Thesis (Ph. D.)--Open University. BLDSC no. DX190074. / Consultation copy in two volumes.

Thesis (D.Ed.)--University of Delaware, 2009. / Principal faculty advisor: Robert Hampel, School of Education. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.S. in Leadership and Human Resource Development)--Naval Postgraduate School, Dec. 2004. / Thesis Advisor(s): Steve Mehay, Linda Mallory. Includes bibliographical references (p. 95-98). Also available online.

Approved for public release; distribution in unlimited. / This study examines the relationship between participation in the United States Naval Academy Foundation Preparatory School Program on Midshipmen performance at the United States Naval Academy. A program review was conducted and several multivariate regression models were developed to analyze the affect of the performance of Academy Midshipmen.

“For we've done so much, with so little, for so long, that now we can do anything, with nothing at all.” This popular phrase at the independent tuition-free school called Harlem Prep in many ways reflected Central Harlem itself in the late-1960s. On one hand, decades of racial discrimination and unfulfilled promises had defined schooling in the neighborhood. There were no public high schools in the area, and talented youth were being pushed out of formal education. Conversely, there was a resilience and continued, centuries-long desire for educational equity. As a result—and buoyed by the dynamic political environment—a handful of leaders in Harlem decided to create a school, similar to other efforts in U.S. cities. However, unlike other emerging Black alternative schools, it would be different than its peers: it would be a multicultural school, and it would be for students who had been pushed out of education and onto the streets. “Liberation, Learning, and Love” explores the unknown history of this school, Harlem Prep. Although firmly rooted in this era’s civil rights activism, Harlem Prep’s educational philosophy—its radical multiculturalism—was also distinct and innovative compared to other ideologies. The school’s leaders, teachers, and students were able to re-imagine education on a community-wide, institutional, and classroom level. Through its “unity in diversity” approach, Harlem Prep not only graduated and sent to college over 750 students, most of them previously out of school, but galvanized the notable Black community of Harlem. This project introduces multicultural education to the lexicon of Black alternative schools in the 1960s and 1970s, and reshapes how historians conceptualize equity, emancipatory education, and beyond. Harlem Prep imagined a more loving, pluralistic world for its young people. Perhaps its story can inspire those of us who strive to create a similar future for our youth today.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between the socialization of English instructors at preparatory schools of Turkish universities at organization, department and task levels, and various individual (academic degree, teaching experience, length of employment at current work place, job satisfaction, commitment, and self-efficacy) and organizational (type of university, training, work conditions, knowledge sharing) variables. A pilot study with 225 instructors from four universities was conducted to confirm the validity of Haueter, Macan, and Winter&rsquo / s (2003) Newcomer Socialization Questionnaire (NSQ) adapted into Turkish. Although the results of exploratory factor analysis in the pilot study did not reveal supportive results for the structures in NSQ, results of the confirmatory factor analysis indicated moderate fit for the structures in the scale. The main study was designed as a correlational study and the participants comprised of 737 English instructors working at 16 public and private universities selected from four cities in Turkey and Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus via cluster sampling. In order to collect the data, an inventory consisting of three parts made up of self-developed and pre-developed scales was utilized. The first part consisted personal questions about education, age, gender and length of employment of the participants. The second part included questions about training and work conditions of the participants. The items related to training and work conditions were developed by the researchers. The third and final part of the inventory consisted of five separate scales for measuring both the predicted and predictor variables. Turkish adaptation of three-dimensional Organizational Socialization Scale, which was self-developed, and the Turkish version of three-dimensional Teachers&rsquo / Sense of Efficacy Scale developed and validated by &Ccedil / apa, &Ccedil / akiroglu, and Sarikaya,(2005), three-dimensional Organizational Commitment Scale developed and validated by Wasti (1997), Job Satisfaction and Knowledge Sharing scales developed by Kondak&ccedil / i and Haser (2011), all of which were pre-developed were utilized to measure the predictors of organizational socialization. Both descriptive and inferential statistics techniques were used for the data analysis. Exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis for the self-developed Organizational Socialization Scale, and confirmatory factor analyses for the pre-developed Teachers&rsquo / Efficacy Scale, Organizational Commitment Scale, Job Satisfaction Scale and Knowledge Sharing Scale were conducted within the scope of this study. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses was carried out in order to investigate the relationship between organizational socialization and its predictors. Descriptive, inferential and multiple regression statistical analyses were performed by the software PASW Statistics 18 and the confirmatory factor analysis was performed by the software AMOS 18. The results of the main study revealed that socialization of English instructors to the organization, department, and task are significantly predicted by several organizational and individual variables. Among organizational variables knowledge sharing and training are the most significant ones / and among individual variables, job satisfaction, self-efficacy for instructional strategies, and affective commitment are the most significant ones. In this respect, the practitioners in the field should provide necessary conditions so as to promote and improve knowledge sharing, job satisfaction, appropriate training in the work place, as well as offering opportunities for instructors to improve their self-efficacy as a teacher and satisfaction with the job, which can lead to increase in affective commitment.

