Teacher Education and Professional Development Commons^™

Disrupting The Dominant Narrative: Beginning English Teachers’ Use Of Young Adult Literature And Culturally Responsive Pedagogy., Elsie L. Olan, Kia Jane Richmond

Journal Articles

In this multiple case study that uses narrative research methodology, two beginning English teachers’ stories, their use of young adult literature, and their dialogic interactions with university mentors are examined through a lens of culturally responsive pedagogy. This study is focused on how teachers’ stories indicate the difficulties they have incorporating culturally relevant young adult literature into their secondary English classes, how they establish connections between the texts, their students’ lived experiences, and their own lived experiences, and why they struggle with the application of culturally responsive pedagogy. Findings indicate that beginning teachers’ stories (a) express uncertainty regarding the place …

Storying Our Journey: Conversations About The Literary Canon And Course Development In Secondary English Education., Elsie L. Olan, Kia Jane Richmond

Journal Articles

Olan and Richmond present preservice English teachers’ stories about having little experience with canonical texts they are asked to teach in their field experiences.

Teaching In A Mixed Secondary Spanish Classroom: A Case Study Of Strategies And Successes Of Minnesota Teachers, Meredith Gunderson

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

The population of Spanish heritage language learners is increasing throughout the state of Minnesota. This change in demographics impacts schools in a variety of ways; one such consequence is the creation of classes for Spanish for Native Speakers in locations with high Latino populations. However, in most locations, such programs currently do not exist, resulting in Spanish heritage language learners enrolling in Spanish foreign language classes. These classrooms, called mixed classes due to the combination of second language learners and Spanish heritage language learners in the same classroom, pose a unique challenge to the foreign language instructors. This qualitative multiple …

Principals' Perceptions Of Student Performance On The Nigerian Senior Secondary Certificate Examination, Comfort Fubara Oghu

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Failure of high school students on the Senior School Certificate Examination (SSCE) in Nigeria is severely limiting the number of students qualified to enroll in college. The purpose of this multiple case study of 6 high schools in southern Nigeria was to describe principals' perceptions of student performance on the SSCE and the principals' influence on school climate, teacher expectations and approaches, and student performance. The theories of reasoned action and planned behavior provided the framework for the study. The research questions focused on the extent to which principals developed and sustained a school climate that supported positive outcomes. Qualitative …

Secondary Teachers' Perceptions Of The Effectiveness Of A Professional Learning Community, Catina Shontelle Stewart

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The implementation of professional learning communities (PLCs) in schools has been shown to serve as a catalyst in transforming school culture and increasing the academic performance of students. Our school district mandated that PLCs were established at the research site, an urban Louisiana school, for the primary purpose of closing the achievement gap. Yet, recent data from the local district indicate that these PLCs have not resulted in capacity building for sustainable improvement. Ineffective implementation of the current PLCs may have contributed to the poor outcomes. One purpose of this qualitative case study was to examine teachers' perceptions of the …

Students' Participation In An Alternative To Suspension Program, Yolanda Jordan Stovall

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Black and Hispanic students in the United States are suspended at a higher rate and lag behind White students academically. This project study examined student achievement and behavior in an alternative to suspension (ATS) program at a Midwest U.S. high school. The purpose of this mixed methods, concurrent embedded strategy study was to determine if participation in the ATS program decreased disciplinary referrals and improved student performance. This study was guided by social control theory, which suggests that when students are disengaged in the school environment, student/teacher and peer relationships are damaged and students turn toward delinquent behavior. The study …

Motivations Influencing Home Support Engagements In Jamaican High Schools, Kasan Tameka Troupe

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Researchers have emphasized the importance of parental involvement in ensuring the educational success of children. Despite the recognized value, some stakeholders continue to struggle to leverage and sustain this partnership, which may encumber students' success. The purpose of this study was to gain an understanding of the factors influencing parental involvement in Jamaican high schools. This qualitative case study sought to unearth the motivational factors influencing parental involvement within a climate of educational accountability in Jamaican high schools. Grounded in Epstein's school-family-community partnership model, this study unearthed some of the differences and similarities of parental involvement within high schools that …

Content Area Teacher Perspectives On Integrating Literacy Strategies, Lynette Smith Smith

