<p> This study focused on student achievement in remedial math through online and traditional delivery modes at Northwest Mississippi Community College. Student participants were interviewed through a semi-structured interview process to determine perceived influences and challenges that affected success in remedial math courses. The perceived influences and challenges that emerged from interview data were used to comparatively analyze online and traditional classroom modality of instruction. The acquired interview data provided for a systematic process to determine if there was a significant difference in student achievement in remedial math based on modality of instruction. A grounded theory methodology was used as a construct for this comparative study. </p><p> The population for consideration was freshmen and sophomore students who attempted a remedial math course online and/or in a traditional classroom format. Participants were interviewed in a face-to-face setting. The study was guided by two research questions: 1.) what are the perceived influences that aided in your academic success in remedial math taken online or in a traditional classroom format at Northwest Mississippi Community College? 2.) What are the challenges that hindered your academic success in remedial math courses online or in traditional classroom format at Northwest Mississippi Community College? </p><p> According to the perceptions of the participants in the study, there was no significant difference in student achievement in remedial math online compared with traditional classroom instruction based on influences that aided in success. Furthermore, there was not a significant difference in challenges that hindered academic success among students who attempted remedial math online and in the traditional classroom.</p><p>

The availability and sophistication of visual display images, such as simulations, for use in science classrooms has increased exponentially however, it can be difficult for teachers to use these images to encourage and engage active student thinking. There is a need to describe flexible discussion strategies that use visual media to engage active thinking. This mixed methods study analyzes teacher behavior in lessons using visual media about the particulate model of matter that were taught by three experienced middle school teachers. Each teacher taught one half of their students with lessons using static overheads and taught the other half with lessons using a projected dynamic simulation. The quantitative analysis of pre-post data found significant gain differences between the two image mode conditions, suggesting that the students who were assigned to the simulation condition learned more than students who were assigned to the overhead condition. Open coding was used to identify a set of eight image-based teaching strategies that teachers were using with visual displays. Fixed codes for this set of image-based discussion strategies were then developed and used to analyze video and transcripts of whole class discussions from 12 lessons. The image-based discussion strategies were refined over time in a set of three in-depth 2x2 comparative case studies of two teachers teaching one lesson topic with two image display modes. The comparative case study data suggest that the simulation mode may have offered greater affordances than the overhead mode for planning and enacting discussions. The 12 discussions were also coded for overall teacher student interaction patterns, such as presentation, IRE, and IRF. When teachers moved during a lesson from using no image to using either image mode, some teachers were observed asking more questions when the image was displayed while others asked many fewer questions. The changes in teacher student interaction patterns suggest that teachers vary on whether they consider the displayed image as a "tool-for-telling" and a "tool-for-asking." The study attempts to provide new descriptions of strategies teachers use to orchestrate image-based discussions designed to promote student engagement and reasoning in lessons with conceptual goals.

The focus of this study is to examine the factors that comprise convenience for distance education students. The prevailing assumption regarding student selection of distance education is that the choice is directly related to convenience and the ability to control the time and place of their learning. Students are selecting and repeatedly taking distance education courses; this research sought to understand the reasons behind this selection. The premise of this study is there are many bundles that underlie the convenience in distance education and they are related to factors other than anywhere, anytime learning. Previous studies have relied on the use of survey data regarding students' preferences regarding distance education. This study utilized a qualitative approach to allow the students to tell their own stories. Nine distance students attending community college were interviewed for this research. The student stories and experiences provide the data and basis for the findings of this study. Implications for future research are discussed.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the factors that influence the persistence of adult students in online undergraduate courses at the community college level. Quantitative analysis of survey results from 476 students enrolled in on-line courses at two community colleges indicate that desire to complete the degree, previous experience in on-line courses and assignment completion are the strongest predictors of course completion. The findings from this research also provide the basis for making recommendations for future research and improving policy and practice. Finally, the results of this study suggest the basis for developing new models for understanding persistence in on-line courses.

