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This 3-month long, participatory-action research study with 19 college freshmen exposed students to children's literature selections hoping to initiate dialogue on social justice. The following questions guided the study: 1) How do students in a freshman writing course at a small, private liberal arts college initially perceive social justice? 2) How will critical reading of children's literature texts impact students' perceptions of social justice? 3) How do students self-identified as preservice teachers differ from the remainder of class members in relation to the first 2 questions? Data included 152 short narratives, 19 long narratives, field notes of the primary researcher and the student research assistant, and a group interview transcript. Findings included the following themes: a) Students and teachers should interact dialogically on their own cultural backgrounds as they consider their social justice perceptions; b) It is possible to go beyond the "tunnel" vision of prejudice and see "difference" as a positive attribute; c) All students, but particularly preservice teachers, need to wrestle with how they "fit" into a larger world context and teacher education should provide this critical opportunity; d) Personal, critical reflection on texts and discussion within a caring, secure environment can foster change; and e) Students embrace change as they hope to avoid becoming "stagnant." The findings serve to explicate the research theories on building caring classroom communities (Noddings, 2003), transformational learning opportunities (Hooks,1994; Villegas & Lucas, 2002), the use of text to drive change (Rosenblatt, 1995; Trites, 1997; Vandergrift, 1993; Zipes, 2001), and the value of dialogue on social justice topics to preservice teachers and others (Ladson-Billings & Tate, 1995; Lowery, 2002; Marshall & Oliva, 2006). / Ph. D.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Illinois State University, 2006. / Title from title page screen, viewed on June 8, 2007. Dissertation Committee: Janice Neuleib (chair), Ronald Fortune, Bob Broad. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 270-280) and abstract. Also available in print.

abstract: This dissertation reports on an action research study that sought to discover how a new WiFi, tablet computing device, the Apple iPad, affected, enhanced, and impacted student engagement in an English Honors course at Scottsdale Community College. The researcher was also the instructor in the two semester, first-year, college composition sequence (English 101/102) in which all 18 students were provided the new Apple iPad tablet computing device. The researcher described how students adapted the Apple iPads to their academic lives, assessed iPad compatibility with current instructional technology systems, and interviewed participating students to document their beliefs about whether iPad activities enhanced the course. At the conclusion of the college composition sequence, 13 students agreed to participate in focus groups to describe how they made use of the iPad and to report on how the iPad influenced their engagement. Among other findings, students reported that there were compatibility problems with current SCC instructional technology systems, that the iPad increased their efficiency in completing informal educational tasks, but that the iPad was not useful for doing word processing and research. Recommendations for future use of the iPad in this course include reducing the number of iPads accessing the WiFi network at the same time, piloting the use of iPad word processing applications, researching more "mobile-friendly" web sites and documents, and developing innovative assignments that take advantage of iPad capabilities. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ed.D. Educational Leadership and Policy Studies 2011

abstract: This study is a philosophical genealogy of the term “student engagement” as it has appeared in composition studies. It attempts to account for the fact that student engagement has become something of a virtue in educational and composition studies, despite the fact that the term is problematic due its lack of definitional clarity and circular understanding of pedagogy (explained in greater detail in chapter two). Inspired by Foucault, this study employs a genealogical analytic to create a counterhistory of student engagement, suggesting that its principles have existed long before educational theorists coined the term, tracing its practices back to the 1940s in composition studies. Far from being the humanistic and student-centered practice that it is commonly viewed as, this study situates student engagement practices as emerging from various discursive and political desires/needs, especially as a way to ideologically counter the rise of Nazism and fascism in pre-World War 2 Europe; in short, rather than evolving out of best practices in education, the concept of student engagement emerged out of an intersection of educational, psychological, and even medical prescriptions set against a specific political backdrop. This study also examines the ways that power dynamics shift and teacher-/student-subjects occupy new roles as engagement becomes a prominent force on the pedagogical landscape, addressing specifically the ways teachers and their assignments enact a disciplinary and pastoral function, all with the intent of molding students into interested, interesting, and democratic subjects. This study closes by considering some of the implications of this new understanding of engagement, and suggests potential directions for the term as well as abandoning the term altogether. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Learning, Literacies and Technologies 2018

