Research has shown that South African mathematics performance is extremely poor compared to other countries that participated in the Trends in Mathematics and Science Study in 2015 and 2016, respectively. Most of the competing countries were developing and were disadvantaged by their socio-economic status compared to the more economically vibrant South Africa. However, South Africa came last in the mathematics and science standardised tests commonly referred to as the Annual National Assessment and National Benchmark Test. The poor performance of the country’s learners in mathematics is exacerbated by the inability of veteran mathematics teachers to adopt technological teaching methods and innovations during teaching and learning. The Mathletics programme is a modern teaching tool that links every aspect of mathematics teaching and learning and gives individual learners the ability to successfully engage in mathematics learning activities. The learner gains mental mathematics skills to solve mathematical problems and is then able to apply the acquired mathematical skills to solve similar mathematical problems in any given situation. This study aimed to investigate and develop the professional status of veteran primary school mathematics teachers through participatory action research to improve their understanding of the application of Mathletics during teaching and learning. The data for my study was collected via audiotape, semi-structured interviews, and participant observations. The participants were veteran mathematics primary school teachers between the ages of 40 and 59 from the Gauteng Department of Education, Tshwane South District Circuit 2. The interviews and observations were conducted at times and venues preferred by the participants at their respective schools. The main research finding of the study shows that the majority of the participating veteran primary school teachers are not fully prepared in terms of skills, resources and methods to effectively respond to the recent technological teaching and learning transformations. As a recommendation, this study needs further research to benefit more schools and more teachers, so that participatory action research (PAR) can be a method for continuing professional development (CPD). / Dissertation (MEd)--University of Pretoria, 2020. / Humanities Education / MEd / Unrestricted

Although social workers are frequently part of interdisciplinary teams in health care and community settings, interdisciplinary training is often lacking in social work education (Berg-Weger & Schneider, 1998). This article describes a study of the effects of an interdisciplinary community-based experiential course preparing new health care professionals for work as part of interdisciplinary teams. The interdisciplinary curriculum was established for a summer course taught in 2006 by faculty from five disciplines: social work, nutrition, medicine, nursing, and public health. The course, Quality Improvement in Rural Healthcare, which focused on health literacy in people with a diagnosis of diabetes that live in northeast Tennessee, provided a model environment for learning interdisciplinary teamwork. Evaluation of this course found that social work students displayed a statistically significant increase in positive attitude toward interdisciplinary teamwork. Course strengths, weaknesses, obstacles, and opportunities for curriculum improvement are elaborated.

Introduction: In 1996, East Tennessee State University (ETSU) reinforced its historical commitment to multidisciplinary community engagement by developing a graduate level community partnerships program in the Division of Health Sciences. While the university's earlier health partnership efforts relied primarily on curricular innovation, the approach to graduate health professions education was to seed a series of curricular enhancements and interdisciplinary, community-based learning experiences and service into traditional curricula. This paper presents the experience of one school in crafting a regional network that became the basis of a division-wide graduate level teaching and learning initiative. Innovations and Evaluation: Carefully selected planning and implementation techniques enabled multidisciplinary practitioners and community members from across a 20-county region to participate with university faculty in training ETSU learners in community-based medical care. By year four of the project, curricular "enhancements" were institutionalized in over five departments across the Division and engaged 1160 medical residents and graduate learners in a give - get model of health education. Programme evaluation methodology was collaboratively defined and documentation of programme effort and outcomes regularly reported and strategically reviewed. Conclusions: Programme evaluation demonstrates mutual benefit to community and university. Faculty involvement in programme activity increased fourfold and community involvement in training of health professions graduate learners increased threefold by year four. Educational innovations were adopted into traditional curricula, thousands of hours of clinical services were provided to underserved communities and the university-community team forged by network links continues to promote multidisciplinary interests through joint public policy endeavors.

