Education Commons^™

A Study Of Grade Level And Gender Differences In Divergent Thinking Among 8th And 11th Graders In A Mid-Western School District., Leah Christine Roue

Dissertations

No abstract provided.

The Effect Of Repeated Reading With Pairs Of Students In A Large-Group Setting On Fluency And Comprehension For Students At Risk For Reading Failure, John N. Frame

Dissertations

Problem. Some students are failing to develop acceptable reading skills; however, instructional time allocated to reading fluency can increase reading comprehension. The purpose of this study was to compare students who received repeated reading with pairs of students in a large-group setting with those who did not in terms of reading fluency, rates of reading fluency growth, and reading comprehension for students at risk for reading failure in a school in a Midwestern mid-sized city.

Method. An experimental pretest-posttest with control group design was used with grade level stratified (2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade) intervention (N = 27) and …

A Grounded-Theory Study Of The Teaching Methods Of Jesus : An Emergent Instructional Mode, Liv Fønnebø

Dissertations

Problem. While models of teaching and teaching methods have manifested themselves in the wake of most major world philosophies and thus are accessible to present-day educators, a defined model of teaching based on the Christian worldview is harder to find. This is strange, given the fact that the person who, by definition, stands as close to the Christian worldview as one can possibly get, Jesus Christ has the reputation of being one of the greatest teachers ever. Institutions that offer an education aligned with the Christian worldview should be the ones showing greatest interest in a model of teaching derived …

Instructors' Perceptions Of The Bologna Model Of Higher Education Reform In Cameroon, Zachary Y. Mngo

Dissertations

Problem Statement. The literature on education in Cameroon suggests that there is a deep-rooted history of resistance to educational reform and harmonization both at the K12 and higher education levels. Attempts by political and educational leaders to reform and harmonize the two very distinct systems of education, inherited from former colonizers (France/Britain), have failed in the past because of failure by policy makers to take care of the socio-cultural, professional, and academic demands of educational stakeholders—faculty, students, parents, and educational leaders. At the center of resistance has been the fear by Francophone and Anglophone students and faculty that their …

Exploring Teacher Attitudes, Experiences, And Beliefs Of The Development And Implementation Of Faculty Data Teams (Tm) In A Midwestern School District, Bradley William Sheppard

Dissertations

Purpose. The purpose of this study was to describe the development and implementation of Data Teams™ in a Midwestern school district and to explore what influenced teachers to become effective team members. It analyzed the product and process of creating Data Teams™ who competently used data to make academic standards work by identifying power standards, analyzing data, setting goals, implementing research-based effective teaching strategies, and assessing student performance and adult behaviors that had a direct impact on student achievement.

Method. A qualitative case study design was used for this investigation as it explored the narratives of 10 elementary teachers on …

Teachers And Their Struggle With Personal Satisfaction As Young Mothers, Katherine Homer

Dissertations

The purpose of the study was to explore how the day-to-day experiences of teachers who are working mothers of young children shape their level of comfort and satisfaction with the dual role they live. This investigation also explored the dynamics of teacher retention by understanding the dilemmas female teachers with young families encounter. There is limited literature on working mothers who are high school teachers. There are many different issues this study examined to gain a better understanding of the complexities of the lives of women who are high school teachers while raising young children.

This study consisted of six …

Daily Practices Elementary Principals Utilize To Increase Student Readingachievement: A Case Study Of Successful Michigan Elementary Schools, Susan L. Johnson

Dissertations

This case study examined three K-5 schools, one 3-5 school, and two K-2 Analysis of the data provided six dominant themes related to the research questions: Behavior/Positive Behavior Support, Visibility, Professional Development, Team/Distributed Leadership, Data, and Deliberate/Focused. The dominant themes were cross tabbed with the theoretical frameworks from Marzano et al. (2005) and Fullan (2008a). Connections were made to both Marzano et al.'s Seven Responsibilities of the School Leader for Second-order Change and 21 Responsibilities of the School Leader as well as to four of Fullan's Six Secrets of Change. This study supports previous research and adds to the literature …

Differentiated Instruction In The Secondary Classroom: Analysis Of The Level Of Implementation And Factors That Influence Practice, Duane Kiley

Dissertations

Differentiated instruction is designing and implementing instruction to meet the needs of every student. Differentiated classrooms adjust to individual student’s needs through a combination of practices proven effective in teaching at the student’s point of learning acquisition.