This study aims to investigate the relationship between emotional intelligence skills and foreign language anxiety levels of students from Atilim University Preparatory School, in addition to looking at Foreign Language Anxiety (FLA) and Emotional Intelligence (EI) in relation to gender, high-school background, foreign language background and the level of exposure to English. In the data gathering process, 436 students from a private university preparatory school participated. The data were collected in three steps. At first, the participants were given a demographic inventory in order to get some personal information for the research questions. Then, they were asked to complete the Turkish translation of Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale. Lastly, they were given the Turkish adaptation of Bar-On&rsquo / s Emotional Intelligence Quotient Inventory. The data were analyzed by the Statistical Package for Social Sciences. To find out the differences between the male and female / foreign language backgrounds / high school types, anxiety levels and level of exposure to Englishrelated tests were used. The results revealed that for students&rsquo / foreign language anxiety levels, there are significant differences in terms of gender, foreign language background and emotional intelligence skills. For students&rsquo / emotional intelligence skills, significant differences were found in terms of gender and high school backgrounds.

Education systems are currently undergoing transformational changes throughout the world and one of these changes is a shift from a philosophy of positivist paradigm to constructivist paradigm of teaching. Accordingly, constructivists claim children actively construct their knowledge rather than absorb information spoken to them by teachers. Therefore, the constructivist teaching of Geography places emphasis on the fact that learners should think more, understand and responsible for their own learning. This study thus focused on the practice of constructivist methods in the teaching of Geography at preparatory secondary schools of Ethiopia. Geography is colourful and an outdoor oriented subject in which learners could get good opportunities to construct their knowledge through various in-and-out of school activities. Thus, constructivist methods are useful for Geography learners to develop their intellectual capacity for life-long learning and for generic skills such as critical thinking, information processing, problem solving, decision-making, etc. Therefore, the main purpose of this study was to investigate the merits and reasons for teacher dominance in the pedagogy of Geography and to suggest learner-centered teaching strategies in the context of constructivist principles on learners’ learning activities to liberate them from passive learning pedagogy. The study was confined to six Higher Education Preparatory Secondary Schools out of 20 preparatory schools of the South Wollo Administrative Zone of Amhara state of Ethiopia. It employed mixed-method approaches (qual-quant) and descriptive survey design. The target population for this study was 1053 Social Science learners and 12 Geography departmental heads and teachers. Among 1053 learners 199 learners were sampled through random sampling technique. But all Geography teachers and departmental heads were taken as the main participants through purposive sampling techniques. Semi-structured interviews, observation, documents and questionnaire were the main data collection instruments for the study. Data that were collected through interviews, observation and open-ended questionnaire were analysed inductively using narrations and descriptions through words, phrases and statements, whereas the data collected from documents were organised in the form of tables and analysed via percentage and mean. However, data that were collected through close-ended questionnaires were edited, coded, classified, tabulated and organised in the form of tables havebeen analysed through frequency, percentage and mean via SPSS software. Based on the analysed data, findings were depicted. The findings of the study revealed that Geography is a unique discipline and its syllabus was prepared in line with the country’s education policy which encourages constructivist approaches of teaching. However, majority of teachers frequently practice traditional teaching methods. Moreover, the study also identified that lack of teachers’ professional training about the practice of a variety of learner-centered methods and continuous assessment techniques, lack of experience about learner-centered teaching methods both on the part of teachers and learners, low interest and commitment on the part of teachers, teachers’ failure to utilise teaching materials, placing of less competent learners in the Social Science stream, learners’ low interest to learn and incapability to learn through learner-centered methods, learners’ low engagement in the teaching activities, learners’ disturbance, shortage of time, absence of plasma TV transmission and shortage of resources such as school facilities, instructional media, reference books, Geography room, department room, pedagogical center, lounge and scarcity of budget were considerable hindrances on the implementation of Geography syllabus through the constructivist approaches of teaching methods. Based on the findings of the study, recommendations were made to the concerned bodies to alleviate the hindrances and to encourage the practice of constructivist teaching methods and making the learners free from teachers’ dependency. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / D. Ed. (Curriculum Studies)

