Education Commons^™

Faculty Integration Of Technology In Undergraduate Courses At Private Colleges And Universities, Evelyn G. Smith

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this quantitative research study was to investigate the integration of technology in undergraduate courses by faculty at private colleges and universities. Integration of technology is using technology as an instructional tool to improve teaching and learning (Clayton-Pedersen & O’Neill, 2005; Wilson & Hayes, 2000; Woodbridge, 2004). Chickering and Gamson’s (1987) 7 principles for good practice in undergraduate education provided the theoretical framework for this research. The researcher conducted a survey of full-time faculty at 21 private colleges and universities in Kentucky, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. The results of the study indicated that faculty use …

Media Literacy And The English As A Second Language Curriculum: A Curricular Critique And Dreams For The Future, Clara R. Madrenas

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis investigates whether or not the Ontario English as a Second Language/English Literacy Development (ESL/ELD) curriculum imparts the critical literacy skills necessary for students to deconstruct the multimedia messages with which the contemporary world is saturated, in order to function as informed, agentic citizens of Ontario society. Using foundations of cultural theory, radical critical pedagogy, and critical race theory, particularly the work of James Paul Gee, Henry A. Giroux, Paulo Freire and Michael Apple, this thesis explores the ways in which the current ESL/ELD curriculum can be found lacking due to its enforcement of the banking model of education, …

Problem-Solving Pedagogy: A Foundation For Restructuring, Updating, And Improving Undergraduate Theory And Musicianship Curricula, Michael T. Simonelli

Masters Theses

The goal of this thesis is to provide the ideological and practical foundation for an improved approach to undergraduate theory and musicianship pedagogy. I will discuss the structure of conventional theory programs and explore problems inherent to traditional curriculum design. Problem-solving pedagogy, an approach rooted in creative composition and improvisation, will be presented as a complement to traditional theory pedagogy. Balancing problem-solving pedagogy with a more traditional pedagogical approach will provide a practical foundation for improving undergraduate theory and musicianship curricula.

An Investigation Of Native And Non-Native Chinese Language Teachers And Their Pedagogical Advantages, Thomas Burns

Masters Theses

The motivation for this thesis stems from my own personal decade long struggle learning Mandarin Chinese. The inherent difficulty of mastering this intricate language too often will leave students feeling bewildered, confused, frustrated, and even hopeless. Having walked down this path myself, I was inspired me to investigate how the Chinese language educational landscape could be improved. What are its shortcomings? What are its strengths? How can the journeys of future Chinese language learners be made easier?

The research investigates the ongoing discussion of native and non-native speaking teachers. Teacher surveys, student surveys, student classwork, and classroom observations are utilized …

Tanzania Post-Colonial Educational System And Perspectives On Secondary Science Education, Pedagogy, And Curriculum: A Qualitative Study, Eugenia Lucas Wandela

College of Education Theses and Dissertations

The development of technology and innovation in any country depends on a strong investment in science education from the lower to the upper levels of education. In most of the Sub-Saharan African nations, science education curriculum and teaching still faces many issues and problems that are inhibiting the growth of technology and innovation in these nations. In order to address these issues, an interpretive qualitative study that aims to examine how Tanzanian secondary science educators perceive secondary science education was conducted in the summer of 2013. The purpose of this study is to investigate problems and educational issues that might …

The Journey Of Chinese Students From English 106 Maintstream Composition Courses To The Purdue Writing Lab: An Institutional Needs Analysis Of Chinese Students, Aylin Baris Atilgan

Open Access Dissertations

According to the Purdue University International Students and Scholars Enrollment & Statistical Report 10-year Enrollment Trends (2014), over the past ten years there has been an 85% growth in the number of international students matriculating at Purdue. As stated in the Purdue University Fall 2014 International Student and Scholar Enrollment & Statistical Report (2013), Purdue University now enrolls 9,080 international students representing 123 countries. This being the case, Purdue University is among the first five top institutions in the nation hosting international students (Open Doors Report-Institute of International Education, 2014). In recent years, Chinese students make up the largest international …

A Pedagogy Of Persistence: Access Through Arrangement In The Age Of New Media, Jennifer Kontny

