<p> The topic of this study examines how the art classroom can be a site to facilitate agency amongst high school students. The research questions for this study are: (a) How will implementing a unit of instruction based in youth participatory action research (YPAR), critical pedagogy, visual culture, and art activism facilitate a change in students&rsquo; attitudes towards their own agency to impact change? (b) How will implementing a unit of instruction based in youth participatory action research (YPAR), critical pedagogy, visual culture, and art activism promote agency within students to think of art as a tool to affect change within their communities? This study uses critical pedagogy to situate students&rsquo; concerns and lived experiences as a starting point. Through a visual culture arts education (VCAE) approach, I developed a discussion about students&rsquo; ability to critically examine how their visual experience produces belief systems that perpetuate social inequities. Lastly, this research utilizes Socially Engaged Art (SEA) to theorize art&rsquo;s ability to build awareness and propose solutions to social concerns. I conducted this study as a Youth Based Participatory Action Research (YPAR) project in which students are active participants within the research, design, and implementation of the study.</p><p>

<p> With the ever-changing requirements of a secondary level of education and the application of standardized testing criteria to determine proficiency in mastery of the subject matter, the attempt to create a standard and acceptable curriculum for all school sites has left the control of the schools. Now classrooms are scrambling for focus, guidance and support with curriculum development and implementation. Over the last three decades, there have been numerous research studies that have examined the place of the classroom teacher in the process of creating curriculum for their classroom with mixed results. The efforts to reform secondary education, from the federal level to the local level, have shut out the local input from teachers and professionals in their particular fields as to what the curriculum in the classroom should be and left that decision to people outside the classroom environment.</p><p> This research study was conducted to derive a theory developed on the empirical basis of teacher input through the lens of the methodology of grounded theory. Its goal was to identify the underlying issues and problems associated with classroom teachers; input into local curriculum as well as the barriers to changing the prevailing thought of classroom teachers on curriculum. Classroom teachers from two separate academic subject matters that are currently being taught at the middle school level were interviewed and their responses were coded using the classical grounded theory methodology and processes.</p><p> The resulting research shows that the involvement of classroom teachers is considered a benefit to the local curriculum development, regardless of experience in the classroom or length of service as a teacher. While most teachers feel that their input is paramount to learning in their particular classroom, teachers admit that they lack the skills to effectively create curriculum for implementation. It is in this manner that teachers strive to do what is best for their students; however, in some cases they lack the support and direction from the district, state or federal level. Knowing the issue as it appears to the classroom teacher, the creation, implementation and execution of locally created curriculum would be and is met with great resistance due to the adherence to the prevailing thoughts on curriculum development at the state of federal level and the need to comply with and execute the curriculum within the existing frameworks.</p><p> Further studies in looking at the existence of and use of locally teacher created and implemented curriculum, in different state or regional areas, would contribute to a better and clearer understanding of the particular issues that surround and deal with teacher involvement in the classroom curriculum decision making process. It is believed that the use of the grounded theory model as a methodological research tool provides a pathway for all interested parties to be open and candid about the issue and provide a better introspective look at the issues at hand.</p><p>

This dissertation examines the academic and social goals that three second-grade English language learners in a U.S. urban school bring to their blog-mediated academic writing practices, and the interrelated nature of those goals. This study aims to bridge the dichotomy between approaches to studying computer-mediated language and literacy development that are oriented toward academic goals inside school, and those that are oriented toward social goals outside school. The study also aims to investigate connections between language use and language development by highlighting linguistic features of semiotic choices that the students made for their texts. This builds upon recent research studies of literacy practices that focus only on situated uses of literacy in various social and cultural contexts (Christie & Martin, 2007). In this study, learning is defined as appropriation and language is defined as a semiotic system, from sociocultural perspectives that capture the transformative nature of tool-mediated practices (Bakhtin, 1981; Halliday, 1985; Kress, 1998; Vygotsky, 1978). Ethnographic data collected over the course of a year include students’ texts, blog comments, videotaped classroom interactions, interviews, instructional materials, and school documents. Analysis of the data examines student goals, semiotic choices employed by the students, and roles adopted by the students, in the social processes of learning academic genres. Systemic functional linguistics is used to analyze register variables across texts and blogging comments, to examine changes in the students’ uses of linguistic resources. The findings demonstrate that students appropriate blogging for both academic and social goals, and compose their texts by drawing on linguistic features appropriate for goals related to the audiences reading their blog posts. Writing for meaningful goals and for wider audiences encourages ELLs to become more invested in learning, and to use linguistic patterns in context-dependent ways. The study concludes with a discussion of the significance of social goals in developing critical academic literacies (Gebhard, Harman, & Seger, 2007), and implications for K-12 educators who are attempting to open up curricular spaces in which all stakeholders collaboratively work toward transformative learning experiences for ELLs (Willett & Rosenberger, 2005).

