This dissertation presents the linguistic ecology of a Spanish-English, bilingual first grade classroom. The term linguistic ecology refers to the communicative behaviors of a group, as well as the physical and social contexts in which their communication occurs. In addition, a linguistic ecology includes the reciprocal influences of persons and environment on each other. Two questions guided this study: (1) How do the children interpret the roles of English and Spanish in their classroom environment? and (2) What resources, human and material, are made available to support the development of both languages in this bilingual classroom? Three over-arching categories were used to describe and analyze the linguistic ecology as viewed by the children: (1) the materials available in the school to support Spanish development; (2) the staffing for bilingual instruction; and (3) the dynamics of language use within the school, especially within one first-grade classroom. The results of this inquiry study strongly suggest that children of bilingual classrooms discern that (1) more time is devoted to English instruction; (2) more communication occurs in English; (3) few teachers have high levels of Spanish proficiency; (4) the personnel of bilingual schools utilize more English than Spanish in the school environment; and (5) Spanish language resource materials are fewer in number and often less appealing than their English-language counterparts. In effect, this case study documents and interprets the social and educational processes through which bilingual children in one U.S. school come to appreciate the prestige and power of English versus Spanish.

The subject of art in Arizona elementary schools is often taught by general classroom teachers with no art training. In an attempt to rectify this situation, The 1986 Arizona Institute for Elementary Art Education, following the example of the Getty Institute for Educators on the Visual Arts, created Staff Development and Curriculum Implementation Programs for these teachers. This study evaluates the Curriculum Implementation Program of Year One of the Arizona Institute. Data for the study were compiled from 10 classroom observations and 23 interviews of Institute participants by two evaluators. The components of discipline-based instruction taught during Summer Staff Development were implemented by all participants. Implementation was on at least a mechanical level of use, and the evaluators' results showed interrater agreement.

<p>This quasiexperimental single group design study investigated the validity of the Vocabulary Levels Test (VLT) to identify fourth and fifth grade students who are at-risk in vocabulary development. The subjects of the study were 88 fourth and fifth grade students at one elementary school in Washington State. The Group Reading Assessment and Diagnostic Evaluation (GRADE), a previously validated vocabulary assessment with fourth and fifth grade students, was used to determine concurrent validity with two VLT subtests, the 2000 level and Academic Word Level. The two VLT subtests and GRADE vocabulary subtests were administered over one academic week near the end of the 2011-2012 school year. </p><p> Prior research has identified vocabulary knowledge and development as a key indicator in reading achievement. However, there is currently a lack of assessments able to identify students who are struggling with vocabulary development. The VLT is a well-established and researched vocabulary test which identifies levels of vocabulary knowledge, but it has been used exclusively with English language learners primarily at the university level. The study, therefore, expands on the current research base on the VLT with a new population to determine if the VLT is a valid vocabulary assessment for fourth and fifth grade students. </p>

<p> Since the landmark Coleman Report was issued in 1966 and questioned whether School Practice, or inputs, may have any effects on student performance, there has been considerable debate in the educational community regarding the role that School Practice may play in learning. More contemporary research has suggested that such factors as teacher training and retention, class and school size, and spending per student, may all have impacts on student academic achievement. Many of the studies that have found School Practice to be influential on higher levels of achievement proficiency have been criticized by others in the professional community for not considering School Context. School Context includes those features of schools over which teachers and administrators have little decision-making authority, such as the socioeconomic, ethnic, and linguistic background of the students at that school, or the school's attendance rate. </p><p> Others have found that for disadvantaged minorities, School Practice may have greater effects than for the general population. This study provides evidence that for Hispanic students, School Practice contributes a small amount to explaining differences in English language arts and mathematics achievement, considering the much larger effects of School Context. </p><p> Additionally, this research suggests that School Practice may have different effects based on geography and subject area content. Specifically, the results of this study suggest that School Practice may be more meaningful for mathematics than for English language arts. School Practice may also have greater effects in schools that are not located in wealthy suburban counties, such as those that surround New York City. In spite of the aggregate small effects of School Practice, there were two variables that were particularly important for their effects on both ELA and mathematics achievement. These variables were the percentage of teachers at a school with advanced levels of training, which had a small positive effect; and the teacher turnover rate, which to a degree had a negative impact on student achievement.</p>

The problem was to determine how comparable is comparable improvement for campuses in Texas. An alternative strategy for determining comparable improvement was developed using 2000 comparable improvement data provided by the Texas Education Agency for 2,403 elementary campuses. Comparable improvement is a measure that shows how student performance has changed from one year to the next and then compares that growth to 40 schools that are demographically most similar to the target school. Instead of using the most dominant characteristic as in the current process, the percent of students in poverty was the initial sorting characteristic. The impact of sorting by poverty was reviewed in four areas: 1.) the impact on quartile placement, 2.) the TLI average growth for the comparison group, 3.) the award eligibility, and 4.) the changes in comparison group composition. No practical significant difference was found for research questions 1 and 3, however, a practical significant difference was found in group average TLI growth for math and in the comparison group composition. Overall, the alternative process had the greatest impact on campuses with 40-80% poverty. Three possible factors may have influenced the results. First, the middle poverty campuses had the most change in comparison group as found in question 4. Second, the interaction between the middle poverty campuses and the alternative process could have been fueled by the removal of the 1,295 campuses with poverty as the dominant characteristic in current system. Third, the high correlation between poverty and ethnicity may have limited any impact of the alternative process.

