As faculty we probably have strong feelings about online teaching and we certainly have pet peeves about our students. What if we were to ask our students what their pet peeves about us or our online classes are? (The student assessment of instruction at my own institution doesn’t include a question this direct). And yikes! once we ask, what do we do with that information? Whether you are new to online or an experienced online instruction, come join the conversation and together we will discuss ways to ‘tame the online beast.’

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Although a relatively small number of K-12 students are currently enrolled in online classes, the dramatic growth in online enrollments in recent years suggests that online education will play a significant role in the future landscape of public education. While our understanding of online teaching and learning continues to grow, relatively little is known about the experiences of teachers as they engage in online teaching. In particular, very little is known about the concerns of teachers as they navigate their teaching roles and responsibilities in an online teaching environment. Using an interpretative phenomenological analysis approach, this qualitative study explored the concerns of seven online K-12 teachers through video interviews and bi-monthly journal entries. The findings in this study resulted in six themes with associated sub-themes. These themes suggest that online teachers are highly concerned about themselves, their roles, and their students, along with concerns found at the intersections of these areas. Additionally, this study reveals that the political, educational, and organizational contexts surrounding these online learning environments significantly influence the development and degree of teachers' concerns. The implications of this research encourages greater dialogue between teachers and online educational leaders to better understand teacher concerns and mitigate the negative impact of these concerns on online teachers.

Relatively little research on blended learning (BL) addresses institutional adoption in higher education. Graham, Woodfield, and Harrison (2012) proposed a framework for institutional BL adoption, identifying three stages: (a) awareness/exploration, (b) adoption/early implementation, and (c) mature implementation/growth. The framework also identified key strategy, structure, and support issues universities may address at each stage. In this series of articles, the authors applied that framework to institutions of higher education implementing BL. In the first article, the authors applied the framework to 11 Next Generation Learning Challenge (NGLC) grant recipients transitioning from Stage 1 to Stage 2 of BL adoption. The authors compared U.S. institutional strategy, structure, and support approaches to BL adoption and identified patterns and distinctions. In the final two articles, the authors applied the framework as well as Rogers' (2003) diffusion of innovations theory to determine the degree to which and why institutional strategy, structure, and support measures would facilitate or impede BL adoption among higher education faculty. The authors also explored whether faculty's innovation adoption category would affect which measures facilitated or impeded BL adoption. To achieve these objectives, the authors surveyed and interviewed faculty at BYU-Idaho (BYU-I). In the second article, the authors reviewed the survey results to determine (a) the appropriate innovation adoption category for each faculty member and (b) the factors that impacted faculty decisions to adopt BL. In the third article, the authors reviewed the results of the interviews to identify why participants reported strategy, structure, and support decisions would impact their decision to adopt BL.

In their book, Teaching Naked Techniques, Jose Bowen and C. Edward Watson suggest that “just calling your classroom a lab or studio will signal that you want your students to be more collaborative, self-directed, self-motivated, and intellectually ambitious.” So labs aren’t just for science courses! Join in the discussion on how you could incorporate a lab component to your classes in order to encourage and improve student engagement.

This thesis presents an evaluation of instructional television as used in four courses at Utah State University. The study is divided into four parts: first, student attitudes and reactions; second, faculty attitudes and reactions; third, the costs involved for the individual faculty members concerned, the academic department, the Radio-Television department, and the University as a whole; and fourth, recommendations concerning the future use of instructional television at Utah State University. The four courses involved in this study were basic introductory courses in Political Science, English, Sociology, and Music. The investigator found that student attitudes and reactions varied with each course. The students in Political Science and English were generally uncertain in their attitude toward the use of television, with approximately equal numbers for and against. The students in Sociology and Music were very much in favor of the use of television. The attitudes of the faculty members associated with this project ranged from very negative to very positive. The study indicated that those instructors who were highly motivated and enthusiastic before actually becoming involved with instructional television tended to remain so throughout. Those instructors who were skeptical and hesitant beforehand also retained their attitudes. The third part of this study dealing with costs was divided into six areas for the Political Science and English courses: production costs, recording costs, instructional costs, utilization costs, cost for additional use, and cost per student credit unit for one academic year. In the cases of Sociology and Music only the production, recording and instructional costs were computed. As a result of this study, this researcher recommends the delegation of more authority to the television personnel in order that they may have a voice in the utilization process of the television courses produced. A second recommendation is that of initiating a two-phase in-service training program to assist the classroom teacher in adjusting to his new role, and to train the television teacher in methods of using instructional television. Finally, the need to have available adequate facilities for the utilization processes has become apparent during the course of this study. Television cannot prove to be a satisfactory medium of instruction if it must be satisfied with poor lighting conditions, excessive noise levels, and an undesirable choice of hours during which to offer classes.

The main aim of the course recommendation system is to build a course recommendation path for students to help them plan courses to successfully graduate on time. The Model-View-Controller (MVC) architecture is used to isolate the user interface (UI) design from the business logic. The front-end of the application develops the UI using AngularJS. The front-end design is done by gathering the functionality system requirements -- input controls, navigational components, informational components and containers and usability testing. The back-end of the application involves setting up the database and server-side routing. Server-side routing is done using Express JS.

