Education Commons^™

Course Design For Quality Online Education: Effective Strategies From The Viewpoint Of Undergraduate Teaching Assistants, Cassady E. Healy, Jackson D. Stayner, Jafra Thomas

Kinesiology and Public Health

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic forced colleges and universities to suddenly transition to a mostly-to-fully online teaching format. Given the nature of the transition and general reservations about online instruction, many were concerned educational quality and achievement would be compromised by large margins. We sought to determine what course design features, if any, helped support undergraduate educational achievement during a sudden transition to 100% online instruction. We addressed our research aim using adapted principles for reflexive thematic analysis, the discernment of ways to interpret data using diverse perspectives and the critique of assumptions (RWJ Foundation, 2008). Following instructor request (JDT), …

The Impact Of Faculty Growth Mindset On Student Mindset And Learning Engagement, Emma G. Cartisano

HIED Student Scholarship

Growth mindset is the belief that general intellectual ability is malleable and can be developed. This thesis describes the presence and cultivation of growth mindset in the academic experiences of six undergraduate students in the social sciences at a medium-sized, liberal arts and sciences college. Individual interviews were analyzed using narrative inquiry to explore the impact of instructor philosophy and pedagogy on student mindset and learning engagement. Research findings highlight that instructor embodiment of growth mindset, including relationality, modeling, and constructive delivery of feedback, as well as assignment design, were instrumental. Participants did not share a common definition of growth …

Dis/Ableist Consumption: A Critical Thematic Analysis Of Avowed And Ascribed Neuro-Identities In The Classroom, Shaundi C. Newbolt

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In the United States, faculty and students are publicly claiming neurodivergent identities and support for the neurodiversity movement. This study uses Collier and Hecht’s cultural identity theories with Lang and Chen’s two-step process, critical thematic analysis (CTA), to examine avowals and ascriptions with four diagnostic terms, ASD, ADHD, bipolar disorder, and dyslexia, of students and professors from Rate My Professors (RMP) with Ritter’s frame of RMP as a phenomenon.

A total of 1,022 posts are analyzed to understand how students resist or re-inscribe popular medical model/deficit discourse in the classroom: student avowals (N = 232), professor avowals (N = 51), …

Imaginative Empathies: Exploring The Role Of Creative Writing In Developing Social Skills Of College Students With Autism, Rebekkah N. Richner

MSU Graduate Theses

Only one-third of students with autism who are enrolled in American universities go on to graduate (Cox & Williams, 2018; Newman et al., 2011; Wei et al., 2014). These students may be currently underserved by the writing curriculum of postsecondary institutions when it comes to facilitating social and personal development in college and beyond. This thesis begins with the hypothesis that creative writing classes already utilize pedagogical tools that could aid students with autism in strengthening their social skills, particularly through the more structured social environment of the creative writing workshop. This study examined a 200-level short story creative writing …