The study sheds light on the interrelations between interlanguage pragmatics and the use of a popular acting method, the Stanislavsky System, for second language (L2) acquisition. The theoretical investigation explores various uses of acting in second language education. The empirical enquiry represents an exploratory case-study of two adult EFL learners attending a theatre course in English. Through teacher journals, interviews, and the analysis of the students’ pragmatic performance as captured by a video camera, the researcher hypothesizes that the pragmatic development of the students involved in drama comes from three main sources: the script, the acting exercises, and the necessity to communicate in English during the theatre course. In all three cases, the zone of proximal development in relation to pragmatic competence emerged as a result of a teacher-generated impetus to use L2, numerous opportunities for imitation and repetition, continuous peer-support, and the collaborative spirit created in the classroom.

This study examines the effectiveness of a community of learning, through a book club, on student performance for students underachieving in literacy. This first chapter introduces the study, the researcher and how they are situated within the research, and the context and rationale of the study. The second and third chapters detail current research in literacy, learning, and communities of learning. They detail the methodological approach and rationale. The fourth and fifth chapters explain what took place during the study, what it means, and why this is important for teachers and teacher practice. Despite its limitations, this study finds that communities of learning, established through a book club, positively affect both academic and social performance. Book clubs create interconnectedness between its members that increases student engagement, which increases the amount of authentic dialogue. From this, book club members collaboratively co-construct knowledge resulting in general improvement, both academically and socially.

Although literature has extensively documented the stereotypes of developing learning communities in schools through book clubs— especially to improve literacy— little is revealed about varied indicators of improvements, such as student self-identification, authentic dialogues, and transforming small groups into learning communities. In this respect, formal efforts on adopting book clubs to improve literacy in Saudi Arabia are simply absent. This thesis presents research findings that seek to explore the effect of book clubs on improving literacy and building a learning community among seventh-grade, under-performing students in Canada. This thesis is contextualized through a thorough review of related literature and discussion of findings from classroom observations, and students’ interviews. The completion of this thesis indicates positive, causal relationships between using a book club as a learning tool and building a learning community, thus improving literacy. The research concludes with implications for using book clubs in Saudi Arabia.

In Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe language), Kipimoojikewin refers to our inheritance, or the things we carry with us. While Anishinaabemowin, Anishinaabe (Ojibwe) pedagogy and research practices are all part of our inheritance, so too is a legacy of colonial violence and historic trauma. This paper details one journey towards the language; the struggle through a colonial terrain rife with institutional and cognitive barriers, the journey to return to Anishinaabe ways of knowing, to articulating Anishinaabe pedagogy in a contemporary urban context and the work done to fulfill the vision of the Elders. There are no “best practices” only stories that exemplify an Anishinaabe axiological framework so that the causes and effects can be better understood, taken up and improved upon. Aapajitoon kema wanitoon.

The study sheds light on the interrelations between interlanguage pragmatics and the use of a popular acting method, the Stanislavsky System, for second language (L2) acquisition. The theoretical investigation explores various uses of acting in second language education. The empirical enquiry represents an exploratory case-study of two adult EFL learners attending a theatre course in English. Through teacher journals, interviews, and the analysis of the students’ pragmatic performance as captured by a video camera, the researcher hypothesizes that the pragmatic development of the students involved in drama comes from three main sources: the script, the acting exercises, and the necessity to communicate in English during the theatre course. In all three cases, the zone of proximal development in relation to pragmatic competence emerged as a result of a teacher-generated impetus to use L2, numerous opportunities for imitation and repetition, continuous peer-support, and the collaborative spirit created in the classroom.

This study examines the effectiveness of a community of learning, through a book club, on student performance for students underachieving in literacy. This first chapter introduces the study, the researcher and how they are situated within the research, and the context and rationale of the study. The second and third chapters detail current research in literacy, learning, and communities of learning. They detail the methodological approach and rationale. The fourth and fifth chapters explain what took place during the study, what it means, and why this is important for teachers and teacher practice. Despite its limitations, this study finds that communities of learning, established through a book club, positively affect both academic and social performance. Book clubs create interconnectedness between its members that increases student engagement, which increases the amount of authentic dialogue. From this, book club members collaboratively co-construct knowledge resulting in general improvement, both academically and socially.

In Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe language), Kipimoojikewin refers to our inheritance, or the things we carry with us. While Anishinaabemowin, Anishinaabe (Ojibwe) pedagogy and research practices are all part of our inheritance, so too is a legacy of colonial violence and historic trauma. This paper details one journey towards the language; the struggle through a colonial terrain rife with institutional and cognitive barriers, the journey to return to Anishinaabe ways of knowing, to articulating Anishinaabe pedagogy in a contemporary urban context and the work done to fulfill the vision of the Elders. There are no “best practices” only stories that exemplify an Anishinaabe axiological framework so that the causes and effects can be better understood, taken up and improved upon. Aapajitoon kema wanitoon.

Although literature has extensively documented the stereotypes of developing learning communities in schools through book clubs— especially to improve literacy— little is revealed about varied indicators of improvements, such as student self-identification, authentic dialogues, and transforming small groups into learning communities. In this respect, formal efforts on adopting book clubs to improve literacy in Saudi Arabia are simply absent. This thesis presents research findings that seek to explore the effect of book clubs on improving literacy and building a learning community among seventh-grade, under-performing students in Canada. This thesis is contextualized through a thorough review of related literature and discussion of findings from classroom observations, and students’ interviews. The completion of this thesis indicates positive, causal relationships between using a book club as a learning tool and building a learning community, thus improving literacy. The research concludes with implications for using book clubs in Saudi Arabia.

This thesis investigates how teachers navigate Common Core State Standards, high-stakes testing, and teacher evaluation while creating their own curriculum to meet the needs of culturally and linguistically diverse students. As a former teacher, I conducted a practitioner research case study of four successful colleagues in a bilingual Pre-K-8 school in Washington, DC. When given flexibility in curriculum, teachers integrated knowledge from their relationships with students to foster a caring environment that supports learning and created their own systems of accountability by deciding what data matters. Teachers centered student engagement as what drives their curriculum and used a variety of differentiation methods based on their own “toolbox” of instructional strategies. Findings suggest a flexible curriculum model allows teachers to be curriculum makers who actively go beyond the standards to integrate knowledge from their practice and relationships with students to create curriculum that successfully supports language learners.

La présente étude avait pour objectif de décrire comment est enseignée (si elle l’est effectivement) la distinction d’emploi entre le passé composé et l’imparfait, une distinction aspectuelle posant problème aux apprenants du français langue seconde, dans trois classes de 3e à 5e années en immersion française précoce aux Territoires du Nord-Ouest et de décrire l’utilisation que font les enseignantes de ces temps verbaux. À partir de dix-neuf heures d’observation en classe et d’entretiens menés avec deux enseignantes, nous avons élaboré une proposition didactique basée sur la réflexion guidée avec exemples positifs et négatifs de Nadeau et Fisher (2006) mettant en évidence le contraste d’emploi entre le passé composé et l’imparfait. Cette proposition didactique fournit aux enseignantes une façon de l’enseigner alors qu’elles ne le font pas à ces niveaux, et aux apprenants, un intrant où la fréquence des emplois atypiques est plus grande que dans le discours de leur enseignante. / The present study is aimed at describing how the distinction in use between passé composé and imparfait, an aspectual distinction that is problematic to learners of French as a second language, is taught (if it is effectively taught) in three 3rd to 5th grade classes of the French early immersion program in the Northwestern Territories, and how the teachers use these verb tenses. Based on nineteen hours of classroom observations and interviews with two teachers, we developed a teaching proposal using Nadeau and Fisher’s « guided reflexion with positive and negative examples » (2006), that brings to light the contrast of use that exists between the passé composé and the imparfait. This teaching proposal gives the teachers a way to teach it, as they don’t teach it at these levels, and exposes the learners to an input in which the frequency of atypical uses is higher than in their teachers’ discourse.