Master of Landscape Architecture / Department of Landscape Architecture/Regional and Community Planning / Mary C. Kingery-Page / School environments of today’s urban children are generally inflexible, restricting and uninspiring places for learning and exploration that are disconnected from their surrounding community and nature. Facilities and teaching methods do not keep pace with the evolving needs of the workforce and varying child learning styles (Stanbury 2009). Organized sports, limited free time and standardized testing steal the zest out of childhood discovery once felt by children who grew up with a connection to their surroundings, especially nature. Many adverse effects are seen as a result. “Nature-deficit disorder describes the human costs of alienation from nature, among them: diminished use of the senses, attention difficulties and higher rates of physical and emotional illnesses,” (Louv 2008, 36). Children are left to face the world’s escalating environmental dilemmas with hindered social and cognitive skills, diseases related to association and disassociation from nature and an impaired relationship with their extended community. Programs like University Colorado Denver’s Learning Landscapes and California’s Collaborative for High Performance Schools (CHPS) and have individually worked to improve learning facilities, reconnect students with outdoor curriculum-based learning and establish a bond with their communities. But implemented designs reveal unmet potential, calling for advancement and further evolution of the school learning environment. MontClair Elementary in Oakland, California is a typical urban school with paved schoolyard, restricted boundary, weak link between curriculum and schoolyard, disconnect from the community and disassociation from nature. New CHPS verified facilities are being implemented on their existing campus to accommodate an increase in student population but the link between schoolyard and curriculum has only been minimally addressed in the proposed design. Integrating Learning Landscapes with the Collaborative for High Performance Schools to create a hybrid learning landscape framework will reconnect MontClair Elementary with the surrounding community and nature. Advancement of the CHPS program, through adaptation of their existing scorecard, will allow Hybrid Learning Landscape Framework to be quantitatively applied to MontClair Elementary.

<p> Working in school settings can present school social workers, teachers, and counselors with multiple risk factors that increase their likelihood of experiencing burnout. Providing direct services to students on a regular basis can have a negative impact on their overall sense of well-being along with other factors associated with being employed as a social service provider. Promoting Resilient School Personnel project (PRSP) consists of a series of on-site mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) workshops aimed at providing school social workers, teachers, and counselors at a public school in Los Angeles County with the resources to understand and help prevent burnout, the opportunity to learn and practice different mindfulness-based techniques, and strategies to establish long term self-care habits that promote a high sense of well-being. A potential funder was identified, although actual funding and submission of this grant proposal were not requirements for the successful completion of this project.</p>

<p> This program evaluation examined students that entered kindergarten not ready on the Brigance screener and received research based reading interventions to determine if an elementary school was successful in closing the achievement gap so that they would have the literacy skills needed to be successful in first grade. Evidence of success was based on progress monitoring through Brigance and MAP testing. The researcher concluded that while 50% of the students were ready at the end of kindergarten only 7% returned to first grade ready. Other results indicated that the achievement gap was closing for students in special education but not low income students as well as gains for students receiving intervention and those not receiving intervention were equivalent. Implications for practice include the importance of preschool and full-day kindergarten as well as ensuring that summer learning is considered between kindergarten and first grade.</p>