The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which secondary teachers differentiate instruction and whether selected independent variables influence teachers’ use of differentiated instruction. Academic teachers were surveyed to determine the extent to which they utilized differentiated instructional strategies. Focus group meetings were conducted to delve deeper into understanding the information received from the teacher survey. Statistical analysis of the …

Teaching Reading In The Secondary Content Area Classroom:Teacher Attitudes And Predictors, Sara L. Norton-Ejnik

Dissertations

Strategic teaching of reading occurs at the elementary level, and students are expected to "read to learn" once they enter high school. The majority of the nation's secondary students do not have all the requisite skills to read and learn from high school texts and materials, and even drop-out rates have been attributed to students' inability to keep pace with the literacy skills demanded by the secondary curriculum. No Child Left Behind legislation now mandates secondary school reading initiatives, from high stakes testing to remediation. Despite the national focus on secondary reading, teachers in America's secondary schools are not teaching …

A Qualitative Study Of Instructional Strategies Used By Elementary General Education Teachers In Inclusive Classrooms, Kristen Peterson

Dissertations

It has become evident in recent years that it is not the placement in the general education classroom that makes the difference for the education of students with disabilities, but it is the instructional strategies used by general education teachers (King- Sears, 1997; Vaughn & Schumm, 1995; Zigmond, 2003; Zigmond & Baker, 1995). In the last two decades, considerable progress has been made in designing, implementing, and evaluating effective interventions for students with learning disabilities. Although the research on effective instruction is abundant, studies continue to reveal general education teachers minimally change their instruction when students with learning disabilities are …

African American Students’ Experiences, Achievement And Outcomes; Examined Through The Lenses Of Teacher Expectations, Racial Congruence And Stereotype Threat, Carla Postell

Dissertations

The phenomenological study examined the retrospective perceptions of academic experiences and outcomes of 13 African American full or part-time college students enrolled in either a community college or university located in an urban area. For the purpose of this study, educational experiences are defined as self-reported academic achievements and perceived success levels attained by participants during high school. Academic outcomes are the self-reported academic achievement and success level attained at their colleges and universities. The researcher interviewed participants, using a one-on-one interview process to conduct the interviews.

This study examined influences of race congruence between students and teachers. This topic …

Voices Of Parolees Who Have Chosen A Community College Element Within A Reentry Program, Kristi S. Potts

Dissertations

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to describe and understand how parolees experience participating in the community college element of a reentry program. This program was located in a Midwestern county and the parolees who chose to participate in the higher education aspect of this reentry program were a small subset of those who participated in the overall reentry program. Research questions included: What influences a parolees' decision to enroll in the community college element within a reentry program? How do such parolees describe their experiences as a student in a community college? How do such parolees describe the …

Stability Of Popular R-Cbm Progress Monitoring Tools: Dibels® Next And Aimsweb®, Christine Russell

Dissertations

Currently there is no agreed-upon method for determining the difficulty level, referred to as the readability level, of Reading Curriculum-Based Measurement (R-CBM) passages. A key tenant of R-CBM is that the passages across each grade level are equivalent in difficulty level and therefore can be used to monitor student academic improvement. The primary objective in this study was to evaluate the homogeneity of oral reading fluency progress monitoring passages of two popular passage sets that are used frequently in schools. The purpose of this research was to examine the stability of each R-CBM progress monitoring passage set as well as …

Evaluating The Use Of A Self-Advocacy Strategy As A Means Of Improving Progress In The General Curriculum For Individuals With Cognitive Disabilities, Amy L. Schelling

Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to evaluate if the use of a self-advocacy strategy, with high school students identified as having a mild cognitive disability, would increase student use of self-advocacy skills across multiple school settings. Participants in the study were also identified as participating in at least one general education class at the time the study was conducted.

A multiple baseline across participants and across settings design was applied to determine the effects of instruction on students' use of a self-advocacy strategy before and after the instructional period and across settings. Use and generalization of a self-advocacy strategy …

Highly Qualified Public School Teacher: Its Status, Distribution, Determinants, And Relationship With Job Commitment And Job Satisfaction, Samuel Striker

Dissertations

Highly qualified teacher (HQT) has been promoted as a policy instrument to improve our public education. In this study, I investigated the quality of public school teachers by examining the distribution pattern of highly qualified teachers across school level, urbanicity, minority student population, and core academic fields. I also investigated what teacher characteristics (age, gender, ethnicity, total years of teaching, certification, bachelor's degree in mathematics and sciences vs. in other areas, teaching level) predict highly qualified teacher status after controlling for school characteristics (% of minority students, % of free and reduced-price lunch, school size, and school location). Finally, I …

Understanding The Career Paths And Experiences Of Division I-A Athletic Directors: A Phenomenological Study, Harold Thomas Swift

Dissertations

The focus of this study was to understand the career paths and experiences of Division I-A Athletic Directors. There are only 120 of these coveted positions in the country. The limited research on how to obtain this position led to this investigation.

