The adoption of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in Mathematics represents a challenge for public educators due to the broad scope of required instructional change. This case study investigated the implementation of a professional development (PD) series across 11 elementary schools, designed to address the problem of insufficient teacher preparation in CCSS pedagogical shifts. Grounded in Vygotsky's social learning theory and constructivism, the training was intended to enhance teacher skills through collaborative, inquiry-based learning. The research questions included in the study examined math teaching practices before and after the implementation of the district training. Through questionnaires and interviews, perceptions of site administrators (n = 17) and math coaches (n = 5) were analyzed via inductive coding and identification of emergent themes to determine the impact of the PD in transforming teacher actions. Findings indicated the PD was effective in preparing teachers to execute math lessons emphasizing conceptual understanding and problem-solving. The resulting project, a program evaluation, was an analysis of the PD where strengths, weaknesses, and recommended improvements were identified. This project study is significant because educational leaders may benefit from the identification of successes and shortcomings of one district's CCSS launch, and may choose to replicate the effective programmatic elements. The study has the potential to impart positive social change as it offers solutions to minimize the achievement gap in the area of mathematics, enabling all students to be better prepared to meet the challenges of the 21st century.

Faculty at a public school in Georgia have been unable to explain how and why English language learner (ELL) students improved their performance on English and writing standardized tests. Leadership at this school desired an evidence-based ELL teaching model, which required exploration of this improved performance. The purpose of this qualitative, phenomenological, and heuristic project study was to understand the roots of this ELL achievement. Guided by teacher effectiveness theory, which suggests that examining the role of teachers is a valid way of understanding student achievement, this theory provided a specific construct of effectiveness consisting of distinct behaviors and characteristics. Thirteen teachers of ELLs were purposively sampled and participated in semi-structured interviews in which they described possible connections between instructional practices, student success, and consistent expectations of themselves and their students. Through analytic strategies of horizontalization, thematic clustering and synthesis, the data revealed that teachers favored the push-in approach, despite the established practice in the school to use a hybrid model, because of various pedagogical advantages. The findings established a professional development plan to guide future ELL pedagogy and support activities. This study generated knowledge to help educators in the target school in selecting the most appropriate instructional strategy to ensure the academic, economic, and social success of ELL students, which is of increasing importance given their growing percentage among students in the United States.

School administrators and teachers must determine the factors most associated with academic success in order to meet the academic needs of all students. Researchers have identified general risk factors such as student socioeconomic status (SES), but there may be additional unidentified factors correlated to student achievement. The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship between a set of school, family, and personal demographic variables and students' math achievement. Bandura's social learning theory, Vygotsky's zone of proximal development, and Feurestein's mediated learning experience served as the guiding frameworks for this study. A descriptive correlational design was used to examine the degree of association among variables and how well the variables of students' SES, gender, ethnicity, attendance, and parental involvement predicted the math achievement among 115 students in 3rd through 5th grade at the study elementary school. Chi square and regression analyses did not reveal significant relationships among the predictor and criterion variables, indicating that the demographic, family, and school variables examined in the study did not predict student math achievement at the study site. These findings support the idea that math achievement is not necessarily predicated on variables extraneous to the teaching and learning process. A professional development project was designed for the study site to provide math teachers with best practice skills on differentiated learning strategies and classroom community building. This project study contributes to positive social change by providing educators at the study site with research-based findings on the relationship between student and school factors and math achievement, and with professional development on math strategies to improve the math achievement of all students.

Learner-centered reading instruction was underrepresented in novice K to 5 teachers' classrooms despite a district mandated requirement to use them. When learner-centered reading instruction is not used, students are less motivated to learn and less likely to become proficient readers. The purpose of this bounded qualitative case study was to explore novice K to 5 reading teachers' perspectives of learner-centered reading instruction and how they taught a comprehensive reading curriculum in their classrooms. The conceptual framework was based on the Arkansas Department of Education's science of reading and Weimer's learner-centered teaching. The research questions focused on exploring novice K to 5 teachers' perspectives of learner-centered reading instruction and how they taught a comprehensive reading curriculum in their classrooms. Purposeful sampling was used to select 10 novice K to 5 reading teachers. Data were collected through semistructured interviews and classroom observations. Data were analyzed using thematic analysis and open and axial coding strategies, which led to themes. Participants identified that they were unprepared to implement learner-centered reading instruction and did not feel they had time to collaborate and plan learner-centered instructional lessons. Based on these findings, a professional development series was designed to support novice teachers' implementation of learner-centered reading instruction. The findings from this study and the resulting project may lead to positive social change when novice teachers implement learner-centered reading instruction leading to increased student motivation and reading achievement.

In a Title I school located in a southeastern state, 60% of 3rd grade students are reading below grade level. The state's new reading initiative ties grade promotion to 3rd grade students reading on grade level. At the study site, administrators identified audio books as a possibly helpful reading tool. Vygotsky's zone of proximal development theory, which holds that learners can learn new skills more readily with guided assistance, framed this study. The purpose of this quantitative, comparative design study was to explore the associations between the use of audio books and the reading levels of 3rd grade struggling readers. Research questions were used to compare the reading levels of struggling readers who use audio books with the reading levels of: (a) struggling readers reading silently, (b) at or above grade level readers who read with audio books, and (c) at or above grade level readers who read silently. Two 3rd grade classes were selected, with 25 students using audio books and 25 students reading silently, to participate in this project. Scores from the AR and from the pre- and posttest STAR assessments over a 9-week period were analyzed and compared using an independent samples t test to explore associations between the use of audio books and the comprehension and reading levels of the participants. Analysis of the results showed that the use of audiobooks was not significantly related to increased reading or comprehension levels for struggling readers. Significant improvements in reading comprehension were shown for students reading at or above grade level that read silently or used audio books. Based on the findings, a professional development project for teachers providing research-supported reading strategy instruction was developed. The findings may lead to improvements in instructional practices by encouraging the use of research-based reading strategies, which could promote positive social change by supporting greater academic success for elementary students through improved reading comprehension.

