The current severe teacher shortage in the United States is exacerbated by the numbers of new teachers leaving the profession after only a year in the classroom. What do new teachers expect? How does the reality of their experience match up to their expectations? The purpose of this nine-month qualitative study was to look closely into the expectations and experiences of a small number of beginning teachers. The study focused on four young women's relations with their administrators, other teachers, and their students. The first-year teachers participating in the study included three elementary and one junior high teacher,all of whom taught in a southern Louisiana parish,where the Acadian culture persists and where their families had roots. Data came from observations and written documents as well as from interviews with the teachers; their administrators; other teachers at their schools, including their district-assigned mentors; their students; and members of the communities in which they taught. All four wanted to be "good" teachers and defined "good" in terms of relations with other people - students, colleagues, and administrators. However, they had different ideas about what represented quality in these relationships: degree of reliance on administrators, the nature of the connections they established with their peers, and rapport with their students. The actual social relations that the teachers experienced in the school contexts differed from what saw as ideal, particularly with respect to the students and other teachers. This conflict was compounded by a required assessment each had to pass in order to become a state-certified teacher as well as by a high-stakes assessment of their students' achievement, both of which provided additional definitions of what it meant to be a "good" teacher. Also, the study showed that, in some cases, being a good teacher seemed to conflict with being a good wife or good family member or good friend because of the numbers of hours devoted to preparing lessons each day.

This dissertation reconceives curriculum through an historical approach that employs Ludwig Wittgensteins later philosophy. Curriculum is more than the knowledge taught in school. Curriculum, as I a theorist conceives it, is concerned with the broader intellectual and ideological ways a society thinks about education. Hence, the current school curriculums focus on specific learning outcomes offers a limited view of the knowledge fashioned by a society, thereby offering an intellectual and social history that is highly selective. Wittgensteins concept of language-games offers curricularists a way to re-include some of these stories. The concept of curriculum emerges at the end of the Renaissance from Peter Ramuss refinement of the art of dialectic into a pedagogical method of logic. The modern curriculum field arose at the end of the nineteenth century as educators sought to further refine the remnants of scholasticisms pedagogical practices by employing social efficiency and scientific management to more effectively organize American education. Social efficiency and scientific management became the underlying premises of Ralph Tylers (1949) rationalization of the school curriculum. During the nineteen seventies, curriculum theorists began disrupting Tylers rational foundations by reconceptualizing curriculum using philosophies and theories developed outside of education to alter the language used to describe education. I use Wittgensteins later philosophy to further disrupt the school curriculums rational underpinnings. Wittgenstein maintains that knowing does not require some internal or external authority, thereby rejecting the empirical and logical foundations of knowledge that underlie Western education. Using a Wittgenstein approach suggests that education is an indirect activity of teaching students the use of words. Wittgenstein suggests that educating students indirectly more closely resemble the kinds of playful activities in which children engage in their ordinary lives. He suggests that learning is a synoptic presentation that connects concepts that emerge from our everyday use of language in new and interesting ways. By asking students to see the resemblances among concepts synoptically, rather than logically, education cannot be reduced to the acquisition of a set of facts, ordered in a sequence of steps. As such, a Wittgensteinian approach reconceives curriculum as an act of language-play.

This dissertation examined the efficacy of using minimally trained college undergraduates to tutor third- through fifth-grade students with reading difficulties. Tutors receiving four hours of training in scripted reading program based on the principles of Direct Instruction and emphasizing explicit instruction in phonological awareness and decoding. Thirty-six students from two elementary schools in a large southeastern city in the United States were selected and randomly assigned to treatment (tutoring) or contrast (non-tutoring) conditions. Treatment students received an average of fourteen and a half hours of tutoring over a twelve-week period. Data indicated that university students with minimal training successfully implemented the scripted tutoring package with experimenter feedback. Although, significant differences were only found for word identification, the treatment students out gained the contrast students on all measures. Effect sizes were moderate to strong. In addition, separate data for regular and special education students indicated statistically significant differences on two measures on two measures of fluency (correct words per minute read) for regular education treatment students over regular education control students. The efficacy of using minimally trained adult tutors to supplement classroom reading instruction for students with reading difficulties is also discussed.

Kindergarten children learn through hands-on interaction with materials. Additionally, the environment contributes to their learning. Therefore, if children are learning about concepts that naturally occur outside, they need to learn these concepts through active exploration, using as many senses as possible. This thesis examines the influence that an outdoor environment may have on children's abilities to comprehend and recall concepts in a science lesson. The sample for this study came from four kindergarten classrooms from a semi-rural school in Louisiana. Three treatment groups received a lesson on trees. The control group was not given a lesson. Two groups participated in the lesson indoors, interacting with either pictures only or pictures and concrete objects. The lessons presented concepts about trees (height, width, roots, leaves, and bark). Children in the fourth group explored each concept as it naturally occurred outdoors in a lesson. Children's initial understanding of concepts and subsequent learning were measured by pre-and post-test drawings. The author found an influence by the outdoor environment on kindergarten children's comprehension and recall of the science concepts. Children taught outdoors demonstrated more accurate understandings of the overall concept of "tree" and of the "leaf" concept.