Cette thèse porte sur l’enseignement des langues, vue par la perspective de la théorie des intelligences multiples proposée par Gardner. J’adopte la position selon laquelle le niveau de réussite d’un étudiant n’est pas uniquement influencé par la manière dont l’enseignement est dispensé, mais également par un ensemble de corrélations qui font que chaque individu est influencé par un environnement immédiat et un environnement non immédiat. La capacité humaine de réagir de manière appropriée à un ensemble de corrélations est ce qui constitue la définition moderne d’intelligence (Barrington 2007 : 423) et plus précisément la théorie des intelligences multiples (intelligences multiples). J’émets l’hypothèse qu’une approche par les intelligences multiples a un effet positif sur l’apprentissage des langues.Afin de confirmer ou non cette hypothèse, j’ai évalué le retour d’information de divers acteurs suite à des activités basées sur les intelligences multiples. J’ai d’abord effectué une enquête auprès des enseignants en LANSAD (Langues pour spécialistes d’autres disciplines) au sujet des leurs pratiques. Puis, j’ai sollicité des enseignants en anglais des sciences pour mettre en place ces activités auprès de leurs étudiants, afin d’avoir une vision subjective. Enfin, j’effectue une enquête spécifique autour de la motivation parmi les étudiants en LANSAD.Cette thèse s’organise en trois parties principales. La première partie porte sur la corrélation entre la théorie des intelligences multiples et la réussite en cours d’anglais de spécialité. La deuxième partie est consacrée à la corrélation entre la théorie des intelligences multiples et la créativité. Enfin, la dernière partie propose une analyse de la relation entre la théorie des intelligences multiples et la motivation des étudiants. La conclusion propose quelques suggestions pour l’enseignement des langues de spécialité. / This thesis focuses on language teaching from the perspective of Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences. The level of success of a student is not only influenced by the way in which instruction is delivered, but also by a set of correlations that influence each individual, be that by an immediate or a non-immediate environment. The human capacity to react appropriately to this set of correlations is what constitutes the modern definition of intelligence (Barrington 2007: 423), and more specifically, the theory of multiple intelligences. The thesis hypothesis questions whether a multiple intelligence approach has a positive effect on language learning.To confirm or not this hypothesis, we evaluated various sets of activities based on multiple intelligences. We first conducted a survey of LANSAD teachers on their class practices. Then, we asked teachers in Scientific English to set up these activities in their own classes in order to have a subjective view. Finally, we also carried out a specific investigation on motivation among ESP students.This thesis is divided into three main sections. The first section deals with the correlation between multiple intelligences and language sustainability in English. The second examines the correlation between multiple intelligences and creativity. The last section discusses the relationship between multiple intelligences and motivation in students. The conclusions offer some suggestions for teaching and learning English for specific purposes.

In order to determine the reliability of international students' English as a Second Language (ESL) class performance as a predictor of academic performance, a population of 169 international students at Portland State University (PSU) in Portland, Oregon were selected and statistical tests were performed on their GPAs and TOEFL scores. Individual students' GPAs were computed for all ESL classes taken and for each component--grammar, reading, writing, and speaking/listening--as well as for the end of the first quarter, first year, and second year of academic study. Pearson Coefficient Correlations were then computed for the ESL and academic GPAs. The students were also divided into subgroups based upon gender, nature of academic major (more-verbal or less-verbal), age, nationality (Asian or Middle-Eastern), number of ESL classes taken, amount of previous English-speaking college experience, prior education level, TOEFL score, and PSU entry date. Then mean GPAs were calculated for each of these which were compared by T-tests. The results were mixed. While it was clear that ESL grades and academic grades correlated strongly for some variable groups, it was difficult to determine which variables had the strongest effect because of subgroup composition. For example, female students, students from Asia, and students whose majors fit the more-verbal category showed strong and statistically significant correlations for ESL-second year academic grades; but 90% of the women were from countries of Asia, and the proportion of both Asian and female students in the more-verbal majors was much higher than that of males or students from countries of the Middle East. There were two patterns that stood out in the research results. One was that ESL students who had taken twelve or more ESL classes maintained consistent academic GPAs across time, while those who had taken fewer than twelve ESL classes and all students in the non-ESL group had GPAs that started higher than those of the first group but declined over the two year period--some of them enough to be statistically significant. The second pattern was that groups with strong ESL academic GPA correlations tended to do better in college that did those with weaker ESL-academic GPA relationships. TOEFL scores were correlated to both ESL and academic grades. In the first case, there were both moderately positive and statistically significant relationships. In the second case, the correlations were very low; and for non-ESL students, there was essentially no correlation. But comparing mean academic GPAs showed a significant difference between students who scored below 500 and those who scored 500 and above on the TOEFL.

The aim of the thesis "Marriage preparation" is to reflect topics of marriage preparation in the context of cultural and historical changes; to find out whether the church themes of marriage preparation are written from a view "what is good for marriage" or "what threatens marriage." "Entry into marriage" or "stay married". The theoretical part describes conception and development of marriage since the modern scientism (late 19th century) till the present from a legal, the Christian (biblical and canon law of the Catholic Church and Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren) and sociology point of view. Each input describes the definition of marriage, the conditions for its closure and its termination. This thesis focuses on Czech territory. The analytical part is devoted to issues of marriage preparation in the Catholic Church and Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren and the perspective of themes. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)