Parental involvement at Shady Lane Elementary School is lower than the district average, which might be contributing to low levels of student achievement. The purpose of this quantitative correlational study was to explore attitudes of parents at the school and selected parental involvement behaviors. The framework for this study was the theory of planned behavior. The focus of research question 1 was the relationship between parents' attitudes toward the school and parental involvement in the form of communicating, volunteering, and learning at home. The focus of research question 2 was the relationship between parents' attitudes toward parental involvement and parental involvement in the form of communicating, volunteering, and learning at home. The covariates were parents' level of education, employment status, and income. Survey data were collected from 108 parents of students in Grades 1-5. Descriptive statistics showed parents had low levels of all 3 types of parental involvement and negative attitudes toward the school and that parents' attitudes toward parental involvement were almost equally positive and negative. Spearman correlations showed a positive correlation between both independent variables (parents' attitudes toward the school and parental involvement) and communicating, volunteering, and learning at home. Multiple regression analysis showed a positive predictive relationship between parents' attitudes toward the school and communicating and learning at home, and between parents' attitudes toward parental involvement and communicating, volunteering, and learning at home. Results may be used to improve students' achievement as a result of improved parental involvement.

The Walter Pope School District (WPSD), a predominantly African American district, has experienced a new wave of immigrant students arriving from African nations such as Liberia and Sierra Leone. Many students arrive with little or no formal education, and they are not achieving academic success. This purpose of this study was to discover successful instructional strategies that academically, socially, and culturally support the immigrant students. Guided by Portes and Rumbaut's segmented assimilation theory, this study examined the experiences of WPSD African immigrant learners and explored instructional approaches to reinforce their learning. The research questions focused on teachers' perceptions of factors that influence immigrant students' success and of their effectiveness in working with this population. The participants were teachers in the district with two or more years of teaching experience. A case study design was used to capture the insights of seven participants through individual interviews. Emergent themes were identified from the data through open coding and findings were developed and validated. The key results were that teachers have a desire to engage with their peers to create collaborative learning opportunities, literacy rich environments, and positive peer interactions and that they desire meaningful and relevant professional development to support instruction for African immigrant learners. Findings indicated that teachers need to receive resources, recognition, and appreciation for their efforts to positively impact their immigrant students. Implications for positive social change are that African immigrant students will benefit from teachers being provided with improved instructional strategies that align with best teaching practices.

This study explored the social inclusiveness of classrooms with culturally competent teachers who were identified both by their participation in in-service diversity training and by principal nomination. The design of this study was primarily quantitative using a one-way ANOVA to analyze whether fourth and fifth grade students (N = 125) in classrooms with teachers identified as culturally competent are more inclusive in their mutual friendships than students (N = 117) in classrooms with not trained teachers at the same schools. Sociometric questionnaires were used to collect data on mutual friendships. Observations of students in lunchroom settings were also conducted. Findings from the sociometric questionnaire suggest that students with culturally competent teachers, also referred to as culturally responsive teachers in the literature, have broader and more diverse social networks than students in classrooms with not trained teachers. However, in the lunchroom settings where a given student must choose a limited number of students to sit next to at the lunch table, no notable differences between the classrooms emerged. Other than training in diversity issues, teachers in the two groups were very similar.

In this study I investigated the process drama convention of tableau to mediate for the representation of main ideas in science information texts. My pedagogical goal was to focus on the body as a tool for engaging with information texts and my rationale for this goal was the belief that the body is neglected in classroom learning. The task of creating caused the students to be active and to think of their own and other bodies as signifiers of meaning. The methodology was based on a formative experiment that allowed for changes and modifications to be made in response to the intervention of tableau. Formative and design experiments recognize that classrooms are ecologically complex research sites that are situated in particular cultural and historical contexts. Theories related to cultural historical activity theory (CHAT), expansive and embodied learning frame this research as paradigms that recognize the dialectics between activity and culture and the body in and of the world. In the study tableau is framed as an innovative learning method that disrupts the traditional and historical methods for identifying main idea, such as the annotation of text. Through the disruption of tableau came opportunities to expand notions of literacy and comprehension as well as the traditional associations of drama with fiction texts. The study shows that tableau is a flexible mediating tool that can be applied to the current focus on informational texts and close reading.

The purpose of this multi-case study was to describe and explain teacher learning within school contexts by exploring the nature of teachers' experiences in learning communities. This study explored the ways in which teachers participated in professional development sessions using the project approach as a framework for facilitating and engaging in professional learning communities by answering: What is the nature of teachers' experiences in inquiry-based professional learning communities? In what ways and under what conditions does documentation play a role in teacher learning? For data collection I used semi-structured interviews, audio recordings of professional development sessions, teacher documentation, teacher daily sheets, and my researcher journal. I applied a constructivist approach using a social lens for the data analysis to make sense of teachers' learning experiences (Vygotsky, 1935; Rogoff, 1995). The findings indicated that group dynamics play a pivotal role in how teachers' experience professional learning communities. Teacher's struggled to foster inquiry into their own practice. The findings also indicate documenting children's learning is essential in developing a deeper understanding of children. Despite the positive role of documentation within the professional learning community, teacher's needed favorable conditions to continue using documentation for teacher learning.