<p> A mini-economy is an ongoing classroom project in which elementary school students apply for jobs, receive simulated income, go shopping at the classroom store, and ultimately create their own businesses. This study uses design-based research methodology to find out what classroom practices emerge when the College, Career, and Civic Life Framework for Social Studies State Standards (C3 Framework) (National Council for the Social Studies, 2013) is used by elementary teachers as the basis for instruction in the context of a classroom mini-economy, and how analysis of those practices can be used to improve instructional design. Design-based research seeks to simultaneously create and analyze teaching materials, with the purpose of improving both the materials themselves and the research literature on which the materials are based. In this case, the goal of the teaching materials was to improve the authenticity and rigor of the teacher-participants&rsquo; classroom mini-economies. Therefore, the study draws upon research literature in Authentic Intellectual Work, as well as inquiry teaching in social studies, particularly in economic education. </p><p> Authentic Intellectual Work (AIW) is a way to think about curriculum, instruction, and assessment. It seeks &ldquo;to identify some kinds of intellectual work as more complex and socially or personally meaningful than others&rdquo; (King, Newmann, &amp; Carmichael, 2009). It consists of construction of knowledge, disciplined inquiry, and value beyond school (Scheurman &amp; Newmann, 1998). Inquiry teaching in social studies has taken many forms, most currently in the C3 Framework, which was the approach used in this study. The C3 Framework conceptualizes inquiry as &ldquo;the disciplinary concepts and practices that support students as they develop the capacity to know, analyze, explain, and argue about interdisciplinary challenges in our social world&rdquo; (National Council for the Social Studies, 2013, p. 6). Classroom mini-economies in particular fall within the realm of the social science of economics, so the study pays special attention to the literature on K-12 economic education. </p><p> The study reveals ways in which teachers were able to use the C3 Framework to build authenticity in the mini-economy, though it also reveals that teachers were willing to dilute the quality of the inquiry process when it fit with their larger goals. The findings suggest that inquiry as conceived in the C3 Framework can be used as a powerful tool for equipping students for an increasingly complex social world. However, the inquiry process is at its best when lesson materials that use it are carefully designed to meet teachers&rsquo; desires to provide interdisciplinary and real-world experiences for their students.</p>

<p> English learners are expected to acquire academic language and content simultaneously. Long Term English Learners (LTELs), a growing English Learner subgroup, struggle academically and do not have the necessary academic vocabulary proficiency to achieve academic success in our current educational system. </p><p> This mixed-methods study examined the implementation of Academic Vocabulary Instructional protocols in the upper grades in a small urban elementary school district. Semistructured interviews, focus group, observation protocol, and data analysis methods were used as primary methods for data collection. Overall, four key themes emerged in this study. First, all 4th- and 5th-grade teachers implemented the new Academic Vocabulary Toolkit and protocol to address the academic language needs of English learner students. Second, teachers consistently used the academic vocabulary and grammatical frames. Third, teachers regularly modeled the use of an academic register. Finally, there was an increase in the use of grammatical sentence frames and academic vocabulary by students across the content areas. Language Acquisition and Sociocultural Theory in Language conceptual frameworks were used.</p>

<p> Reading proficiently opens doors to college and career pathways. The success of children depends on this fundamental skill, yet students are failing to learn to read. This research investigated the relationship between teacher knowledge of phonemic awareness and the development of early literacy skills in kindergarten students. The study was conducted in a suburban school district of more than 20,000 students. This study sought to identify a kindergarten teacher profile linked to positive student achievement growth in phonemic awareness. Kindergarten student data was collected from 1,258 kindergarten students in 57 classrooms from 21 different elementary schools. Participants ranged between 5 and 7 years old who attended full-time kindergarten classes. The Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills (DIBELS Next Edition, 2011) assessment was used to collect kindergarten student data on the First Sound Fluency measure. Kindergarten classroom teachers were assessed on their knowledge of phonemic awareness. The results of this study demonstrated a general lack of knowledge about phonemic awareness by kindergarten teachers, however, no clear kindergarten teacher profile correlated to student performance on the phonemic awareness measure. Findings may be useful when identifying effective instructional materials for teaching phonemic awareness to kindergarten students. A possible explanation for increased levels of student achievement may be the degree to which the kindergarten teacher utilized the provided phonemic awareness instructional materials. Recommendations for future studies include investigation into the relationship between the use of phonemic awareness instructional materials with fidelity and kindergarten student achievement. </p>

<p>Research has shown that there is a strong link between reading comprehension and vocabulary, yet many children lack the required vocabulary needed to perform adequately on reading comprehension assessments. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the teaching of Larry Bell&rsquo;s 12 Powerful Words vocabulary program in order to raise third, fourth and fifth grade test scores on the North Carolina Reading Comprehension End-of-Grade Assessments. This study surveyed third, fourth and fifth grade teachers concerning their beliefs of the efficacy of this vocabulary program, surveyed third, fourth and fifth grade students to determine their knowledge of these 12 words, and tallied the occurrence of these 12 words on formative and summative assessments administered within the district. A regression analysis was performed to determine if there was a relationship between teachers&rsquo; perceptions and student performance on the North Carolina Reading Comprehension End-of-Grade Assessments. Results of the regression analysis showed no significant relationship between teachers&rsquo; beliefs of the value of teaching these 12 words and students&rsquo; mean scores across 12 years of third, fourth and fifth grade North Carolina Reading Comprehension End-of-Grade Assessments in the district of study. Results of the word searches indicate that only five of these 12 words occurred frequently enough to impact reading assessments. An implication of this study is that teaching and learning a short list of vocabulary words may not result in higher scores on reading comprehension assessments. </p>

