaging middle level learners. This article shows how these criteria apply to designing lessons for girls.

Listening to young adolescent girls has greatly altered my ideas of what it means to teach at the middle level. Using the ideas and attitudes that these girls bring with them to the science classroom, I now select what happens in that classroom. Others are encouraged to use this rubric to select activities as they attempt to engage the adolescent girls in the middle level curriculum. No longer looking upon girls to see …

Special Education In Maine: Attaining Equity Through Program And Finance Reform, Walter J. Harris, Pushpan Jain

Maine Education Policy Research Institute

No abstract provided.

Teaching Economics In United States History: One Teacher Shares Some Lessons, Kathleen S. Bullock

Critical and Creative Thinking Capstones Collection

This paper addresses the value and benefits of teaching economics in U.S. History at the high school level. Some of the challenges it presents such as curriculum style, teacher qualifications, assessment and accountability, pacing, and developing thinking skills for a theory-based course are discussed. I also offer activities with accompanying worksheets and graphic organizers that may assist teachers in meeting these challenges. The activities include tariffs, a run on the bank, monopolies, and recessions as an introduction to basic economic principles that are important in teaching U.S. History. A set of graphic organizers on The Civil War demonstrates how economics …

Increasing Social Relationships Among Kindergartners Using Peer Reporting, Christine A. Gruenler

Theses and Dissertations

This study focused on increasing the social relationships of kindergarten students using peer reporting. This method encouraged children to use social skills on the playground. In addition, the students were encouraged to report the observed use of social skills to be recognized by their classmates. The subjects of the study included an experimental group of 20 kindergarten students and a control group of 21 kindergarten students, both located in an elementary school in a rural area of southern New Jersey. Social relationships were measured by the number of tattle tales on the playground, whereas tattletaling indicated that there were diminished …

The Effects Of Grouping In Social Studies On The Enjoyment, Motivation, And Successful Learning When Reading Informative Texts, Pamela D. Pitt

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of the study was to determine whether grouping when reading informative texts during social studies lessons gave students enjoyment and motivation, which, in turn, would provide more success in learning for the students. It explored a method that is not whole class instruction, but is sometimes used in the classroom. The researcher of this study did not attempt to determine which method is better to use during social studies instruction, but rather how students perceive reading informative texts in social studies after being exposed to peer-assisted group instruction. The forty-eight participants of the study were taken from two …

Effect Of Whole Language Instruction In Reading Comprehension Scores Of First Grade Students, Jeffrey A. Shone

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine whether any significant difference in the reading comprehension scores of first grade students utilizing a whole language method of instruction as opposed to phonics-based method of instruction existed. An experimental and control group of first grade students, with 20 children in each group, were administered the Silver Burdett Ginn Reading Comprehension test. Both groups were pre-tested to ascertain their level of reading comprehension before a treatment was administered. Next, the experimental group received the whole language method of reading instruction. Through repeated readings, students were exposed to reading and phonics at the …

The Effects Of Character Education On Fourth Grade Students' Attitudes Toward In-School Behavior, Jenna S. Snyder

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to show that students would benefit from learning about character education in a classroom setting. This study used scores from a pre-test and post-test which was designed with character development scenarios taken by fourth grade students in a rural elementary school after they participated in a character education unit.

Eighteen (n = 18) participated in this quasi-experimental study. The results were analyzed to find the significance of the relationship between the students' scores on the pre-test and post-test. The Sign test indicated there was no significant change between the scores on the pre-test and …

An Integration Of Chemistry, Biology, And Physics: The Interdisciplinary Laboratory, Gerald R. Van Hecke, Kerry K. Karukstis, Richard C. Haskell, Catherine S. Mcfadden, F Sheldon Wettack

All HMC Faculty Publications and Research

As a new venture to integrate research and education, a pilot section of a first-year laboratory sequence known as the Interdisciplinary Laboratory (ID Lab) was introduced on the Harvey Mudd campus during the 1999–2000 academic year and continues to be offered. The ID Lab attempts to bridge laboratory experiences from biology, chemistry, and physics for the first-year student. Taught by a team of faculty from these disciplines, the course seeks both to illustrate commonality of investigative methods and laboratory techniques in these sciences and to introduce discipline-specific principles. Experiments with a chemistry component include the Molecular Weight of Macromolecules, the …

Lessons Learned From The "It Takes A Valley" Program: Recruitng And Retaining Future Teachers To Serve High-Needs Schools, Amy Strage, Susan Meyers, Janet Norris

Faculty Publications

“It Takes a Valley” is a teacher preparation program that aims to recruit and retain teachers in schools that serve students from low socioeconomic backgrounds. This program provides future teachers with extensive early teaching experience and chances to develop strategies for success in this type of educational context. The theoretical basis for this program's approach is examined, some key aspects of the program are considered, the initial evaluation of the program and the lessons learned to date are explored, the challenges and growing pains encountered by the program are examined, and the implications of the program for teacher education are …