No description available.

Thesis (MPhil)--University of Stellenbosch, 2004. / Library lacks CD-ROM. On title page: MPhil in Hypermedia for Language Learning. Bibliography. Also available via the Internet.

<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> This dissertation presents findings from a qualitative case study of three English teachers representing varying levels of comfort with technology and years of teaching experience at St. Patrick Catholic High School. This research was motivated by two questions: (1) What are three literacy educators&rsquo; perceptions of a multimodal tablet initiative at a Catholic High School? (2) How is information regarding the use of iPad technology for literacy disseminated to three High School English teachers within a Catholic School system? Data was collected over a twelve-week period during the first academic year of implementation of a school-based multimodal tablet (iPad) initiative. Implementation during this time period was limited to students in their first and second year of high school. Under the direction of the initiative, teachers were tasked with utilizing the iPad as part of their daily instruction. Moreover, three Apps were highlighted for explicit use for uploading assignments and sharing content with students. Additionally, all textbooks utilized were in digital format. Data collected includes: artifacts, observations, interviews, and reflective field notes. Findings from this research indicate that all participants had positive perceptions of the tablet initiative and its promise for the future of the school and effect on student achievement. They felt, however, many areas that would support the effective implementation of the initiative were overlooked in lieu of the school remaining overly focused on maintaining its competitive edge against neighboring private schools. In essence, the school&rsquo;s leadership utilized the iPads like &ldquo;pixie dust&rdquo;- sprinkling them around campus and hoping for an increase in achievement and digital citizenship among students without providing appropriate support and guidance for the teaching staff. Furthermore, the teachers believed the device presented new difficulties within the classroom dynamic including struggles with classroom management, academic honesty, and networking. The path of dissemination for information was convoluted with leadership members often verbally presenting conflicting expectations and information. While promising, the initiative lacked clearly articulated expectations for how teachers should integrate the device in their classrooms. Information related to the initiative was most often disseminated verbally via faculty meetings, but also uploaded within the school&rsquo;s digital communication system. This digital drive was overly crowded with documents and lacked organization making locating information tedious and challenging. Given the pilot status of this implementation, the administrators did not present fully developed evaluative procedures or expectations for iPad integration creating uncertainty for teachers. These findings offer insight into the need for meaningful and individualized professional development opportunities for teachers that focus on deep interactions with multimodal capabilities prior to the onset of any initiative aiming to integrate iPad technology. Additionally, a clear path of dissemination in which expectations are written, explicit, and correlated with evaluative procedures would likely reduce confusion among teachers. Aligning the goals from all leadership members in an effort to create consistency among the information shared with staff is critical to implementing a technology initiative effectively. </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>

Interactive teaching approaches have been documented as viable and effective methods of comprehension instruction. This study identified the components characteristic of interactive and directive teaching. The language employed by teachers and learning disabled (LD) students engaged in one of three interactive strategies or a directive strategy are described and compared with student performance. A written summary and a multiple choice comprehension test served as dependent measures. Subjects were upper elementary bilingual, LD students and their teachers in eight self contained or resource classrooms. Classes were randomly assigned to one of four instructional conditions: (a) semantic mapping, (b) semantic feature analysis, (c) semantic syntactic feature analysis, or (d) direct instruction. Teacher utterances were coded according to general, directive, and interactive teaching functions. Student utterances were coded according to prior knowledge categories including elaborate, specific, restrictive, and response, and other. Results reported indicate findings regarding classroom interaction, condition effects, and theoretical tenets. Teacher and student interaction patterns revealed (a) no difference in the amount of teacher talk across assigned conditions, (b) "no response" as the most frequent student response to teacher utterances, and (c) the most student to student conversation occurred in the semantic feature analysis and the semantic syntactic feature analysis condition. Condition effect findings reported significant difference on prior knowledge and cohesiveness of written summaries. Student performance on the multiple choice test exhibited no significant difference on vocabulary items. Theoretical divergence was represented by interactive and directive teaching functions that were most differently used. These differences characterize interactive and directive instruction. Findings indicate that learning disabled students are capable of benefiting from interactive instruction; and, teachers engaged in interactive instruction employ teaching functions that encouraged student participation in classroom discussion.

This study addressed four questions about bilingual first graders' Spanish and English retellings. First, how do their retellings change over the period of one school year? Second, how do their own Spanish and English retellings of the same story compare and contrast? Third, do English retellings influence Spanish retellings? Fourth, do Spanish retellings influence English retellings? The retellings were scored using a holistic measure. Nine bilingual first grade students were placed in two experimental groups based on teacher observation. The groups were comprised of a heterogenous mix of students and were similar to each other. The first graders' Spanish and English retellings improved over the school year. Their Spanish retellings consistently scored higher than their English retellings. The findings did not indicate an influence of Spanish retellings on English retellings. There was no influence of English retellings on Spanish retellings, except in one domain of the measure used.

<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> Given that reading at the third-grade level by the end of third grade is a predictor of future academic success, the purpose of this study was to determine if receiving or revoking English Language (EL) services had an impact on students&rsquo; ability to read at a third-grade level by the end of third grade. In this quantitative study, the scores of students (N= 258) from a suburban school district were examined to determine if EL service status, gender, ethnicity, and family income significantly impacted students&rsquo; reading fluency scores.</p><p> Results of the study indicated that there were no statistically significant differences in reading achievement scores between students who accepted and who revoked EL services. The study also found that gender, ethnicity, and family income did not affect the relationship between EL service status and students&rsquo; ability to read at third-grade level by the end of third grade. </p><p> Results of this study indicated that the use of pull-out EL instruction did not have a statistically significant impact on students&rsquo; ability to read at a third-grade level by the end of third grade. Although the results were not statistically significant, there was a pattern wherein proportionally more students who accepted EL services met the third-grade target (81 %) in comparison to those students who revoked EL services (76%), suggesting that EL services do have some impact on students&rsquo; ability to meet reading achievement goals.</p><p> Results of this study indicated that pull-out EL instruction, which is one of the many types of instruction commonly used for EL instruction, should be examined more closely in order to determine its effectiveness in helping EL students reach reading achievement goals.</p>

<p> This study examined the effectiveness of an evidenced-based reading intervention, Word Sort, with bilingual students receiving dual immersion education. This study expands upon the existing research on Word Sort by examining its impact on bilingual students&rsquo; reading fluency. The following research questions was proposed: Is Word Sort an effective intervention with bilingual (dual immersion) students who are struggling early readers? A visual analysis and effect size of participants&rsquo; data across baseline and treatment conditions found that all three participants&rsquo; Oral Reading Fluency (ORF) improved. This suggests that Word Sort is a promising intervention for bilingual, dual immersion students with reading delays.</p>