Education systems are currently undergoing transformational changes throughout the world and one of these changes is a shift from a philosophy of positivist paradigm to constructivist paradigm of teaching. Accordingly, constructivists claim children actively construct their knowledge rather than absorb information spoken to them by teachers. Therefore, the constructivist teaching of Geography places emphasis on the fact that learners should think more, understand and responsible for their own learning. This study thus focused on the practice of constructivist methods in the teaching of Geography at preparatory secondary schools of Ethiopia. Geography is colourful and an outdoor oriented subject in which learners could get good opportunities to construct their knowledge through various in-and-out of school activities. Thus, constructivist methods are useful for Geography learners to develop their intellectual capacity for life-long learning and for generic skills such as critical thinking, information processing, problem solving, decision-making, etc. Therefore, the main purpose of this study was to investigate the merits and reasons for teacher dominance in the pedagogy of Geography and to suggest learner-centered teaching strategies in the context of constructivist principles on learners’ learning activities to liberate them from passive learning pedagogy. The study was confined to six Higher Education Preparatory Secondary Schools out of 20 preparatory schools of the South Wollo Administrative Zone of Amhara state of Ethiopia. It employed mixed-method approaches (qual-quant) and descriptive survey design. The target population for this study was 1053 Social Science learners and 12 Geography departmental heads and teachers. Among 1053 learners 199 learners were sampled through random sampling technique. But all Geography teachers and departmental heads were taken as the main participants through purposive sampling techniques. Semi-structured interviews, observation, documents and questionnaire were the main data collection instruments for the study. Data that were collected through interviews, observation and open-ended questionnaire were analysed inductively using narrations and descriptions through words, phrases and statements, whereas the data collected from documents were organised in the form of tables and analysed via percentage and mean. However, data that were collected through close-ended questionnaires were edited, coded, classified, tabulated and organised in the form of tables havebeen analysed through frequency, percentage and mean via SPSS software. Based on the analysed data, findings were depicted. The findings of the study revealed that Geography is a unique discipline and its syllabus was prepared in line with the country’s education policy which encourages constructivist approaches of teaching. However, majority of teachers frequently practice traditional teaching methods. Moreover, the study also identified that lack of teachers’ professional training about the practice of a variety of learner-centered methods and continuous assessment techniques, lack of experience about learner-centered teaching methods both on the part of teachers and learners, low interest and commitment on the part of teachers, teachers’ failure to utilise teaching materials, placing of less competent learners in the Social Science stream, learners’ low interest to learn and incapability to learn through learner-centered methods, learners’ low engagement in the teaching activities, learners’ disturbance, shortage of time, absence of plasma TV transmission and shortage of resources such as school facilities, instructional media, reference books, Geography room, department room, pedagogical center, lounge and scarcity of budget were considerable hindrances on the implementation of Geography syllabus through the constructivist approaches of teaching methods. Based on the findings of the study, recommendations were made to the concerned bodies to alleviate the hindrances and to encourage the practice of constructivist teaching methods and making the learners free from teachers’ dependency. / Curriculum and Instructional Studies / D. Ed. (Curriculum Studies)

The main objective of the study was to explain how learning styles and instructional material influence students’ academic performance in some fundamental chemical concepts, and to integrate a specific learning styles model into the literatures of chemistry education and suggest how to apply it in the teaching-learning process of chemistry. To achieve the intended objective, a sequential explanatory mixed method design was applied. Out of 1676 science students in two preparatory schools, 326 participants were selected using a disproportionate random sampling and a sequential mixed method with a nested sampling strategy. Data were collected through Learning Styles Index, Chemistry test, and Semi-structured and open-ended questionnaire. The quantitative part of the data was analysed using descriptive statistics and inferential statistics including an independent sample t-test and multiple regression analysis. The qualitative part of the data was analysed using a framework analysis approach. This approach involves thematic analysis followed by comparisons both within and between themes, and between cases. The quantitative phase of the study found that the contributions of learning styles to academic performance in some fundamental chemical concepts have not statistically significant contribution. Therefore, it can be concluded that there was not any superior learning style that lead students to success in the fundamental chemical concepts considered in this study. The qualitative part of the study showed that the majority of students preferred the same nature of chemistry instructional materials. It also showed that nature of chemistry instructional materials used in the schools were different which can accommodate students’ with different learning styles. Based on the findings it is recommended that instructional designers and teachers take into consideration the representational nature of chemical concepts and then students learning styles when making instructional decisions. / Science and Technology Education / D. Phil. (Mathematics, Science and Technology Education (Chemistry Education))