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The Common Core State Standards recommend that all educators prepare students with the literacy skills needed for college and careers. The purpose of this qualitative case study was to examine 7th and 8th grade content area teachers' perspectives towards teaching literacy. The research questions addressed teachers' capabilities in the role of literacy instructor as well as the actual application of literacy. The conceptual framework included Bruner's constructivist, Bandura's self-efficacy, and Knowles's andragogy theories. These theories informed the investigation of adult learners' perspectives regarding the way they learn and gain confidence to provide literacy instruction. Eleven English, math, science, and social …

Teaching College: The Ultimate Guide To Lecturing, Presenting, And Engaging Students, Norman Eng

Publications and Research

Your students aren’t reading. They aren’t engaged in class. Getting them to talk is like pulling teeth. Whatever the situation, your reality is not meeting your expectations. Change is needed. But who’s got the time? Or maybe you’re just starting out, and you want to get it right the first time.

If so, Teaching College: The Ultimate Guide to Lecturing, Presenting, and Engaging Students is the blueprint. Written for early career instructors, this easy-to-implement guide teaches you to:

• Think like advertisers to understand your target audience—your students
• Adopt the active learning approach of the best K-12 teachers
• Write a syllabus …

Raising The Curtain: Investigating The Practicum Experiences Of Pre-Service Drama Teachers, Christina C. Gray, Peter R. Wright, Robin Pascoe

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

The practicum is internationally recognised as a valuable component of teacher education. It is an opportunity for pre-service teachers to develop teaching skills in authentic ways and pursue professional inquiry into practice. While extensive research has been conducted into the practicum generally, little research focuses on the practicum experience for pre-service drama teachers. This article, investigates the preparation of drama teachers for the profession with a particular focus on the practicum component of pre-service education. Drawing on the experiences of 19 pre-service drama teachers from a Western Australian university, focus-groups were conducted in order to scope the key components of …

The Role Of Teachers In Identifying And Supporting Homeless Secondary School Students: Important Lessons For Teacher Education, Monica Thielking, Louise La Sala, Paul Flatau

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

Young people entering homelessness often do so while still at school. This study explores Australian teachers’ and other student support staff perspectives of the experiences of students who are running away from home, the barriers to student help-seeking, and how local youth services can best support secondary schools to provide necessary services to keep students at school and at home or in some other form of safe and secure accommodation. The study revealed that although teachers and student support staff report awareness that student couch surfing exists; there are a range of barriers which prevent a student from seeking help. …

Fostering Creative Ecologies In Australasian Secondary Schools, Leon R. De Bruin, Anne Harris

Australian Journal of Teacher Education

This study investigates and compares elements of creativity in secondary schools and classrooms in Australia and Singapore. Statistical analysis and qualitative investigation of teacher, student and leadership perceptions of the emergence, fostering and absence of creativity in school learning environments is explored. This large-scale international study (n=717) reveals the impact of teacher behaviours, teaching environments and school leadership approaches that promote and impede the enhancement of creative, critical, and innovative thinking, organisation, and curriculum structures. Implications for Australian schools and teaching urge for secondary education to challenge current, practices, pedagogies and environments, arguing for school-based strategies and considerations that enhance …

First Year Professional Learning Community Implementation Within The Marion High School Science Department, Madilyn M. Ramaekers

Graduate Research Papers

The underlying theory of this research study is a radical constructivist worldview. Radical constructivism is based on two main ideas, that knowledge is not passively received but instead is actively built by individual people and that the function of cognition is adaptive and works to organize the experiential world (Von Glasersfeld, 1989). It is assumed that as teachers partake in a professional learning community they seek understanding of their school and classroom. Findings of the research will not be narrow but rather varied and multiple, leading to a range of views rather than a singular view. In radical constructivism, experience …

The Role Of The Secondary Principal As A Transformational Leader In High Performing, Project Based Learning Schools In California, Daniel P. Ching

Dissertations

ABSTRACT

The Role of the Secondary Principal as a Transformational Leader in High Performing, Project Based Learning Schools in California

by Daniel Ching

Purpose: California (CA) schools are facing increased pressure to implement new content standards and perform well on the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP). The new standards focus on higher level thinking skills, technology, and skills that cross multiple content areas. These expectations are aligned with project based learning (PBL) as an instructional model. However, there are very few models for PBL schools that are considered high performing. To implement PBL in high schools requires …

The Immigrants In The Central Coast Of California Need Motivation To Attend Classes And Learn English As Their Second Language, Martin Rodriguez-Juarez

Master's Projects and Capstones

This field project shows that the immigrant community that works in the fields from the Central Coast of California need the motivation to attend adult school to learn English as their second language. A six-week courses is included.