The purpose of this year long strategic ethnography is to discover how introducing digital storytelling into an urban second grade classroom impacts the study of language arts and repositions students as literacy learners. Research questions include: (1) In a classroom where most of the students have never used computers before as learning tools, what happens as they learn to create books using digital means? (2) How do the students position themselves as authors, and how do they use imagery in representing their alphabetic (or regular print) texts? For this study, the students write stories in cooperative writing groups and choose their own topics. The students illustrate their stories and the illustrations are scanned for digitalization. The students learn how to word process their stories, and the students also learn how to incorporate both image and text onto a page using a computer application. The researcher is a participant/observer, spending one language arts period per week in this classroom. The methods of data collection include: fieldnotes, digital photographs, audio tapes, video tapes, student surveys, teacher interviews, news stories and demographic information collected from Winterdale school system, student generated texts and other student artifacts. The frameworks of this study include: The New London Group’s theory of multiliteracies, Kress and van Leeuwen’s theory of semiotics, and Spradley’s analysis techniques based on ethnographic participant observation. Analysis of these student generated texts using the frameworks mentioned, critical discourse analysis and domain analysis help to reveal emerging themes and how the students position themselves as writers. Video footage, fieldnotes, participant observation and dialogical data show that the students in this study were excited and energized by their involvement with the Digital Storytelling Project (DSP) and that the use of computer and digital media technology was very well received. As the students shared in the decision making involved in designing a story, they positioned themselves and one another as authorities, and as successful and creative writers and illustrators. Creating the images for their stories opened up yet another mode of communication and became a source of competence for the students. They used their imaginations and elaborated on their story lines as they added visual details that were not found in the written texts. The DSP also raised the classroom teacher’s awareness of computer technology and gave her the courage to be an active participant in the realm of technology alongside her students. Three of the student participants exhibited positive behavior changes as a result of participating in this project. This study implies that pairing social semiotics with computer technology can enable students, including at-risk students, to find modes of communication that they can employ, and this has the potential to increase active engagement with literacy learning.

This dissertation will document the development of a computerized audio-visual system that uses interactive instructional modules to inform and educate United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) employees in the fuzzy areas of work force diversity (i.e., soft areas that offer multiple views and options in dealing with a situation). For example, in text, video and auditory modes, the system presents several alternative techniques for dealing with a variety of stereotypes that are generated in the work environment. The user learns a range of techniques that may be applied successfully. This includes the established as well as the more innovative approaches, such as establishing an agency-wide calendar that marks off all religious holidays or the development of discussion groups. The system's operation will be observed in terms of three design features: (1) flexibility to select auditory and/or visual interface, (2) flexibility to select topics and techniques, and (3) appropriateness of the technology for the subject matter. Also, users will be interviewed a few weeks after interacting with the system to assess the degree to which the users' initial requests for instruction (i.e., choices to access particular topics) were satisfied.

Who were the proponents and what were the circumstances that ultimately led to the adoption of Chapter 560, An Act Creating the Massachusetts Educational Telecommunications Corporation, by the Massachusetts legislature and its signing into law by Governor Edward King on December 23, 1982? To understand the history of Chapter 560, it is necessary to turn first to the Engineering School of the University of Massachusetts where the long process that led to Chapter 560 really began in the 1960's. The School of Engineering recognized the possibilities of the new technologies for offering education at-a-distance. In 1969, it commissioned Genesys Systems, Inc. of Mountain View, California to survey the various technologies available for linking teaching institutions with remote classrooms. The first step had been taken on a road that would eventually lead to Chapter 560. It is the contention of this dissertation that the University of Massachusetts played a sine qua non role in the ultimate passage of the legislation creating an educational telecommunications network for Massachusetts. The process that began with the School of Engineering soon passed on to the Office of the President. In 1973, the first Committee on Telecommunications was created by President Robert Wood. From this time on, all initiatives relative to the establishment of a state-wide telecommunications network employing the latest technologies would be centered in the Office of the President of the University of Massachusetts. The work of the Commissions appointed by President Wood in the Seventies came to an abrupt halt with the resignation of President Wood in 1977. The next stage in the evolution of Chapter 560 would begin with the appointment of David C. Knapp as President of the University of Massachusetts. The Telecommunications Commissions appointed by President Knapp will be the main focus of the dissertation, for it is their work that led directly to Chapter 560. The main sources for the work of the Commissions are the minutes of the meetings, the correspondence that issued from Commission members and Presidential staff and the interviews with key participants. The dissertation will conclude with a careful evaluation of what happened after the signing of Chapter 560.