Generation 1.5 students, foreign-born children of first-generation immigrants, complete some or most of their K-12 education in the United States. Their oral communicative competence may be advanced, but their academic language proficiency may still be underdeveloped when they enter college. In 2013, SB1720 made placement testing optional for most Florida public high school graduates, including generation 1.5 students, making them eligible to enroll directly in the college-level English Composition 1 (ENC 1101) course. In order to succeed in this course, generation 1.5 students may need additional support appropriate to their unique needs. This study first described the literacy backgrounds of 107 generation 1.5 students at Miami Dade College. Then, guided by the interdependence hypothesis, the common underlying proficiency model of bilingual proficiency, and the compensatory model of second language reading, it examined the relationship between the predictor variables (native language literacy, English language knowledge, and pre-ENC 1101 coursework) and the criterion variables (English reading comprehension and ENC 1101 performance). Nearly a quarter (23.6%) of the MDC students who completed the initial literacy survey belonged to the generation 1.5 group. English language knowledge was significantly and positively correlated to both reading comprehension (p < .001) and ENC 1101 performance (p < .05). The negative correlation between pre-ENC 1101 coursework and reading comprehension (p < .001) was also statistically significant, but native language literacy was not significantly correlated to either English reading comprehension or ENC 1101 performance. The results of the regression analyses showed that English language knowledge accounted for nearly 50% of the variance (p < .001) in generation 1.5 students’ English reading comprehension; however, none of the independent variables contributed to a significant amount of variance in ENC 1101 performance in the regression model. This study contributed to the literature that aims to provide a better understanding of the numbers, the literacy foundations, and the instructional needs of generation 1.5 college students. While the findings did not fully support the theories that framed the study, future studies should continue to focus on generation 1.5 students producing academic texts in higher education institutions.

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In this qualitative research study, I share first-generation college students' help-seeking experiences with writing tasks and use an affective lens to investigate how first-generation students feel when navigating various help-seeking situations. Often, students' experiences and emotions highlight their commitments to independence. In this study, I found that students' feelings of insecurity and confidence both encouraged and discouraged help seeking with writing, that students expressed determination as a central affect when describing their commitment to independence, and that loneliness is a significant affect in regards to writing help seeking and independence. These findings provide writing center faculty and tutors and first-year composition instructors a framework for interpreting first-generation college students' expressions of confidence, insecurity, and determination. Using this framework, I give suggestions on effectively responding to the help seeking of first-generation students.

The preparation of new college teachers of composition has been a disciplinary topic of interest as well as an institutional concern since the establishment in the late 1800s of the modern English department. In this project, I offer a critical history of the treatment of the topic of the preparation of teachers of college composition by the three most historically significant organizations to English as a discipline and Composition as a field of study within that discipline: the Modern Language Association, the National Council of Teachers of English, and the Conference on College Composition and Communication. By analyzing the treatment of the topic of the preparation college teachers of composition by the major publications of these three organizations during their formative years, I provide a topic specific history of the marginalization of composition within the discipline and its organizations. This project expands on the work of individuals such as James Berlin, Albert Kitzhaber, Stephen North, Robert Connors, and others who have written on the historical marginalization of composition within the discipline and Academy and offers a more specific interrogation of the position of composition within the discipline and the Academy in general. In my work, I argue that the contemporaneous founding of the modern English department and the Modern Language Association allowed for the institutionalized relegation to a low status of composition and teachers of composition. That institutionalized low status eventually led to the marginalization, fractionalization, and specialization of a group of composition scholars who believed teaching to be a central concern for the discipline, as well as to the development of NCTE and CCCC. I further argue that a similar fractionalization and specialization within these smaller groups has left intact the institutionalized notions of status that led to their formation in the first place. I conclude by suggesting that in order to raise the status of composition in the discipline and the Academy, it is necessary to address the sources of marginalization directly as opposed to fractionalizing and specializing in reaction to it.

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