The Living Classroom: A Professional Learning Session, Albert P. Buckley Jr.

Instructional Design Capstones Collection

The American public school classroom has begun moving from the traditional furniture of education (hard plastic chairs attached to desks) to flexible mobile furniture as part of a holistic approach to creating a learning environment that enhances learning for its students. This project describes the process derived in the development and delivery of an asynchronous professional learning session aimed at helping teachers acclimate and engage new or adapted physical and psychological attributes to the learning environments in their care. The program is backed with research demonstrating why the progressive classroom improves the learning experience for both students and teachers. The …

Call For Manuscripts!

Journal of Science Education for Students with Disabilities

Call For Manuscripts!

Journal of Science Education for Students with Disabilities (JSESD)

The Journal of Science Education for Students with Disabilities is a multi-disciplinary, peer-reviewed journal with an international focus on providing information on science education for students with varying types and levels of disabilities. We aspire to publish the best of theoretical research and practical application and we review articles by both special and general educators. Interesting topics have included innovative curricular ideas, instructional adaptations, research-based modifications, best practices, and management issues in science education.

Copyright Statement

Journal of Science Education for Students with Disabilities

Publication rights to works is granted to Journal of Science Education for Students with Disabilities, however, full copyright for works published in this journal is retained by the author(s). The author(s) may post their works online in an institutional repository, on their University departmental website, or on their own personal websites

The Impact Of Short-Term International Volunteers On The Capacity Development Of A School For Students With Disabilities In The Caribbean, Edwin L. Blanton Iii

Theses & Dissertations

This qualitative study contributes to the field of international volunteerism by giving insight into the impact of short-term international volunteerism on the capacity development of a school for students with disabilities in the Caribbean. In the United States over one million people volunteer abroad annually, with 70-80% of these volunteers serving eight weeks or less (Lough, 2010). However, whether the international volunteers are having an impact on the capacity development of the population served remains to be seen. This study focused on an aspect of short-term international volunteerism that has largely been ignored – how short-term international volunteers impact the …

Graduate Internship In Agricultural Education-John H Pitman High School, Turlock, Luke F. Gocke

Agricultural Education: Graduate Internship Reports

This internship report includes validation documents required in meeting the quality criteria for secondary-level programs of instruction in agriculture. The documents are concurrently used for the Agriculture Incentive Grant review process at John H. Pitman High School conducted by representatives of the California Department of Education. The internship included a project which consisted of researching and implementing safety inside a high school mechanics and welding classroom. Vocational Education enhances the learning experience for students and ensuring a safe environment promotes the learning process.

Teaching Android Security Through Examples: A Publicly Available Database Of Vulnerable Apps, Daniel E. Krutz, Samuel A. Malachowsky

Articles

Security is hard, and teaching security can be even harder. Here we describe a public educational activity to assist in the instruction of both students and developers in creating secure Android apps. Our set of activities includes example vulnerable applications, information about each vulnerability, steps on how to repair the vulnerabilities, and information about how to confirm that the vulnerability has been properly repaired. Our primary goal is to make these activities available to other instructors for use in their classrooms ranging from the K-12 to university settings. A secondary goal of this project is to foster interest in security …

An Analysis Of Secondary Integrated Stem Lesson Plans: Common Characteristics, Learning Expectations And The Impact From The Teacher's Definition Of I-Stem, Jacob Hayward

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative study investigated teachers’ understanding of their definition of I-STEM (Integrated STEM education), how those understandings manifested into lessons and associated lesson artifacts, how they assessed students in such lessons, and what factors or rationales supported their ability to conduct or not conduct I-STEM lessons. A survey was sent to the members of four professional organizations representing I-STEM disciplines to solicit their participation in this project. Ten teachers ranging from grades 9-12 participated in this study. Of those who responded, six teachers identified with National Science Teachers Association (NSTA), three teachers selected International Technology and Engineering Education Association (ITEEA), …

How Select Groups Of Preservice Science Teachers With Inquiry Orientations View Teaching And Learning Science Through Inquiry, Peggy Diana Ward

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Although hailed as a powerful form of instruction, in most teaching and learning contexts, inquiry-based instruction is fraught with ambiguous and conflicting definitions and descriptions. Yet little has been written about the experiences preservice science teacher have regarding their learning to teach science through inquiry. This project sought to understand how select preservice secondary science teachers enrolled in three UTeach programs in Arkansas conceptualize inquiry instruction and how they rationalize its value in a teaching and learning context. The three teacher education programs investigated in this study are adoption sites aligned with the UTeach Program in Austin, TX that distinguishes …

