Education Commons^™

Determining Faculty Capacity For Transdisciplinary Instruction, Dominic Swayne

Dissertations, 2020-current

The purpose of this study was to develop a reliable and valid survey instrument that would prove useful in identifying faculty with the capacity and inclination to succeed in team-taught, hands-on, transdisciplinary course programming. Using an exploratory, mixed-methods design, the qualitative component consisted of semi-structured interviews of nine experienced X-Labs faculty. The qualitative analysis process identified attributes that were vital to transdisciplinary teaching and demonstrated patterns that were consistent with complex leadership development. During the mixing process, these data were translated into a quantitative instrument. A panel of experts reviewed the prototype instrument and reduced the number of items included …

Assessing Perceptions Of Group Work Using Team-Based Learning, Lauren Ferry, Phillip J. Wong, Kathryn Hogan

James Madison Undergraduate Research Journal (JMURJ)

Group work is frequently incorporated into courses; however, student perceptions of their experiences and the benefits of group work might differ based on the structure of course. In this study, we examined student perceptions of group work in a team-based learning (TBL) course. Undergraduate students completed pre- and post-surveys on their team work experiences over a semester. Students had lower agreement with the statement “working in groups usually ends up with one person doing all of the work” and higher agreement with “working in a group makes me feel as though I am part of a learning community” at post-test. …

A Pilot Study On The Impact Of Teaching Assistant Led Cs1 Study Sessions Using Peer Instruction, Megan E. Gilbert

Senior Honors Projects, 2020-current

James Madison University’s Computer Science program strives to be a student-centered learning environment with a focus on creating a community for undergraduate success. National data reveals computer science has the lowest student retention rate compared to other STEM majors. The National Center for Women and Information Technology (NCWIT) has compiled a list of ways to retain students in Computer Science. In particular, NCWIT calls for collaboration indicate that “a sense of belonging, or a feeling of fit, is important for supporting student interest and persistence.” One aspect of creating community is the department’s longstanding commitment to provide undergraduate teaching assistants …

Threshold Concepts And Transfer: A Curriculum Mapping Tool For First-Year Writing, Kerry Smith

Masters Theses, 2020-current

Writing scholars Adler-Kassner and Wardle, Beaufort, and Devet have placed pragmatic learning goals of transfer at the core of education’s purpose. This thesis shares the assumption of pragmatic learning goals for education and examines these goals for transfer through Meyer and Land’s theory of threshold concepts in the context of first-year composition courses. Covering Meyer and Land’s foundational work on threshold concepts and Thorndike and Woodworth’s groundbreaking research that later informed Perkins and Salomon’s work in transfer, this thesis aims to contextualize this literature within and operationalize it for first-year writing programs’ curriculum course design through the creation and testing …

Rise And Shine: A Comparison Of Item Fit Statistics For The Rasch Model, Glenn T. Waterbury

Dissertations, 2020-current

The Rasch model implies that the relation between examinee ability and the probability of correctly answering an item can be defined solely by a small set of parameters. In the case of Rasch modeling, there are only two parameters: the ability of an examinee and the difficulty of an item. When the data meet the requirements of the Rasch model, it possesses several appealing properties that distinguish it from Classical Test Theory and more complex Item Response Theory models.

However, the desirable properties of the Rasch model only exist when the data meet its strict requirements. Therefore, it is vital …