<p>The purpose of this study was to examine the implicit language attitudes of college-level instructors toward accented English and the effect of gender, teaching experience, and home language background on those attitudes. The auditory multifactor Implicit Association Test (IAT) was used to measure the implicit attitudes toward Standard, Chinese, Hispanic, and Korean accented English. For the current study, audio stimuli were embedded into the multifactor IAT, which became available for the first time in 2014. The auditory multifactor IAT generated implicit preference scores of six pairs of accented English: Standard vs. Chinese, Standard vs. Hispanic, Standard vs. Korean, Chinese vs. Hispanic, Chinese vs. Korean, and Hispanic vs. Korean accented English. </p><p> Participants (<i>N</i> = 93) included college instructors at an urban university in Florida. Statistical analysis results suggested that college instructors in this study exhibited some bias towards speakers of Hispanic-accented English, but no bias toward the other five. However, analysis of the frequency distributions of the responses showed bi-polar accent biases did exist. It was possible that the similar numbers for the polar opposites balanced each other in the statistical results of no bias. Gender and home language background had no effect on implicit preference scores. The years of teaching experience had significant effect in Hispanic vs. Korean-accented English, but not in the other five accented language pairs. However, close examination of the beta coefficient per year indicated that the relationship was weak even though the effect was significant. </p><p> Faculty, administrators, and students could use test results as a topic of discussion in faculty development, teaching assistant training, student services, and diversity training in higher education institutions. The discussions might help awareness of hidden-yet-present accent bias and prevent potential prejudice toward other accented English speakers. </p><p> The administrators need to be aware that preferences do exist toward accented English speakers. These preferences&mdash;or biases&mdash;toward an accent may be important in selecting instructors. </p>

Grounded in Rosenblatt's transactional theory and Pacific literary theory, this qualitative case study looked at Chamorros teachers' responses to contemporary fiction books as a way of exploring cultural authenticity within a recently emerging genre of children's books. Nine teachers read and responded to eight books that presented a variety of character types, settings, and social issues related to the island of Guam. Guided by three research questions, this study explored what artifacts, images or depictions reflected the lived experiences of the contemporary Chamorro people. Data (transcripts of interviews, literature discussions and participant-generated artifacts) was collected from teachers in a professional development course on children's literature and from individual meetings. Using inductive analysis, the teachers' responses were examined for recurring themes, concepts and words that focused on their personal connections with the books, their cultural understandings, and their perceptions of the portrayal of the Chamorro culture. The teachers' connections drew attention to the ways in which they attempted to use their knowledge about the Chamorro culture to make sense of the stories they read. The teachers' responses to the stories demonstrated that they were making connections to those representations that emphasized and honored their Pacific identity, such as the extended family and how certain traditional practices symbolize the resiliency of the Chamorro people. They also demonstrated how rich cultural images served as prisms that revealed layers of cultural understandings. Finally, the teachers' responses revealed that their decisions regarding the authenticity of a book were mediated by their personal senses of culture as well as by a communal ideology. Not only does this study highlight culturally appropriate representations of the Chamorro people, it also sheds light on the relationship between cultural elements in a story and a culture's value system, and how these two influence the meaning that a reader finds within the story. By highlighting how readers home in on the subtleties of cultural depictions, this study demonstrates how the issue of cultural authenticity can best be understood as a complex matrix of cultural images, a community's value system and personal experiences.

Deaf children of monolingual Hispanic families possess unique linguistic needs and are recognized as a "minority within a minority" because of their unique language situation, in which case, American Sign Language (ASL), is not available in their environment, and both Spanish and English are essentially spoken languages and not accessible to them. In order to develop a strong language foundation, deaf children need exposure to ASL. Moreover, their own parents, if non-signing, also need exposure to ASL to serve as a language model and to maintain reciprocal and effective communication. A formal signed language intervention program is critical for deaf children and their families of non-English-speaking backgrounds. In response to the linguistic and educational challenge posed by Hispanic deaf children, a complete approach has been developed and utilized in this case study. The ASL intervention project is especially designed to explore the feasibility and outcome of this study in meeting the unique linguistic needs of the Hispanic deaf child and the family.

No description available.

No description available.

<p> Maier Acosta, Ana Margarita, Ph.D., Purdue University, May 2016. A Multiculturalist and Sociotransformative Approach to Entrepreneurship Education in Honduras. Major Professor: JoAnn Phillion. This research seeks to take advantage of the converging points among multicultural education, sociotransformative constructivism and entrepreneurship education to propose new ways of teaching entrepreneurship through a multicultural approach in Honduras, based on the potential that entrepreneurship education has to impact society. Action research, because of its potential to connect theory and practice was used as the methodology for this project. This study had the purpose of exploring the efficacy and effects of incorporating multicultural education into entrepreneurship education through a sociotransformative constructivist theoretical framework at the graduate school in the leading private university at Honduras, UNITEC. Entrepreneurship&acute;s contextual nature, its desire to foster individualism and its potential to impact society provided the perfect platform for multicultural education through the incorporation of sociotransformative constructivism in the curriculum to act as an awareness raising device for both students and the teacher. A review of multicultural literature and business education literature, specifically entrepreneurship education literature, reveals adisconnect between the two fields. Even though in some literature the integration of multicultural education is implicit; it is not explicitly stated. The field of Entrepreneurship in Honduras had never been studied before through the lens of such a theory and this as a starting point from which future research should be done.</p>

