Elementary Education Commons^™

Putting Educational Reform Into Practice: The Impact Of The No Child Left Behind Act On Students, Teachers, And Schools, Timothy Song

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis seeks to investigate the effects of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) on U.S. student achievement and teacher effectiveness. By combining the results from various data sources, I am able to indicate the levels of student preparedness, school spending, and specific classroom practices. After an analysis of my results, I suggest that NCLB has found moderate success in increasing the level of math preparedness for younger students from historically disadvantaged backgrounds. On the other hand, the data also suggests that there have been no statistically significant gains in reading achievement after the implementation of NCLB. Additionally, spending …

Latino Immigrant Family Involvement: Feelings Of Belongingness And Attachment In An Urban Elementary School, Christel Marie Hibbard Pond

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to explore the relationship between Latino immigrant family involvement and feelings of belongingness and attachment in relation to the school community. This study explored how Latino immigrant family voices described their feelings of belongingness and attachment by investigating the linkages between Latino immigrant family beliefs and social capital relating to school involvement and perceptions of belongingness. This study used theories of attachment and belongingness to understand the relationship between family feelings of belongingness, attachment, social capital, and family involvement in the school community. Findings of the study revealed that although Latino immigrant …

Family Literacy And Engagement: A Framework, Hannah Wells

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

The purpose of this project was to construct a framework for a family literacy program that would inform parents of Native English Speakers and English Learners on literacy practices and allow time for families to practice literacy together. The family literacy program consists of three sessions, each comprised of a 20-minute presentation to parents and a 30-minute parent-child literacy activity. Each session covered a different topic: early literacy practices, technology and literacy, and advocating for student success. The program was implemented in an adult literacy center, where parents who attended classes at the center and parents in the …

Using American Sign Language To Support Sight Word Acquisition In English Learners, Kaitlin A. Woodrow, Susan Keesey, Christina Noel

Kentucky Teacher Education Journal: The Journal of the Teacher Education Division of the Kentucky Council for Exceptional Children

English Learners constitute a growing, and important, portion of our school communities, yet the research base regarding evidence-based practices to support effective instruction for English Learners is minimal, especially for those with disabilities. American Sign Language has effectively supplemented curriculum for different student populations, but there has been little research on how sign language can be used to teach English Learners. Sight word acquisition is often a challenge for English Learners so this alternating treatment, single subject research design explored if adding American Sign Language to sight word instruction of first grade English Learners would increase learning of sight words …

P.S. 25, South Bronx: Bilingual Education And Community Control, Laura J. Kaplan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Through a methodology of oral history interviews with primary subjects and archival research, this dissertation explores the creation and evolution of P.S. 25, The Bilingual School, the first Spanish-English bilingual elementary school in New York City, as well as the entire Northeast. The Bilingual School, founded in 1968, was a product of the civil rights movement in the United States and one key manifestation of that movement in New York City, the struggle for community control of schools.

Latinos in general and Puerto Ricans in particular have been written out of the official narrative of the educational civil rights movement …

Friends With Benefits: Collaboration Between A State University And A School District Designed To Improve Teaching And Learning For Bilingual Students, Elizabeth A. Skinner, Pauline Williams

Journal of Multilingual Education Research

This article describes a long-term collaborative effort between a college of education and a public school district in Illinois. As both the district and the Bilingual-Bicultural Education Program at the university sought to improve the teaching and learning for emergent bilingual students, the relationship between the two institutions evolved. The result is a pipeline of teacher candidates, specifically prepared to work in the district’s dual language schools. The article describes the implementation of the federally funded program as well as the challenges encountered over the course of the collaboration.

Illegal; Dreamer; Home For Refugees, Ana Herrera

Journal of Multicultural Affairs

A collection of three poems focusing on the critical social issue of immigration in order to educate young children. Each poem consists of a different issue in the wide range of topics of immigration. The topics include: deportation of illegal immigrants, the DREAM Act, and homing refugees in the United States from countries of war.

