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No description available.

Several years ago an experimental re-entry program for women was initiated at the University of Central Florida. Women with B.S. degrees in Math or Science dating back 10 and 20 years ago were given a review course in Mathematics, primarily calculus, preparatory to subsequent courses in their M.S. programs of study. The complete course is available on tape and many students have viewed it since the course’s inception. This project involved generation of software for testing the manipulative skills presented in the Calculus review. A skeleton format is presented which demonstrates all the features of the different programming modules being developed. The user has the option of requesting a cross reference between problems which emphasize those topics deemed most appropriate. A series of menus direct the student to subproblems in response to a level of difficulty stipulated. Each subproblem presents the user with a multiple choice of answers. A random number generator is used to assure that the same subproblem produces a different correct answer each time. Window graphics is used extensively to highlight the important aspects of each problem as well as a choice of graphs relating the variables within a specific problem. A user’s manual with detailed analytical solutions of all the problems is available to supplement the software.

No description available.

No description available.

The achievement of students who participated in a computer-assisted instruction unit on social studies directionality skills was examined in relation to group size. Also analyzed were students’ interaction in small groups and the structure of those groups. Sixty-six second-grade students in solo, pair, or triad treatment conditions were given a pretest and equivalent-form posttest. The computer task concerned cardinal and intermediate directions, which students applied in a computer tictactoe game. Interaction among the students was recorded by audiotape and observer notes. The coding protocol contained the four major categories: giving help, receiving no explanations, receiving explanations, and procedural assistance. Verbatim records of twenty-five randomly chosen students were coded, tallied, and analyzed. For students in pairs or triads (n=55), group structure was analyzed for cooperation, competition, dominance, “odd-man-out” phenomenon, and how the group developed over time. Students made significant gains in their social studies knowledge. Analysis of covariance, with the pretest as the covariate, showed no significant relationship between achievement and group size; achievement and sex; or achievement and ability. For triads, but not for pairs, students in mixed-ability groups had significantly greater gains in achievement than students in uniform-ability groups; this is consistent with prior research. Procedural help was the most frequent type of student interaction. There was no significant relationship between achievement and any of the four major categories of interaction. This is in contrast to the work of Webb (1982a, 1982b, 1982c, 1983, 1985). Because these students were much younger, they probably could not generate effective explanations. Of the twenty-two groups, sixteen were characterized by cooperation and three by competition. Neither ability nor sex was related to cooperation. Ability had no bearing on competition, but boys were more likely to compete. Cooperative interaction was least at the beginning of the session, increased during the middle, and slightly decreased at the end of the computer session. Administrators can utilize the conclusion that students learned in small groups equally as well as when they were alone. Small groups were useful for C.A.I. in that students mastered the content, appeared motivated, and participated actively. / Ed. D. / incomplete_metadata

The study was designed to discover how conununity college students used the available learner control features of the TICCIT computer assisted instruction system, and to determine whether those students who completed all the course requirements of two TICCIT delivered courses within an eleven week academic term used different strategies to work through the instructional materials than those students who did not complete the courses. One hundred and forty eight students who enrolled in a developmental level Algebra I course and freshman level· English grammar course participated in the study. Sixty-seven students met the criteria for course completion; 81 were non-completers. A log tape record was kept of the keypresses made by the subjects as they progressed through the topics of the lesson selected for the study. The sequences of keypresses resulted in the classification of nine different strategy patterns which were analyzed by means of chi-square contingency tables. The findings were that community college students made use of the learner control options presented to them by TICCIT to develop learning strategies. While"successful patterns" were identified in the statistical analyses, these were actually used by an equal proportion of completing and non-completing students-and could not be considered as paths to success for future TICCIT students. No evidence was found that students used a pattern consistently throughout a lesson. There was significant evidence that pattern choice was influenced by the subject matter studied and, specifically, by the topic of the segment. Students in the English course used more patterns which included EXAMPLES, whereas the students in the math course favored the RULE/PRACTICE combination. With regard to timely completion, however, the. RULE/PRACTICE pattern was a successful option for both math and English course completers. The use of PRACTICE without reference to RULES or EXAMPLES was detrimental to the timely completion of math coursework, but beneficial in the case of the English course. / Ed. D.

The purposes of this study were to: (a) determine the professional development preferences of educators in a selected school district, (b) discover to what extent and under what circumstances these educators desired the use of Web-based distance education for professional development purposes, and (c) discover the obstacles to implementation of Web-based instruction professional development within the school district. In addition, demographic and informational data thought to be pertinent were solicited. A survey instrument developed for this study was administered to 1,843 site-based educators; 1,455 (78.95%) surveys from all (N=39) of the targeted schools were returned. Analyses of the data provided by respondents indicated the following major findings: (a) 90.2% preferred to use district-provided in services for recertification training; (b) 64% reported a high computer and Internet comfort level; (c) 74% preferred learning with peers over solitary training; (d) 44.5% favored traditional in service delivery over Web-based instruction; (e) appropriate subject matter was deemed the most important element in the selection of training, followed by training when needed, stipends, training location, and training with peers, respectively; (f) 61% indicated an interest in utilizing Web-based instruction for recertification purposes and 61.3% for required subjects; (g) 65.1% would use Web-based instruction if a menu of practical topics were offered; and (h) 62.7% would use Web-based instruction if training was provided. Inadequate marketing of online courses and user fear of insufficient instructor assistance (26.7%) were found to be barriers to implementation. No statistical significance was found between chosen demographic data (age, gender, grade level, and job category) and desire for Web-based instruction. Training in the use of technology and Web-based instruction was deemed desirable prior to the implementation of online delivery.