Preparing teachers to teach in the diverse classroom has become one of the most important goals for universities and teacher training programs. The main purposes of this study included to examine what type of multicultural concepts were taught preservice teachers who sought certification in Grades 4-8 and how these preservice teachers understood and implemented multicultural concepts in their educational portfolios and coursework, field experiences, and student teaching. The population of the study consisted of 53 undergraduate, preservice teachers enrolled in the last two years of a 4-8 teacher certification program. A modified grounded theory methodology and interpretive approach was used in the analysis of the course syllabi, required readings and student coursework. The study found that this particular program exposed the preservice teachers to a significant number of multicultural concepts in preparation for teaching in the ethnically diverse schools in the area. In addition, the study looked at which of Grant and Sleeter's five multicultural approaches were found most often in the course syllabi and required readings, as well as the preservice teachers' portfolio artifacts, key assessments, and reflective writing samples. The research found the majority of the course syllabi and assigned readings covered concepts in the human relations and multicultural education approaches. The majority of the preservice teachers in this study identified most often with the multicultural education approach, although all five multicultural approaches were found in various portfolio artifacts, key assessments, and reflective writing samples. The study further indicates it was a combination of the multicultural courses, the field experiences, the student teaching, and the preservice teachers' adaptability to ethnic diversity that helped the preservice teachers experience successful opportunities with the students. The adaptability of the preservice teachers in the study also appears to match recent research that suggests that university students in general may be growing more accustomed to the ethnic diversity in the communities around them as the population demographics changes.

<p> Most studies on relationships in education are not about human relationships <i>in itself,</i> but about what teachers or students <i>perceived</i> to be a good teacher-students relationship or the <i>outcome</i> of a good teacher-students relationship. This dissertation, however, attempts to unfold the complex and implicit elements of human relationships and investigate how it can be practiced in teacher-student relationships in current educational settings. For this purpose, this dissertation explores two figures who had significantly contributed to the knowledge of human relationships&mdash;Martin Buber and Jalaluddin Rumi. The aim of this study is to explore how an understanding of human relationships from a spiritual perspective can improve teacher-student relationships in educational settings and help students to learn to perceive any relationship with another person not only as multicultural relationships but also as relationships between human beings. There are three principles of spirituality in human relationships derived from the teachings of Buber and Rumi. First, the human reason cannot be the foundation of the relationships between human beings because of certain limitations. Second, there is a state of a unified-self where qualities including ones that are paradoxical to each other can be reconciled and hold together within the unified self. Third, the relationship between a human being and the world is a microcosm-macrocosm relationship. Spiritual relationship is a relationship of microcosm¹-macrocosm-microcosm² where two individuals are sharing the same macrocosm. In educational settings, teachers play an important role in establishing spiritual relationships with students. Spirituality is not something that the human reason can observe and assess. What teachers can do is to make sure that the spiritual barriers are removed and turn towards the students as a whole person. Such a relationship between teachers and students of different race and religion can possibly establish a harmonious multicultural society in Malaysia.</p>

The literature sees community members of Mexican ancestry as persons who are denied full participation in matters of school policies and practices. It also cites that forty percent of children of Mexican ancestry who enter school drop out before they graduate from the twelfth grade. In view of these perceptions, this study was designed to examine what relationship existed among three factors: (1) the goals of a school district; (2) student academic achievement as indicated by GPA; and (3) the intra-group variability among Chicano, Mexican American and Mexican students. This study assumed that if students, parents and teachers prioritized goals congruently, students would do better in school than if there was not a congruity of ranking. However, data results revealed that the existence or nonexistence of goal-ranking congruence among students, parents and teachers made no practical significant difference in student GPA. The research sample included 267 middle school age students of Mexican ancestry, their parents and 74 teachers. The three groups of students, that is, Chicano, Mexican American and Mexican, each ranked communication, work skills, logical thinking, critical thinking skills, study of one's own heritage and other ethnic groups, and accomplishing one's own potential among the seven most important goals. It is recommended that school districts develop their goals with representative input from the total community and that goals with representative input from the total community and that goals be coherently and consistently publicized among professional and lay people in order that the purpose and consistency of school practices be underscored.

This paper reports on the relationship between the perceptions of the native listener of personality traits of nonnative speakers and the grammatical errors and phonetic errors of nonnative speakers' speech. Research to date shows that native listeners do have definite attitudes towards "accents," and their attitudes differ according to what accent is produced. However, no empirical study has yet been reported investigating the parts of the "accent" that elicit a particular response. / In this study, speech samples were collected from three nonnative speakers of English, one Spanish, one German and one Arabic. Each speaker recorded a speech sample of English that contained only grammatical errors and another which contained only phonetic errors. The respondents were 122 randomly chosen college freshmen. Each respondent heard eight speech samples, the six from the nonnative speakers and a control of each speech sample type. However, the respondent was led to believe that s/he was hearing eight different speakers. While the respondent was listening to a given speech sample, s/he was filling out a semantic differential questionnaire; attributes such as good looks, leadership, humor, and likability were measured. / Results show that, when listening to speech containing phonetic error, native listeners differentiate between American English and each of the other language background speech samples, perceiving the American English speaker more positively; but not among the language background speech samples. In speech containing grammatical error, native listeners do not differentiate between American English and either German or Spanish language backgrounds, but do differentiate between American English (more positively) and Arabic, as well as between German (more positively) and Arabic. It is concluded that, with respect to phonetic error, native listeners have strong perceptions of persons speaking with such errors. However, speech containing grammatical error does not elicit as strong a reaction from native listeners. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 54-07, Section: A, page: 2492. / Major Professor: Frederick L. Jenks. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1993.