Traditional models for public health professional education tend to be didactic, with brief, discrete practica appended. National reports of both practitioners and academicians have called for more competency-driven, interdisciplinary-focused, community-based, service-oriented, and experientially-guided learning for students across the curriculum. East Tennessee State University began its own curricular revisioning in health professions education nearly 2 decades ago with a grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, emphasizing competencies development through community-based learning in community-academic partnerships. This article describes 3 examples that grew from that initiative. In the first example, students in multiple classes delivered a longitudinal community-based employee wellness intervention for a rural county school district. BS public health students conducted needs assessments and prepared health education materials; MPH students conducted health assessments and worked with school wellness councils to deliver client-centered interventions; DrPH students supervised the project and provided feedback to the schools using participatory methods. In the second example, MPH students in a social-behavioral foundations course used experiential learning to investigate the region's elevated cancer mortality ranking. Following meetings with multiple community groups, students employed theoretical constructs to frame regional beliefs about cancer and presented findings to community leaders. One outcome was a 5-year community-based participatory research study of cancer in rural Appalachia. In the third example, MPH students in a health-consulting course assessed local African Americans' awareness of the university's health and education programs and perceptions of their community health issues. Students learned consultation methods by assisting at multiple regional African American community meetings to discover issues and interest that resulted in the organization of a regional African American health coalition, multiple community health interventions, and the region's first health disparities summit. Lessons learned are presented which identify key elements of success and factors that influence adoption of community-based teaching and learning in public health.

Project Senior Art was conceived in answer to the growing need for worthwhile directed activities in our community senior centers and to provide valuable community-based learning experiences for university art students. This intergenerational program recognizes the unique intellectual abilities of older adults and meets the educational needs of senior participants and college art students, providing both creative opportunities for personal growth. Fundamental to the successful development and implementation of the program, and the focus of this study, is ascertaining the experiential art and crafts preferences of the targeted senior adult population. Personal interviews, focus group discussions, and a survey instrument were used to secure the information necessary to plan experiential art activities, recruit student facilitators, and provide the core course content. A high interest in traditional and nontraditional art activities was expressed, with senior adults citing photography, painting, and memory book making as the most preferred media.

The purpose of the study is to determine whether an instructor’s intentional effort to build community in his/her classroom results in a higher sense of classroom community among students. This study also examined what types of community building activities were conducted by each instructor and measured the students’ responses to each different activity. This was intended to establish a preliminary set of best practices for creating classroom community. A two-part questionnaire, including an adapted version of the Classroom Community Scale, was administered to instructors (n=5) and students (n=113) enrolled in two or four unit courses at California Polytechnic State University. These courses were designed to introduce students to their chosen majors. One-way analysis of variance, and two-proportion tests were used to determine the relationship between instructor intentions and student sense of classroom community, and the differences in student sense of classroom community between courses. Findings indicate that what course a student was in was the significant factor in determining sense of classroom community. Additionally, students accurately perceived their instructor’s intent to create classroom community.

This thesis discusses how the restructuring of the UK television industry in the 1980s and 1990s has affected learning and skills development in the sector. It is based on 71 semi-structured interviews with television freelancers and key informants in the industry, and a case study of a small regional independent company developed through semi-structured interviews and three months of participant observation. To investigate the current learning and skills development mechanisms, this thesis engages with community-based learning theories. These are discussed in relation to industry characteristics such as commissioning and independent production and labour market realities related to freelance work and educational provision. The findings reveal that the traditional on the job learning mechanisms within communities of practice are challenged under the new structural context characterised by unrestricted entry and progression and short-term projects within an uncertain employment context. Commercial pressures affect both the access to learning opportunities and the learning experience, mainly because of the lack of legitimate and gradual experiential learning possibilities, short-term involvement in the industry under pressures to perform. The thesis also discusses the realities of the work in a small regional independent production company as well as its benefits and limitations as a venue for community-based learning. This thesis concludes with several policy recommendations which address some of the main challenges to the sustainable skills development in UK television. These recommendations subscribe to the need for introducing legitimate traineeships, entry rules and detaching learning from the commercial pressures in the sector.