This research examined the career paths of 10 Division I-A ADs male (five African American and five White) and their experiences reaching their position. A qualitative phenomenological approach was used as the methodology. One-on-one phone interviews were conducted using open-ended interview questions that elicited information from each participant. The Social Cognitive Career Theory and Critical Race Theory were …

Reading, Writing, And Repetition: Performance On Nonword Measures Bystudents With And Without Language-Learning Disabilities, Patricia J. Tattersall

Dissertations

The central purpose of this three-paper dissertation was to explore the ability of school-age children with and without language-learning disabilities (LLD) to apply sound/word level structure knowledge when performing speaking, spelling, and reading tasks. Data came from a larger investigation that used stratified sampling to create two ability groups—children with typical language (TL) and with LLD—comparable in terms of age (range 6 through 18 years), sex, race/ethnicity, and socioeconomic status.

The central purpose of this three-paper dissertation was to explore the ability of school-age children with and without language-learning disabilities (LLD) to apply sound/word level structure knowledge when performing speaking, …

The Impact Of Leadership Training On Collegiate Student Athletes, Jerry Bergsma

Dissertations

This research is an exploratory study of the impact of leadership training on the student-athletes at an NCAA Division III member institution. Leadership education and training for athletics has seen a lack of research that could give insight into identifying attributes and actions that are associated with high-quality leadership training experiences. The purpose of this study is to identify the: (a) quality and outcomes of the Gainey Leadership Retreat training program, and (b) the attributes and impact of the Gainey program using the lens of Eich's (2008) wounded theory of high-quality student leadership programs.

The study participants are 60 female …

The Impact Of The Head Start Parent Teacher Partnership On Home Based Mathematical Interventions Provided By Single Rural Head Start Mothers, Curtiss J. Babcock

Dissertations

Increased research in the area of early childhood education has expanded knowledge in the area of educating young children and improving school readiness. In Head Start, as well as other preschool programs, attention has recently focused on the pre-mathematics component of early education and school readiness.

The purpose of this study is to gain insight into the home-based mathematic activities and experiences single rural Head Start mothers use to provide math-related instruction to their children prior to Head Start entry. Also examined was the preschool teacher's influence on parent initiated in-home mathematics practices.

This study looked for relationships between the …

Bayesian Item Response Theory: Statistical Inference And Power Analysis, Jason W. Bodnar

Dissertations

The regulatory pharmaceutical approval process is flawed in that industry clinical trials (ICTs) are always powered for efficacy and rarely powered for safety. The key safety parameter is the adverse event (AE). This practice may result in efficacious products with confounded safety. An ICT’s ability to be powered for detecting AE trends may improve patient safety. Therefore, this dissertation’s purpose was to determine if power analysis resulted in feasible sample sizes for substantiating AE hypotheses. AEs were modeled with three Bayesian 2PL IRT models. The unidimensional latent trait, transfusion-related AE, was modeled as a patient predisposition for experiencing an AE. …

Children‘S Protagonism At The Centro Cultural Da Criança: A Case Study, Claudia Protasio Ceccon

Dissertations

This dissertation provides a thick description and discussion of how child protagonism, participation and autonomy were implemented in an out of school center – The Children‘s Cultural Center – in a favela, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The researcher visited the center for more than two years, twice a week from February 2008 to June 2009, and once a week from June 2009 to July 2010. She conducted in-depth interviews with educators and children, recorded observation sessions in the activity rooms, and observed actualization sessions for educators and family days. This study describes the perspectives and expectations of the Center‘s …

Death By Boredom: The Role Of Visual Processing Theory In Written Evaluation Communication, Stephanie D. H. Evergreen

Dissertations

Evaluation reporting is an educational act and, as such, should be communicated using principles that support cognition. This study drew upon visual processing theory and theory-based graphic design principles to develop the Evaluation Report Layout Checklist intended to guide report development and support cognition in the readers of evaluation reports. It was then reviewed by an expert panel and applied by a group of raters to a set of evaluation reports obtained from the Informal Science Education evaluation website with maximum variability sampling. Results showed fairly high exact percent agreement and strong to very strong correlation with the author’s ratings. …

Professional Learning Communities And First-Year Composition Instructors., Erinn Bentley

Dissertations

This study is situated within the field of writing teacher education and investigates the professional development of first-year composition instructors. The purpose of this study is to examine the flexibility of one K-12 teacher professionalization model, the professional learning community (PLC), for offering first-year composition instructors ongoing support and for promoting instructors' pedagogical content knowledge growth.