Theses and Dissertations

Fostering access in our writing classrooms has been a centrally important goal in the field of rhetoric and composition since the social turn in the 1980s. As a means of creating classroom spaces that help students gain access to new identities and ways of being in the world, those in our discipline have long privileged pedagogies that focus on invention. This dissertation traces the work of those in diverse areas of the field in order to show our wide-spread favoring of invention (or creativity, discovery, and the "new"). Unfortunately, I argue that the attention we have paid to invention has …

Transitioning To Writing About Writing: A Consideration Of The Metawriting Teaching Approach At The University Of Arkansas, Katie Michelle Smith

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis uses case studies of six Teaching Assistants and Instructors to analyze the curricular and pedagogical shift from a writing-through-literature model to the Composition II course to a metawriting approach during the 2014 spring semester at the University of Arkansas. The administrative decision from the Program in Rhetoric and Composition to make this transition came in response to the 2007 article by Elizabeth Wardle and Douglas Downs in College Composition and Communication outlining a "Writing about Writing" approach to teaching composition.

A Comparison Of How Three Four-Year University Teacher Education Programs Prepare Pre-Service Teachers To Use Culturally Relevant Pedagogy, Yvette Lawary

Dissertations

While many pre-service teachers successfully passed the state licensure test, a large percentage of students from diverse school districts continue to score below average on their ending standardized state test. Instruction in Culturally Relevant Pedagogy (CRP) might diminish the discrepancy between student performance and teacher performance. The research question was: How do the three university teacher education programs prepare pre-service teachers to teach CRP? The purpose of this qualitative study was to compare three distinctive TEPs regarding how they prepare pre-service teachers to respond to the learning needs of culturally diverse student populations using CRP. Three distinct Midwest TEPs participated …

A Comparative Study Of The Practitioner's Role To Integrate Technology Within An Inquiry-Based Learning Environment, Ashley C. Mayor

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis considers alternative pedagogical approaches within which the integration of technology is applied, to determine if inquiry-based learning is an approach that can facilitate the integration process more effectively. The role of the practitioner was evaluated to determine beliefs, concerns, and perceptions of technology integration. Practitioners' use of an inquiry-based learning approach was gauged and compared with practitioners use of a more traditional approach. The level of technology integration was assessed and compared as subgroups according to their teaching practices. The study analyzed the responses of teachers' survey data, with intentions to draw conclusions about the optimal approach for …

The Writing Is The Wall: Expanding The Means Of Communication With Multimodal Approaches To Teaching Composition, Matthew Williams Schering

All Student Theses

As the paradigm of communication shifts into the digital realm, it seems only logical that instructors’ pedagogical approaches to teaching writing should shift as well. Though there is still much merit to teaching tradition approaches to composition, are there more modern methods that could be employed to teach communication in a contemporary setting? This thesis shall examine the role that new media can play in a multimodal composition course, as new media seems to be the most effective way to teach rhetorical communication skills in a modern setting. By looking at new media elements, such as podcasts, wikis, and images, …

Researching The Real: Transforming The Science Fair Through Relevant And Authentic Research, Rosemary Mcbryan Davidson

Dissertations

This teacher research study documents the processes used to help students in an all-female, religious-based high school create science fair projects that are personally meaningful, scientifically sophisticated and up-to date in terms of science content. One-hundred sixteen young women in an honors chemistry class were introduced by their teacher to the methods used by science journalists when researching and crafting articles. The students then integrated these strategies into their science fair research through collaborative classroom activities designed by their teacher. Data collected during the process included audio and video tapes of classroom activities, student interviews, process work, finished projects, email …

The People Who Do ‘This’ In Common: Book Clubs As ‘Everyday Activists’, Julie E. Tyler

Doctoral Dissertations

This study of the Books-N-Wine club in Knoxville, Tennessee participates in a growing body of research on reading communities. Since the 1980s, researchers have investigated book clubs as social-intellectual phenomena whose history dates back to eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Intersecting with the development of the public sphere and even fueling concrete social movements, book clubs comprise a “shadow tradition of literature.” Current research suggests that contemporary clubs continue to advance this “shadow tradition” and have the potential to teach and transform their constituencies. Several areas remain unexplored in research on book clubs, including the ways in which particular categories of …

Adult Literacy In Tennessee: An Analysis By Gender, Age, And Race, Amy R. Keesler

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate the state of adult literacy in Tennessee. The field of adult education underwent a transition as the testing procedure and the test changed to correlate with the induction of the Common Core standards in public schools. Adult students face many barriers to overcome to be successful. The research questions posed guided the analysis of demographic data on student who completed the GED prior to the changes.