Scholastic Liberation: Schools' Impact On African American Academic Achievement, Aaron M. Johnson

Language Arts Journal of Michigan

This article addresses some of the factors that contribute to low achievement observed in African American students. It is common that either schools or school districts are unable to fix the problem or they are unaware about how the beliefs and attitudes about African American students can contribute to their low performance in school. Furthermore, this article encourages school institutions to examine themselves and change school environments to align to the identities of African American students. African American students must be liberated from negative assumptions about them and to do that, individuals and the institution of school as a whole, …

Effects Of An Elementary Immersion Program On Academic Achievement In Core Subject Areas, Marlee Schmidt

Dissertations, Theses, and Projects

This study sought to find out if students who became bilingual score

higher, lower, or the same on standardized tests as their monolingual peers across

multiple disciplines. An answer was obtained by comparing the Minnesota

Comprehensive Assessment scores of Spanish language immersion students to

scores of non-immersion students for the following subject areas: reading in

grades 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 10; math in grades 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 11; and science

in 5, 8, and high school. The scores used came from a graduating class of 2018

with approximately 342 students. Data was analyzed …

A Sentence Construction Intervention For Elementary-Aged Spanish-Speaking Language-Minority Students With Writing Difficulties, Tim Andress

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The present replication study used a multiple probe across participant single-case experimental design to measure the effect of a sentence construction intervention on Spanish-speaking language-minority students with writing difficulties. Participants were two males and one female, aged eight to ten. Dependent variables tracked were frequency of correct word sequences, incorrect word sequences, complete sentences, and incomplete sentences written in one-minute sentence construction probes. A pre-and post-test five-minute paragraph probe served as a secondary measure to determine whether sentence-level instruction improved paragraph-level writing. Results were an increase in frequency of correct word sequence and complete sentences for all participants, as well …

Mexican American Parents Of Elementary Students And Literacy Engagement: A Case Study Of A Bilingual (Spanish/English) Parent Book Club Using Children's Literature, Pablo Ochoa

Dissertations

This qualitative case study explored what occurred when seven Latinx parents and a bilingual coordinator engaged in a book club using the same historical fiction text as the school's fifth grade classroom. Research questions focused on Book Club participation, connections to the focal text(s), and new learning. Data included audiotapes of the sessions, parent written/artistic artifacts, participant interviews, retrospective field notes, and reflective journal entries.

Study findings suggest that positive partnerships between schools and parents can occur within familial text engagement opportunities built on existing relationships with school personnel; use of relevant literature, literacy activities that allow for parent choice …

Poverty And Empowerment Discourse In Utah Dual Immersion Classrooms, Lauren Johnson

Undergraduate Honors Theses

This paper considers the discourse, or communication, that occurs in dual immersion programs in Utah. I take a sociocultural perspective to address the question of whether and how these programs are meeting the unique needs of the students enrolled in them. I consider two tasks frequently viewed in five consecutive days of filming: mirroring/repeated phrases and partner talk. Findings suggest that although they have promise, they often do not meet the intended aims of comprehension and language development. The findings also show that these tasks do little to empower participants. The conclusions and implications suggest that commonly accepted tasks in …

Best Practices For The Development Of English Language In Rural Elementary Schools In Prevention Of Long Term English Learners, Heather Christine Gomez

Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to describe the best practices of English language development programs in rural South San Joaquin Valley elementary schools in the targeted areas of reading, writing, listening and speaking and best practices in teacher professional development to prevent Long Term English Learners from the perspective of principals. An additional purpose was to identify and describe obstacles to the implementation of best practices of English language development in rural South San Joaquin Valley elementary schools from the perspective of principals.

Methodology: Through data analysis, rural elementary schools in South San Joaquin Valley were identified …

Mandarin Chinese Tone Identification Training: Developing Materials For Second And Third Grade Classes In Mandarin Chinese Immersion Programs, Xiaoyi Zhang

Master's Projects and Capstones

Among all the different perspectives of Mandarin teaching, Mandarin tone teaching and practicing has been largely ignored. The lack of attention and materials for Mandarin tone teaching is why many students speak, read and listen without the correct tone pronunciation, which leads to a lot of misunderstanding. This field project is a curriculum of Mandarin tone teaching. This project is for second grade and third grade teachers who teach Mandarin Chinese as a foreign language in immersion programs in the Bay Area. This curriculum will enable students to speak and read Mandarin with correct tone pronunciation and distinguish different tones …

“Yo Soy Su Mama”: Latinx Mothers Raising Emergent Bilinguals Labeled As Dis/Abled, Maria Cioe Peña

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Parental involvement in the United States has been identified in both academic and mainstream literature as a defining marker in academic achievement. Yet most of the literature regarding parents and schools are written about them without including their voice or their stories. Through the use of ethnographic case studies, this dissertation presents the experiences of immigrant, monolingual Spanish-speaking Latinx women raising emergent bilingual children who are labeled as dis/abled. This research is guided by an intersectional framework and the following questions:

1. What are the mothering experiences of Spanish-speaking Latinx mothers of emergent bilingual children labeled dis/abled?