This study builds upon scholarship within the field of rhetoric and composition to examine current trends in training graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) who teach first-year composition courses (Dobrin, 2005; Latterell, 1996; Pytlik & Liggett, 2002; Tremmel & Broz, 2002; Yancey, 2002). Such research indicates …

Learning Organization Principles: The Impact On A Midwest State Government As Perceived By Its Employees, Rosalee Billingslea Rush

Dissertations

This study sought to determine the extent to which learning organization constructs influence performance in state government. The overarching purpose was to examine the relationship between Peter Senge’s five learning disciplines and organizational performance.

The study utilized an ex post facto survey design. The sample population was composed of supervisors and professional and administrative staff within the 19 agencies of a Midwestern state government. Participants were administered an instrument that asked them to rate their perception of the organization and its performance along seven dimensions of learning. Of the randomly selected 381 participants, 110 (or 28.9%) returned the survey instrument. …

The Relationship Between Caring School Community Program Implementation And Elementary School Attendance, Discipline, And Climate, Debra A. Kyle

Dissertations

This program evaluation of Caring School Community was conducted by two educators who studied the implementation of this character education program in an elementary school. In an effort to foster a culture of respect and kindness, where students, staff, and parents are treated as valued, contributing members of the school community, the school of study implemented a character education program called Caring School Community. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the success of the implementation of Caring School Community and its possible impact on student attendance, student discipline, and positive behavior referrals. The evaluation of this program involved …

Narratives Of Longevity From The Perspective Of Seventh-Day Adventist School Administrators In North America: A Multiple Case Study, Janet Ledesma

Dissertations

Problem. The average length of stay for school principals in the Seventh-day Adventist system of education in North America is 2.5-4.0 years. Elementary principals remain in leadership for 2.5 years, day academy principals stay for 3.6 years, and boarding academy principals stay for 4.0 years. Many studies have identified reasons why school principals leave their jobs. However, few studies have been conducted to understand why principals in the organization stay.

Purpose. The purpose of this study was to describe the experiences of principals who have remained in leadership in the Adventist system of education in North America longer than 10 …

The Relationship Between Community Service Involvement And Student Outcomes In Mexican Higher Learning Institutions, Raul Lozano

Dissertations

Problem. Although Mexican Seventh-day Adventist higher learning institutions involve their students in diverse forms of community service, it is not clear whether involvement in service-related projects in these institutions is producing the desired prosocial, spiritual, and personal development in the students.

Method. A mixed methods design combining qualitative and quantitative research approaches was carried out to understand the way community service is implemented in Mexican Adventist higher education and its impact on students. In the qualitative stage, three cases were studied in which 18 people from three Seventh-day Adventist universities in Mexico participated in interviews and focus groups. Data were …

A Descriptive Case Study Of The Perceptions And Use Of Adventist Edge : An Initiative Developed In Response To The North American Division Of Seventh-Day Adventists' Document, "Journey To Excellence", Pamela C. Forbes

Dissertations

Problem. The Southern Union started the Adventist EDGE initiative as an action plan in response to the North American Division's document, Journey to Excellence . The Adventist EDGE became a comprehensive educational reform initiative. However, there were different ideas on how the innovation should look when inaction in the schools, and these differences became obvious during the initial EDGE school validation visit, resulting in hurt feelings and confusion. Thus, the need for my study to clarify EDGE became critical for the survival of the initiative.

Purpose. The purpose of my study was to develop two operational definitions or …

Factores Predictores De La Satisfaccion Laboral En Los Docentes De Las Instituciones Educativas De La Apc-Sur, Luis Barba Briceño

Dissertations

Problem. The present study explores the following research questions: Are the work environment, teacher supervision, teacher recognition, and a fair and equitable perception predictors of work satisfaction in secondary school teachers in the South Central Peru Conference during the 2009 school year?

Methodology. This study is exploratory, descriptive, correlational, and cross-sectional. The population sample in this study is comprised of 60 teachers from the South Central Peru Conference secondary schools in the Lima district. The unit of observation was the classroom teacher. A survey was used as the means for collecting information. The statistical software SPSS was used for data …