This study adapted the knowledge engineering process from expert systems research and used it to acquire the combined knowledge of a mathematics student and a mathematics teacher. The knowledge base acquired was used to inform the design of a hypercard learning environment dealing with linear and quadratic functions. The researcher, who is also a mathematics teacher, acted as both knowledge engineer and expert. In the role of knowledge engineer, she conducted sixteen sessions with a student-expert. The purpose of the knowledge engineering sessions was to acquire an explicit representation of the student's expertise. The student's expertise was her view of mathematical concepts as she understood them. The teacher also made explicit her understanding of the same mathematical concepts discussed by the student. A graphical representation of the knowledge of both student and teacher was developed. This knowledge base informed the design of a hypercard learning environment on functions. Three major implications for teaching and learning emerged from the research. First, the teacher as knowledge engineer is a compelling new way to conceptualize the teacher's role. In the role of knowledge engineer, the teacher develops an understanding of the student's knowledge base which can inform curriculum. Second, recognizing the student as expert allows the student to be a more active participant in the learning process. Finally, hypercard is an appropriate and promising application for the development of knowledge based systems which will encourage the active participation of teachers and students in the development of curriculum.

The Evolutionary Tool Kit, a new software package, is the prototype of a concept simulator providing an environment for students to create microworlds of populations of artificial organisms. Its function is to model processes, concepts and arguments in natural selection and evolutionary biology, using either Mendelian asexual or sexual reproduction, or counterfactual systems such as 'paint pot' or blending inheritance. In this environment students can explore a conceptual "What if?" in evolutionary biology, test misconceptions and deepen understanding of inheritance and changes in populations. Populations can be defined either with typological, or with populational thinking, to inquire into the role and necessity of variation in natural selection. The approach is generative not tutorial. The interface is highly graphic with twenty traits set as icons that are moved onto the 'phenotypes'. Activities include investigations of evolutionary theory of aging, reproductive advantage, sexual selection and mimicry. Design of the activities incorporates Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences. Draft of a teacher and student manual are included.

Public education has been in a recession many years longer than our economy and unless we make some attempt to break from the past the outlook for public education in the state of Massachusetts looks bleak. This study discusses the status of experienced teachers working in public schools in ten communities in Massachusetts. Using the telephone interview survey the research shows a lack of technological skills among the participants and demonstrates a definite need for retooling the seasoned teacher. Public schools do many things well but very often we find our school systems short on finances and short on long-range planning. This is especially true in the areas of staff development. There are still many educators who are still professing that our traditional teaching methods are adequate to address the needs of today's student. The survey relates the responses of one hundred teachers regarding their knowledge and expertise in the use of computers and the use of computers in education. Retooling the experienced teacher is essential to the success of our public schools. Among the towns surveyed all ten of the communities reported that seventy-five to eighty percent of their teaching staffs are on the maximum salary step. The subjects of this study ranged from twenty years of experience to thirty-four years. The literature review indicated that very little research has been conducted around the topic of teacher training in technology. Most of the literature and research has been dedicated to the promotion of various brands of computers and various software programs and very little on the needs of the classroom teacher in the age of technology. All of the subjects surveyed recognized the prominence of computers in education and also showed a willingness to be trained to make use of the computers available to them. This study discussed the responses of the teachers and their suggestions for staff development.