This dissertation research examines students’ lived experiences of dance improvisation in a 2014 Hampshire College course titled “Community Crossovers: Dance in the Community” taught by the author. Research methodology is informed by the hermeneutic phenomenology of educational philosopher Max van Manen, dance education research grounded in phenomenological methods by Karen Bond and Susan W. Stinson, among others, and researchers and writers of classroom action research. Sources of qualitative data include students’ reflective writings about their experiences of three selected dance improvisations—Human Puzzle, Mirror, and Approach/Avoid—in both college and community settings. Additional sources contextualizing students’ experiential meanings include course entry questionnaires, videotaped college and community dance sessions, written pedagogical and phenomenological reflections of both the researcher and a teaching assistant, and class discussions. Our Massachusetts community partners were the Treehouse Foundation, Easthampton and the Robert Fitzgerald Kennedy Children’s Action Corps, South Hadley. Student lived experience writings were coded over several cycles to identify categories of meaning in each of the three improvisations at both college and community sites, and these were analyzed for themes across four modes of student participation: self, partner, group and movement (an aesthetic mode). Findings revealed bodily-affective-social-aesthetic meaning making that foregrounds relationality, or connection, through embodied experiences. Students’ descriptions of connection can be understood as qualitatively distinct kinds of felt intersubjectivity: two-person, merged, and other-first. Findings are placed in conversation with literature from dance, community-based education, philosophy, and critical pedagogy. / Dance

Generation Z, also known as the iGeneration, iGenners, GenZ, and Generation Now, consists of those born in the mid-1990s through the late 2010s. Historical events important for this generation have influenced their perception of safety as well as how they interact with others. As compared to previous generations, technological advances (i.e., Smartphones, social media) changed how GenZ communicates, socializes, and receives information. Unique experiences and attributes influenced Generation Z’s empathy because living through these events and seeing their impact changes how they can understand and take the perspective of others. The relation between three factors was examined across University students who are members of Generation Z; intensity of the CBL activity (high versus low), sex, and empathy (empathy assessment index, basic empathy scale, ethnocultural empathy scale). It is hypothesized that freshmen students would exhibit higher gains in empathy due to their developmental period. As hypothesized, there was a consistent main effect for sex in multiple subscales across the Honors Colloquium and Interdisciplinary late-teen sample indicating that females were higher in initial pretest scores and remained higher on post-scores on empathy as compared to males. These findings hold implication for instructors aiming to provide effective CBL experience for their students. Faculty may consider how students may be differentially receptive to CBL experiences on multiple demographic and personality variables, and while this study only examined sex and intensity of experience, it provides a good representation of the diversity of outcomes that can be evidenced.

ABSTRACT LANDSCAPES OF COMPASSION: A GUATEMALAN EXPERIENCE MAY 2011 TRAVIS WILLIAM SHULTZ A.S., UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS AMHERST B.A., UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS AMHERST M.A., UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS AMHERST Directed by: Professor Peter Kumble, PhD If landscape architecture can intertwine with the practice of social justice, how should academic training provide an atmosphere where this correlation is developed? In a professional degree program, such as landscape architecture, there are a plethora of skills among students that can be utilized no only in their future careers, but during their academic experience. By learning the tools while implementing them, there is a profound educational opportunity to be taken advantage of. An even greater opportunity can be capitalized if the tools are implemented in a context where the deliverables make positive impacts on impoverished communities. The goal of this thesis is to demonstrate how a landscape architect can contribute to humanitarian efforts; and the opportunity for this contribution should begin within the walls of academia. To support this argument, the author reviews literature and clarifies the vision and targets of this style of learning. The most convincing part of this thesis was the implementation of a graduate level class, LA 591g: Applied Field Studies in Guatemala, where eight students, a professional, and a professor combined their scholastic, professional, and life experiences in a community service learning atmosphere. Their work lead to the start-up of AbonOrgánico, a non-for-profit company located in Guatemala City whose mission is: To supply necessary jobs to at-risk youth from impoverished communities within Guatemala City by taking organic waste from the Central Market in Guatemala City and producing high-quality compost. Students participated in a 9-day spring break trip to Guatemala City, 11 journal entries, 2 questionnaires, 5 group reflection meetings, a 145-slide department-wide presentation, and a 12-chapter manual including a site design, construction details, operational guidelines, and a business plan. In the pages of the thesis, the reader will see how this class set out to make a difference with the tools they had, and they did, but the most profound difference was made by this community on them.