2. What values, …

Musicking And Literacy Connections In The Third Space: Leveraging The Strengths Of A Latinx Immigrant Community, Angelica Ortega

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The music-making classroom is a space were students enact their multi-literacies. This space is especially important for Latinx bilingual students who are often labeled as struggling in school. In the music-making classroom, students reinvent their identities as integral members of a learning community, are accepted as leaders by their peers and are seen as literate in their music making practices. This habitus of success can have a durable, generative and transposable impact on the identity formation for the bilingual student that goes beyond the music classroom. This occurs because the music–making classroom acts as a third space both cognitively and …

The Heart Of K'É: Transforming Diné Special Education And Unsettling The Colonial Logics Of Disability, Sandra Yellowhorse

American Studies ETDs

This paper takes up the roles of ideology and spatiality as they impact Diné students and learners in understanding conceptions of normativity, neuro-diversity and bodily variance. I am concerned with how the movement and creation of Indigenous schools and their praxis still maintain and often times produce settler colonial ideologies of being, personhood, difference and ability. I illustrate the challenges that Diné planners and educators face in entrenching cultural knowledge and language into their educational initiatives, while some of the problematic manifestations and expressions of normativity present themselves through state polices, federal law and mainstream curriculum.

I focus on the …

Linguistic Interactions Of Spanish Speaking Mexican American Families, Adelfio J. Garcia

Dissertations

This study explored the bilingual linguistic interactions in Mexican families and their impact on children’s language and literacy development. This qualitative study gathered data using different methods, namely, interviews, direct observations, participant observation, and physical artifacts to examine parents’ perceptions of their own educational path in comparison to their children’s educational path in an American school system, together with their daily linguistic interactions in various social contexts, and the features, themes and roles of linguistic interactions participants. Study results assisted in gaining deeper understanding of daily conversations happening in different social contexts and their impact on the language and literacy …

Immigrants And Educational Institutions: Family And Student Perspectives Toward School And Education, Paul Naso, Kimberly Joyce-Bernard, Marcelo Juica, Frank Rothwell

Lesley University Community of Scholars Day

The purpose of this session is to bring together insights from three research studies (one completed and two ongoing) concerned with documenting the experiences of immigrant populations as they interact with U.S. educational institutions. The session is an opportunity to consider the common and distinct aspects of three qualitative research studies: an inquiry into native Spanish-speaking parents’ experiences regarding their children education; a narrative analysis of Francophone African-born adult family members’ accounts of their children’s language and literacy development at home and in early childhood programs; and a study to identify the obstacles and challenges of undocumented students enrolled in …

Privileged Leadership: Teaching English Learners With Fixed Mindsets, Alexandra Lituchy

Lesley University Community of Scholars Day

Research was conducted over a hundred hours at a nearby public school to observe the growth or fixed mindset language of English learners as compared to native English speakers in the second grade. Observations were also made of the English learner’s teacher’s mindset language. Existing research proves that any student with a fixed mindset have poorer academic performances. Yet, very little research has been done on if the same is true for English learners specifically. Based on the research conducted, English learners are more likely to use fixed mindset language than native English speakers. English learners also demonstrate a fixed …

Perspectives And Expectations Of Native Spanish-Speaking Parents About Their Children's Education In An American Elementary School, Franklin D. Rothwell Ii

Educational Studies Dissertations

This qualitative study inquired about the perceptions of Spanish-speaking immigrant parents about their children's experiences in a Massachusetts elementary school, the expectations they have for their children's education, and their understanding of their role with regards to their children's education. The phenomenological design and analysis concentrated on parents' lived experience as they and their families interacted with the school. Thirty-eight parents of English learners participated in answering a questionnaire and ten were later interviewed. Findings reveal that parents of English learners face obstacles in understanding American schooling and often rely on information from others and comparisons with their own previous …

Identifying And Addressing The Educational Needs Of Primary Elementary Latino Males, Sandra Vilas

Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this qualitative study is to understand and describe the strategies and practices that exemplary teachers use to address the educational needs of Latino male students from kindergarten through third grade.