Data were provided from the Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development database. The demographics and scores included those of adults who had passed the GED …

Teaching In The Shadow Of Sekou: Reflective Practice, Culturally Relevant And Student-Centered Pedagogy And The Research To Performance Method, Brian Gregory Lewis

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Teaching in the Shadow of Sekou: Reflective Practice, Culturally Relevant and Student-Centered Pedagogy and the Research to Performance Method

By

Brian Lewis

Adviser: Bethany Rogers

I seek to bring the literature of critical pedagogues, reflective practitioners in education and student-centered teachers to bear on a critical examination of my own teaching methods. I reflect on and analyze my past professional teaching and educational experiences, focusing primarily on utilizing Sekou Sundiata's Research to Performance Method to teach a course on Sekou Sundiata and the Black Arts Movement at the New School in New York City. Through my teacher self-study, I attempt …

Rwandan University Efl Teachers' Awareness And Attitudes Toward Clt And Their Classroom Practices, Gaudence Uwamahoro

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

This research investigates Rwandan English teachers' awareness of and attitudes toward CLT including their practices in their respective classrooms. Data were collected by means of an online questionnaire that was responded to by 16 practicing teachers. The results revealed that most participants believed that both form- and meaning-based pedagogy were important in the language classroom. The participants also reported that they practiced what they believed in their respective classrooms. With regard to CLT awareness, most of Rwandan university teachers who responded to the questionnaire confirmed that they had learned or heard about CLT, eleven teachers among thirteen who had known …

Evaluating Inquiry-Based Learning As A Means To Advance Individual Student Achievement, Cherilyn Gwen Ziemer

Theses and Dissertations

Although inquiry-based learning has been debated throughout the greater educational community and demonstrated with some effect in modern classrooms, little quantitative analysis has been performed to empirically validate sustained benefits. This quantitative study focused on whether inquiry-based pedagogy actually brought about sustained and measurable improved learning and higher levels of student engagement, satisfaction, and understanding. The present study employed classic stratified random sampling to form two sample groups. Sixth-grade student subjects in two middle school science classes completed a four step process: all students completed a 40-question objective pretest, students completed a unit of study in either an inquiry-based learning …

Four Preservice Teachers' Use Of Mathematical Knowledge During Lesson Planning And Instruction In The Field Experience, Margaret Swearingen

Doctoral Dissertations

The field experience of a teacher education program offers the opportunity for authentic practice in lesson planning and instruction for preservice teachers prior to their transition into their teaching career. However, preservice teachers often struggle applying their developing knowledge and skills because of the multifaceted nature of the field experience context. This complexity is particularly true in mathematics instruction since it includes simultaneously understanding mathematical concepts and mathematical procedure standards during instruction.

This study used mini-case studies to examine how four preservice teachers used their developing mathematical knowledge learned in the teacher education program while lesson planning and teaching within …

"My Gut Has To Feel It": A Participatory Action Research Study Of Community College Educators Navigating The Emotional Terrain Of Human Rights Education, Lindsay Padilla

Doctoral Dissertations

Informed by feminist theories of emotion and the concept of critical emotional praxis, this PAR study highlights the emotional terrain of four Northern California community college teachers who teach human rights. The following meta-question guided this research: "Given the role of emotions in challenging injustice, as well as in engaging in personal and societal change, what role do emotions play when teaching in a community college?" Data sources included journals, monthly meetings, final reflection narratives, and exit interviews, which were culled for emergent themes. The findings indicate that the co-researchers in this study experienced emotional ambivalence (the simultaneous experience of …