The Potential Of A Virtual School To Help Mobile Students, Amy G. Dickinson

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Capstones

An average of 1.8 million students drop out of high school each year (National Council of Education Statistics, 2014). Dropping out of high school is a problem for both society and the individual (Rumberger, 2003). It can lead to lower wages, unemployment, and incarceration. Mobile students make up a part of those who drop out of school. Students are considered mobile if they attend more than one high school in four years (Rumberger & Larson, 1998). One way of helping highly mobile students is to offer asynchronous virtual classes. Using Institutional Theory (Rumberger, 2001) and Academic Mediation Theory (Vygotsky, 1978; …

Four College-Level Writing Assignments: Text Complexity, Close Reading, And The Five-Paragraph Essay, Elizabeth Brockman, Marcy Taylor

Teaching/Writing: The Journal of Writing Teacher Education

No abstract provided.

Creating In A Participatory Culture: Perceptions Of Digital Tools Among Teachers, Emily Howell, Rebecca Kaminski, Sarah Hunt-Barron

Teaching/Writing: The Journal of Writing Teacher Education

The following embedded case study examines teachers’ perceptions of using digital and Web 2.0 tools for literacy instruction. These perceptions are important if teachers hope to enact a more participatory culture of creation rather than consumption called for by scholars such as the New London Group and the New Media Literacies scholars. Case study participants were teachers involved in a NWP site’s Invitational Summer Institute (ISI), with embedded cases of rural teachers in a high-poverty school district. The findings suggest teachers still face extrinsic barriers to enacting a participatory culture, and professional development is needed to help teachers effectively use …

Poetry Is Powerful: High School Students And Pre-Service Teachers Develop Literacy Relationships Through Poetry, Susanne L. Nobles, Amy Price Azano

Teaching/Writing: The Journal of Writing Teacher Education

Teaching poetry can serve as a roadblock for many English teachers who lack confidence with the genre. Likewise, high school students struggle reading poetry and creating their own poetic works. In an effort to provide an authentic learning experience for our students, we created a semester-long, collaborative poetry project between our high school and college students. This manuscript provides details about the goals, processes, and takeaways for both groups of participants. The high school students were two classes of freshman-level English students who practiced developing critical literacy skills while reading, reciting, and writing poetry. The college students were pre-service English …

Feedback In Online Writing Forums: Effects On Adolescent Writers, Heather J. S. Birch

Teaching/Writing: The Journal of Writing Teacher Education

Adolescents are writing online. A cursory look at the web reveals that teenagers are well-represented; in blog posts, social media updates, profile pages, comments on YouTube videos, responses to news articles, and websites about their interests, teenagers are writing (Williams 2009). In the current research study, the specific kind of adolescent writing under consideration is writing posted in a social media context designed specifically for writers. This case study focuses on six young writers who are active members of an online writing community, and who post their writing in order to receive feedback. Descriptive data collected through interviews, as well …

“It’S A Two-Way Street”: Giving Feedback In A Teacher Writing Group, Lochran C. Fallon, Anne Elrod Whitney

Teaching/Writing: The Journal of Writing Teacher Education

Abstract: A consistent feature of teacher writing groups is the giving and receiving of feedback on writing. While there have been several studies that have explored the effects of receiving feedback on one's own writing, there have only been a few that explored the effects of providing feedback to others can have on a teacher’s own work. Drawing on interviews with teacher-writers who work together in a writing group, we conclude that giving feedback transforms the writing lives of all participants involved in the feedback process through experiences of reciprocity, involving claiming authority within a community of writers, developing …

Developing Preservice Writing Teachers’ Professional Judgment: Design Conjectures For Supporting Equitable And Rigorous Writing Instruction, Britnie Delinger Kane

Teaching/Writing: The Journal of Writing Teacher Education

To meet the composition demands of the future, secondary students in the United States will need more rigorous and more equitable writing instruction. They will need opportunities to inquire into and frame authentic problems. They will need to communicate for a variety of audiences and purposes, and they will need access to a variety of linguistic and literary forms. In turn, secondary teachers will need improved preparation for teaching writing. This conceptual review outlines what intellectually rigorous and equitable writing instruction looks like, arguing that teaching writing in these ways requires that teachers deploy substantial professional judgment. I then rely …