Methodology: The researcher selected a qualitative research design to describe and understand the instructional strategies and practices used by district Teachers of the Year from 2011 - 2016 in three counties in Southern California. Through in-depth semi-structured open-ended interviews, the researcher provided a detailed examination of the instructional practices and strategies exemplary primary teachers use to address the educational needs of primary Latino males. The district …

The Use Of Response To Intervention With English Learners, Anna Burnley

ECTESOL Review

RTIs assist teachers in adjusting instruction to support ELs in acquiring English and content-area knowledge and learning behaviors. The use of RTIs with ELs can supplement support for ELs as an integrated concept of the sheltered instruction (SI) commonly provided for this student population.

Connecting North And South: Engaging Latin American English Learners, Kenyan Intercultural Communications And American Undergraduate Students Through Reciprocal Service Learning, Laureen Fregeau, Ukaiko A. Bitrus-Ojiambo, Suhana Chikatla, William Cornejo

ECTESOL Review

Reciprocal Service Learning through videoconferencing is an efficient tool for connecting native English speakers of various world Englishes and ELs in other nations for the benefit of all. The authors of this study recognize the reciprocal nature of teaching and learning and the social justice of equalizing power structures through the inclusion of participants and researchers from both North and South as members of a project and research team. Through participant observation and document review the authors examine the experiences of educators and learners in the phenomenon of reciprocal service learning through videoconferencing focused on cultural competence and English language …

From The Editor, Laureen Fregeau

ECTESOL Review

No abstract provided.

Employing Word Study With Spanish-Speaking Els, Timothy Rodriquez

ECTESOL Review

Phonics Instruction has had a controversial history. How to teach phonics to Spanish-speaking ELs is also controversial. Understanding the differences between Spanish and English and how phonics instruction occurs in each language would be insightful. Also, knowing how the nature of the two languages affects instruction would be beneficial. Furthermore, exploiting similarities between English and Spanish and examining differences will bolster instruction. This paper will discuss the reasons for word study and how it may be utilized to teach spelling and decoding to Spanish-speaking ELLs.

Context-Focused Grammar Teaching: A Comparison Between English Present Perfect And Past Tenses And Affects On Korean English Learning, Seungheui (Ellie) Lee

ECTESOL Review

Despite massive amounts of time Korean English Learners (KLL) study English grammar, they continue to have problems becoming proficient in verb tenses, especially the present perfect. This study examines this problem through a linguistic comparative analysis of Korean and English present perfect and past tenses. Two possible reasons for KLL difficulty with verb tenses could be mode of instruction and L1 interference.

Not “One China,” Not “One Culture”: Multicultural Exploration Of Differences And Similarities Between Mainland China And Taiwan, Philip J. Ward, Michelle Loo

ECTESOL Review

This study focuses on the outwardly similar cultures of Taiwan and mainland China and the subtle differences within them. The study was conducted as part of the requirements of doctoral program in Instructional Design and Development at a public university in the southeastern United States. Using a qualitative case study approach, the study demonstrates that there are cultural similarities between mainland China and Taiwan, however instructors should also be aware of the differences when developing relationships with students and developing course content. A mini-workshop was developed for the study to help teach instructors about the two cultures. However, the mini-workshop …

Teaching Global Literature To “Disturb The Waters”: A Case Study, Kelly K. Wissman

Literacy Teaching & Learning Faculty Scholarship

Within this qualitative case study, I describe how a fifth-grade teacher in an affluent and culturally homogenous school attempted to “disturb the waters” through teaching global literature. Framed by transactional theories of response and critical language awareness, I identify three central pedagogical moves that supported disruptions of students’ assumptions and beliefs: (1) inviting students to share their aesthetic transactions, (2) privileging multiple perspectives and genres, and (3) calling attention to language choices as a central line of inquiry. I argue that both transactional and critical approaches to literacy and language are necessary in order to move students beyond disinterested and …

Language Ideologies And Epistemic Exclusion, Lydiah Kananu Kiramba

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

Research in educational linguistics is now challenging the efficacy of monolingual approaches that often dominate educational practices in multilingual settings. In most African nations where multilingualism is the norm, there remains a persistent reluctance by educational stakeholders (principals, teachers, parents, and students) to embrace multilingualism in education or to reposition local languages as resources in classrooms. This article draws on qualitative data from a multilingual, rural, fourth-grade classroom in Kenya to interrogate the articulated ideologies and their effects on communicative practices as voiced by the participants and by observing actual classroom practices. Bourdieu’s notions of habitus, legitimate language, and symbolic …