<p> Current population trends have revealed a huge influx of non-native English speaking students in the mainstream classroom across the United States. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore what mainstream teachers are doing to meet the academic needs of English Learners (ELs) in their classrooms on a daily basis. The researcher used semi-structured open-ended interview questions in order to gather data to answer five research questions; 1) How do teachers use data to plan for differentiated instruction? 2) How do teachers describe their experiences with differentiated instruction methods in planning reading lessons? 3) What processes do teachers go through when differentiating process, content and product during differentiated instruction? 4) What training do teachers receive to help them become effective at teaching EL students? 5) What challenges do teachers have when using differentiated instruction? Participants of the study were purposefully selected from a title one school in the Southeastern, United States with a high population of ELs. In order to be eligible to participate within the study teachers were required to teach either the third, fourth or fifth grade and have had at least 80% of their EL students meet expectations on the state mandated test in reading. The data analysis revealed six themes; 1) Collaboration 2) A huge inventory of research bases instructional strategies 3) Data-driven instruction 4) Well trained 5) Rigor 6) Learning community (7) Courage and Resilience Findings also suggested that differentiation of choice as well as interest is essential for creating an environment to meet the academic needs of ELs. Further perceptions included; using differentiation in the mainstream classroom was time- consuming, difficult to plan for, and often was met with a lack of resources. Even though, participants identified these challenges they felt that differentiated instruction was the only way to meet the academic needs of ELs. Recommendations for further study included broadening the research study to include classroom observations as well as teachers who are new to teaching ELs in the mainstream classroom setting. Further recommendations for qualitative studies included EL student perceptions of their successes and failures when participating differentiated instruction in the mainstream classroom.</p>

<p> Personalized learning is not a new concept and can be traced back to the 1700s, but it has become increasingly popular in today&rsquo;s schools (Bray &amp; McClaskey, 2015). With the high rate of technology introduction into classrooms, the implementation of personalized learning has become easier as instruction shifts from teacher-led to student-centered (Grant &amp; Bayse, 2014). The purpose of this study was to identify the role of technology in personalized learning and to determine if the implementation of the pedagogy had an effect on student achievement scores. Elementary classroom teachers and elementary principals served as the participants for this study, which was conducted in a southwest Missouri school district. Teachers rated their personal level of personalized learning implementation on a survey. The rating was compared to mean student scale score gains in reading and mathematics, as measured on the i-Ready Diagnostic Assessment. Teachers and administrators also identified how technology impacted personalized learning in their classrooms or buildings. After an analysis of the data, it was determined there was no statistically significant correlation between the degree of implementation of personalized learning and student achievement. According to survey responses, 89% of educators agreed technology eased the implementation of personalized learning, and the teachers and administrators indicated using technology for research and accessing resources outside of the classroom as the most frequent use for devices.</p>

<p> Using de-identified data, this study investigated the relationship between racial categories with curriculum-based early writing measures (CBM-W), which included word dictation, picture word sentence writing, and story prompt tasks for over 300 participants in Grades 1, 2, and 3. Words written, words spelled correctly, correct letter sequences, incorrect letter sequences, and correct-minus-incorrect letter sequences were scoring procedures used to measure student performance in the data set. A one-way ANOVA tested for significant relationships between racial categories across all assessments, test forms, and scoring procedures. Fisher&rsquo;s LSD was applied post hoc for further examination of significant relationships reported from the ANOVA. Overall, findings from this preliminary investigation into racial bias of CBM-W, revealed nonsignificant relationships between racial categories. However, further investigation regarding socioeconomic status, English as a second language (ESL) learners, and background knowledge variables is necessary.</p>