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Thesis (D. Min.)--Ashland Theological Seminary, 1990. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 174-178).

Thesis (Ed. D.)--Illinois State University, 1994. / Title from title page screen, viewed March 22, 2006. Dissertation Committee: Larry D. Kennedy, Raymond A. Davidson (co-chairs), Patricia H. Klass, Barbara L. Nourie. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 85-90) and abstract. Also available in print.

Thesis (Ed. D.)--Illinois State University, 2001. / Title from title page screen, viewed April 18, 2006. Dissertation Committee: Michael A. Lorber (chair), Patricia H. Klass, Margaret T. Kang, Debbie Mounts. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 112-117) and abstract. Also available in print.

Since the first course in rhetoric began at Harvard in the 1890's, college and university English departments have been concerned about the writing proficiency of freshmen. This concern was magnified by the adoption of open-admissions policies in the sixties, and as a result many English departments began developing remedial English courses to deal with the unprepared student.This study proposes to investigate this development from a variety of perspectives. Its main purpose is to present a model textbook for remedial composition, explain how it was used, and analyze the results of its use in the classroom. The first three chapters provide a justification for such a textbook. The first chapter contains a discussion on the changing attitudes toward education in general and freshman composition in particular that have resulted from the drop in SAT scores and the adoption of open-admissions policies.The second chapter is an analysis of information about remedial programs at American universities based on a questionnaire which asked the following questions: 1) How do you identify the remedial student? 2) What is the relation of your remedial program to your regular program? 3) Who teaches your remedial courses? Is there an orientation program for the staff? .4) What is the focus of your curriculum? sentence? the paragraph? the essay? 5) What texts using? 6) Do you have any self-study documents that see?The third chapter is a history of the development of the remedial English course at Ball State University over the past five years. It includes an evaluation of the texts that have been used, the different types of standardized tests that have been given, and the progress of a selection of 102 students.The fourth chapter is the model textbook, Beginning Writing, that was used in two special sections of English 102 in the Fall Quarter of 1976. Each chapter of Beginning Writing, follows the same format. First there is an illustrative quotation, usually from a literary work, followed by a carefully written introduction to the various forms of writing assigned in the remedial English program. Next are three illustrative essays: one by a professional writer, one by a strong student writer, and one by a weak student writer. Each selection is followed by questions related to its organization and development, assignments for a journal, and a list of theme topics. Finally, there is a cartoon that emphasizes a major point discussed with the chapter.The fifth chapter contains a journal of the quarter and case studies of twelve students from the two sections which used Beginning, Writing. This analysis identifies the strong features of the textbook and those sections that will require revision.

For years, basic writers have been identified and labeled as remedial. Several alternative approaches have had limited success in terms of developing basic writers' skills. My study explores the potential of in-class tutoring to serve as an educational alternative to working with basic writers. Once Ball State's in-class tutoring was in place, I was faced with evaluating and justifying in-class tutoring in terms of department pedagogies, Writing Center goals, and effect on basic writers. However, in order to understand the Writing Center's role in basic writing programs, I had to design a study which would incorporate the most important factors of evaluation: assessment data and observation. My study identified key factors of in-class tutoring, to justify the continued existence and development of in-class tutoring at Ball State and possibly beyond. By breaking my analysis down into two areas, assessment data and observation, I isolated the individual aspects which affected the program. Although this data does not offer conclusive evidence about the program itself, the assessment data offers some interesting patterns of growth, and the observational data proved to be useful in terms of evaluating the program from an administrative perspective. My analysis of the issues and data lead me to conclude that in-class tutoring is worth evaluating and researching. / Department of English

Basic writers often require different courses than traditional Freshman Composition 1 students to succeed in college. Ball State University's basic writing program offers a two-semester sequence that provides students with additional time and attention, thereby addressing these students' special needs. The program encourages students to see themselves as academic writers and as part of the academic community.This study examined the degree of presence of academic voice in students' writing as measured at four intervals during the program's initial year. A 2 x 4 analysis of variance measured change in academic voice for female and male students, using the Academic Voice Checksheet. In addition, students' levels of confidence was measured using the Daly-Miller Writing Apprehension Test (W.A.T.) and correlated to the presence of academic voice using the Pearson product-moment correlation. Findings are presented in an analysis of the study group as a whole and in an analysis of six individual students' work. Those students' profiles were examined for overall academic voice, discrete features of academic voice, the W.A.T. overall scores, and specific questions dealing with student confidence.The analysis revealed that a change in the degree of presence of academic voice occured during the two-semester sequence. However, male and female students were seen to have the same basic profile, thereby suggesting no difference according to sex of student, challenging current gender theory. A comparison of the initial measurement and the final measurement indicated a positive change in a majority of academic voice scores.A correlation between the academic voice score and a decrease in students' writing apprehension was found in the final measurements. Five percent of students' W.A.T. score may be explained by the academic voice measurement. In the study group, 65 percent of the students showed a decrease in W.A.T. scores between the two measurements, indicating a positive lessening of writing apprehension.This study suggests that the basic writing sequence at Ball State University is providing an environment that facilitates students' use of academic voice and lessens their writing apprehension. Both factors enhance students' opportunities for academic success. / Department of English

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2007. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

This study evaluated the comprehension of inference statements by language-learning disabled (LLD) children and children with normal language development (NL) under two conditions: uncontextualized and contextualized. The contextualized condition was designed to encourage retrieval of information from the subject's general knowledge — a procedure proposed to encourage elaborative inference-making. Two text passages were analyzed according to a model developed by Trabasso and presented by Trabasso, van den Broek & Suh (1989), which yielded a set of bridging causal connections across clause units. Sets of three true and three false causal inference statements were developed to represent bridging inferences for each story. In addition, three true and three premise statements were obtained directly from each story, yielding a total of twelve statements for each text. Subjects were ten language-learning disabled students (7 boys, 3 girls) and ten children with normal language development (5 boys, 5 girls) aged 9 to 11 years old. Mean age for children in both groups was 10 years, 4 months. Children were selected for the LLD group on the basis of the following criteria: (1) enrollment in a learning assistance or learning resource program for learning-disabled students, preferably for remediation of Language Arts; (2) history of speech-language intervention in preschool or early primary grades; (3) normal nonverbal cognitive skills; (4) lexical and syntactic comprehension within normal abilities (as determined by standardized language tests for the LLD group); (5) native English speaker and (6) normal hearing ability. Every subject received both stories and conditions. Story presentation and condition were counterbalanced across 8 of the 10 subjects in each group; condition only was counterbalanced across the remaining two subjects in each group. Inference and premise statements were randomized; each random set was randomly presented to each subject. Items were scored correct or incorrect. Subjects were also asked to answer open-ended wh-questions. Responses were compared and analyzed using a nonparametric statistical method appropriate for small sample sizes. Results indicated significant differences between the LLD and the NL groups on the number of correct responses to inference and premise items. Both groups scored significantly worse on inference than premise items. Analysis did not indicate that the LLD group scored significantly worse on inference items than the NL group did. Results also suggested that a contextualization effect operated for both groups, which affected the retention of premise items but acted to improve scores on inference items. This effect was seen most notably for the LLD group. / Medicine, Faculty of / Audiology and Speech Sciences, School of / Graduate