<p> The purpose of this study was to discover the meaning of school body mass index (BMI) screening and referral to parents. The goal of school BMI screening and referral is to provide information to compel parents to change their child&rsquo;s diet and activity levels when overweight and obesity are identified. Measuring BMI in schools and alerting parents to findings above what is considered normal is one intervention to reduce overweight and obesity that has been utilized since 2001 in Florida. </p><p> To determine the meaning of BMI screening and referral to parents a mixed methods approach was utilized. Voluntary interviews of 20 parents who had received BMI referrals for their children were conducted. Analysis of the interviews was guided by phenomenology, as delineated by van Manen (1997). A cross sectional survey developed by Ruggieri (2012), was distributed to measure parent beliefs and opinions regarding the BMI screening and their reaction to referrals.</p><p> Findings from interviews indicated that parents ascribe different meaning to school BMI screening and referral. Overarching themes of changing and reflecting were discovered. The themes were manifested as dichotomies; some parents reflected on their role as parent and were more satisfied with the process; they reported change of diet and activity for their families upon receipt of a BMI referral. Others reflected on the role of the school in their child&rsquo;s life. They were more dissatisfied with the school screening and recommended changes in the screening and referral process. Suggested changes for school screening and referrals included subthemes: sensitivity, accuracy, privacy, and notification. </p><p> Parents responded in the survey that they would change diet and activity for their families if they were told by the school that their child had a weight issue. Actions taken upon receipt of a BMI referral were not limited to changing diet and activity levels but also included discussing weight with their child and others. Parents denied they would be offended by a BMI referral. School BMI screening and referral is a valuable and effective intervention to address child overweight and obesity, especially if the process is accomplished with characteristics that parents deem caring.</p>

Depuis la rentrée scolaire de septembre 2002, les écoles primaires québécoises doivent composer avec une nouvelle organisation des programmes ainsi qu’avec de nouveaux contenus. Au premier cycle, en univers social, la compétence visée est « Construire sa représentation de l’espace, du temps et de la société » (MEQ, 2001). Or, nous savons que, pour bâtir un enseignement qui a pour but de guider un individu dans la construction de sa représentation, il est nécessaire d’avoir conscience de ses représentations initiales de l’objet. Mais, quelles sont les représentations du temps des élèves de maternelle et de premier cycle du primaire au Québec? C’est la question que nous nous posons dans cette thèse. Pour y répondre, nous avons cherché à circonscrire le temps dont il est question en proposant une réflexion théorique sur son essence et en analysant les sens qu’il prend dans le programme. Puis, nous avons mis en place une méthodologie et les outils lui étant nécessaires pour dégager les dimensions de représentations présentes dans les discours de 164 sujets de maternelle, de première et de deuxième année, répartis sur 13 classes d’écoles de la grande région montréalaise. À l’issue de cette recherche, nous pouvons proposer aux chercheurs et aux enseignants une nouvelle liste de dimensions de représentations du temps adaptée au contexte québécois actuel. Cette liste nous permet de dépeindre le paysage des représentations du temps des élèves des classes que nous avons visitées. Enfin, riche de nos résultats, nous pouvons émettre quelques remarques et principes pour l’enseignement du temps en classe. / Since September 2002, elementary schools in Quebec have to use a new series of programs with a new content. In the first cycle, in social universe, the competence that is targeted is "Building its representation of space, time and society" (MEQ, 2001). But we know that to build a teaching with the aim to guide an individual in the construction of his/her representation, it is necessary to be aware of the initial representations of the object. But what are the representations of time for students in kindergarten and in the first cycle in elementary school in Quebec? That is the question we are asking in this thesis. To answer this question, we sought to express the time by proposing a theoretical reflection on its essence and analyzing the sense that it takes in the program. Our methodology identified the dimensions of these representations in the verbalization of 164 subjects in kindergarten and in first and second year of elementary school, spread over 13 classes in Montreal. Through this research, we would be able to provide researchers and educators with a new list of dimensions of time representations adapted to the current educational system in Quebec as well as to express the representations of time from the classes that we have visited. Finally, thanks to these results, we will be able to suggest a few remarks and principals on how to teach time in classrooms.

The purpose of this study is to identify and evaluate the competencies that a person who desires to teach should possess in order to be an effective classroom teacher. Identification of these competencies will be made from evidence obtained through a consensus of student's opinions, these opinions to be solicited from students currently enrolled in courses required for a major in elementary education, and from the consensus of faculty members who ware currently teaching these courses.

This study was made to determine the relationship between n Achievement, the McClelland technique measure of achievement motivation obtained from picture-story protocols, and academic achievement in elementary school children. The California Achievement Tests Battery was used as the criterion for academic achievement.

This study was undertaken in order to compare the self-contained classroom with team-teaching organizations according to pupil behavior and personal-social adjustment in children of first- and second-grade level. A comparison was made of pupil behavior and personal-social adjustments between (1) children in the first grade after one year in the self-contained classroom and children in the first grade after one year in a team-teaching organization and (2) children in the second grade after two years in the self-contained classrooms and children in the second grade after two years in team-teaching organizations.