The purpose of this study was to explore, describe and examine how early childhood teachers utilize and integrate the arts (music, drama, and visual arts) in teaching children ages 3 to 5. It also examined the formal and informal arts education background of early childhood teachers, the relationship between teacher training and educational practice and the role it plays in teachers’ use of music, drama and visual arts in their curriculum. Data was collected through the use of the Arts Integration Questionnaire (AIQ) and by observations, Arts Integration observation Protocol (AIOP). A total of 91 early childhood teachers completed the questionnaire; it included background information as well as general aspects of teacher’s knowledge about the arts, an exploration of the use of the arts in their classrooms, and an exploration of arts integration with other academic subjects. From those participants, 20 teachers were randomly selected to participate in the observations. The results of the study indicated that the majority of teachers have received formal and informal training in music, followed closely by visual arts, and very little in drama. Overall teachers were found to use music more than visual arts and drama in their classrooms; more time is spend on musical activities than in any other form. Again teachers preferred music because they considered it to be more beneficial than drama and the visual arts. This study revealed an array of reasoning behind the arts use in the classroom including addressing different learning styles, students’ preference, and stimulating students’ creativity. There was no statistical significant difference between a teacher’s background training and experience and their use of music and drama into their early childhood classroom. In the case of visual arts there is a statistical significant difference meaning that teachers need training and experience to help them develop an understanding of the visual arts. And finally teachers do integrate the arts with other academic subjects with the purpose of developing skills, explore roles, and to assess learning and understanding of concepts. Recommendations for professional development, teacher education, and further research are discussed.

Although a limited body of research has supported the positive impact of the Tools of the Mind curriculum on the development of self-regulation, research supporting a direct relationship between Tools and academic achievement is extremely limited. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of the Tools of the Mind curriculum implementation in improving math and reading scores in Kindergarten by comparing scores obtained before and after Tools. This study also seeks to investigate the effects of SES on student achievement. Finally, this study seeks to identify contributions and challenges perceived by teachers during implementation. Participants included 93 students in the before Tools condition and 97 students after Tools. Students who had Tools scored statistically significantly lower on reading scores than students who did not have Tools. While students also scored lower on math after Tools, this difference was not significant. Differences were found in student scores based on SES. Qualitative results are base interviews of six Kindergarten teachers, and revealed teachers' experiences with implementation. The findings of this study are intended to increase the understanding of the effectiveness of Tools and its implementation.

The purpose of the study was to determine whether or not elementary classroom teachers’ exploration of an integrated theoretical model of formative assessment would change participants’ understandings of formative assessment and whether or not participants would apply this newly-acquired knowledge to their classroom assessment practices. After exploring elements of formative assessment in a collaborative study group, participants applied new understandings to their classroom assessment practices. The model of formative assessment explored by the study group included these elements: the articulation of clear learning outcomes, the alignment of instruction and assessment to learning outcomes; the providing of feedback to students and using feedback to plan future instruction; and the involvement of students in classroom assessment practices. Previous research on formative assessment has demonstrated the importance of individual elements of formative assessment. This case study provided teachers with an integrated theoretical model that included all of the elements of formative assessment identified in the research literature and used this model as the basis for professional development to change teachers’ classroom practice. Data were gathered through surveys, study group transcripts, participant reflections, classroom observations, interviews with students and documents from individual classrooms. Data were analyzed using a constant comparative method in an effort to identify categories and themes that emerged for changes in teachers’ understandings and classroom practices for each of the elements of formative assessment. Results of the study indicate that the collaborative study group changed teachers’ understandings of the elements of formative assessment, the important relationships among the elements and the teachers’ classroom formative assessment practices. The collaborative study group also provided participants with a supportive environment in which to share their experiences as they attempted to implement new assessment practices in their classrooms.

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No description available.

In this elementary science curriculum development effort, concepts are used as tools in the realization of objectives, but they are not objectives in themselves.

In order to make school camping programs educationally more effective, teachers, school administrators and educational policy-makers should be provided with data on the important issues of conducting school camping programs. Some of these issues include goals for school camping programs and constraints in conducting such programs and knowledge and value perception of teachers and school administrators concerning school camping programs. However, little research has been obtained to get empirical data on these issues. The purposes of this study were to: (1) diagnose teacher and school administrator attitudes toward the value of outdoor education and school camping and skill level necessary for conducting outdoor education and school camping programs, (2) identify broad goals and program objectives for school camping as well as constraining factors based on the teacher and school administrator opinions, (3) ascertain variables that influence teacher and school administrator attitudes toward the outdoor education and school camping. Among one thousand fifty questionnaires sent, seven hundred thirty-three were returned and seven hundred twenty three responses were analyzed by ANOVA, MANOVA, and Factor Analysis. The results and conclusions of this study can be summarized as follows: (1) In general, teachers and school administrators are quite positive toward the value of outdoor education and school camping. (2) Teachers and school administrators are not equipped with knowledge and skills related to outdoor education and school camping. (3) Five sets of broad goals were extracted through Factor Analysis and all of them were considered desirable as the goals for school camping. However, teachers and school administrators prefer the goal "To improve human relationships" to other goals. (4) Seven constraining factors were identified through Factor Analysis. Among the seven constraining factors, "Administrative difficulties and teacher inconvenience" was considered the most constraining factors. (5) Several variables were found to influence teacher and school administrator attitudes toward outdoor education and school camping.