This dissertation focuses on Lavinia Lloyd Dock's (1858-1956) re-envisioning of nursing and caring as social responsibility and the implications of this conceptualization for democracy. Dock was an American nurse, educator, settlement worker, suffragist, pacifist, social activist, writer, and historian. Her conception of holistic welfare embodied a 'new ideal' of society (Dock 1907, p. 899), a new understanding of democracy, and an expression of citizenship based on social responsibility for the welfare of others. Dock's idea of democracy embraced women's values and ways of being in the world; disputed universal, individual rights; and privileged communal values, collaboration, inclusion, and diversity. Moreover, she envisioned the world as a global democracy beyond national boundaries and other differences which often separate individuals. This study aspires to promote an understanding of an internationalist notion of citizenship and democracy that includes caring, collaboration, social responsibility, pacifism, and the holistic well-being of all individuals. This historiography also explores Dock's relentless social activism for the construction of a 'new ideal' of society and democracy. This study aims to empower nurse educators and practicing nurses to interrogate traditional notions of caring. Inspired by Dock's epistemology, the author proposes a re- conceptualization of nursing curricula as democratic and as embracing caring as social responsibility for the holistic welfare of others. Finally, this dissertation seeks to recuperate Lavinia Dock as a nurse educator, historian, philosopher, writer, feminist, social worker, social activist, and one of many turn of the 20th century progressive women who enhanced the welfare of society and improved American democracy.

This study investigated the effect of music on text recall and involuntary mental rehearsal (din) with students from four college-level Beginning Spanish classes. Two groups heard texts as songs, one group heard the same texts as speech, and one group was the control group. For the text recall variable, a cloze test was administered at the end of each song treatment to determine total words recalled. Students from one of the music groups heard the melody of the song while testing. For the din variable, students were asked to report on the amount of this phenomenon experienced. Data was collected to answer the following questions: (1) Is there a significant increase in text recall when that text is learned through the use of songs?, (2) Is there a significant difference in delayed text recall for students who learned the text with song, as compared to those who learned the text with spoken recordings?, (3) Is there a significant difference in the recall results when one group of students from the song groups hears the melody of the song during the recall test?, and (4) Is there a significant difference in the occurrence of involuntary mental rehearsal after listening to song rather than text? Immediate recall of text showed higher scores for the music class in all three songs. This difference reached significance in Songs 1 and 3. Delayed text recall showed no significant difference between the classes. There was no advantage observed for the group that heard the background melody during testing. Overall results for the din occurrence showed a significant difference between the classes. Students in the classes that heard music reported a higher occurrence of this phenomenon than did those who heard only spoken text. Students of the melody group reported a significantly higher frequency than did students from the text group. These findings suggest that the use of songs in the foreign language classroom may aid memory of text. The results evidenced that the occurrence of the din is increased with music, and therefore may be a more efficient way to stimulate language acquisition.

Based on semiotic, aesthetic response, reader response, and drama in education theories, this phenomenological study seeks to describe the literary experience of text through oral interpretation for middle to high SES, fourth and eighth grade students as compared to Low SES fourth and eighth grade students. Using the research methodology of Moustakas (1994) and data analysis of Teddlie (2000), this study proposes to describe and understand the relation of literary understanding and oral dramatic expression implicit in the descriptive paralinguistic and chronemic patternizations of the oral rendition of text and describe the act of reading as phenomenology. Descriptions of the perceptions and reading experiences of Low Socioeconomic Status (SES) and Middle-High SES dramatic readers was obtained through multiple interviews and recorded readings. Rich descriptions were used as the basis for a reflective structural analysis. Ultimately, the goal was to determine the effect of the voice of interpretation on the perception of the reader and to determine the benefit of dramatization as a tool for comprehension across varied educational and experiential backgrounds. Results reflected an across the board positive correlation between students' perceptions of reading as a significant and meaningful learning experience and students' use of dramatic interpretation through the indices of the voice. For oral dramatic readers, the purpose for reading was the process, not just the product. Dramatic readers see reading as something composed that must be performed. They are able to perform the "story" much like a musical score, backing for patterns, beats, and rhythms. Literacy then is a performing art, by definition a form of aesthetic response that is autobiographical in essence, constructivist in nature, and a highly personal "phenomenon."

This study attempted to determine the accurateness of the representation of the Hispanic culture in childrens books. I interviewed ten people: five non-Hispanic and five Hispanic, and I found that the Hispanic people do not seem to pay as much attention to physical features as non-Hispanic people do. However, they were concerned about the portrayal of the Hispanic culture in traditional ways: the traditional roles of women, the traditional dress, the architecture of the houses and the portrayal of the Hispanic people living in rural areas and being extremely poor. It appears that from the timeline covered by the books, from the 1930s until the present time that the more recent the publication, the more accurate the portrayal of the Hispanic culture becomes. In recent years, we see more books in the literature that portray characters from the Hispanic culture as middle class citizens living in cities rather than people living in rural areas doing agriculture based jobs. The results from this study confirm my own perceptions of the portrayal of the Hispanic culture in childrens books. To support this statement I can refer to Hamel (1993), who explains the notion called initial theory. This means that any researcher can have an initial idea of the perceived social phenomenon. In my specific case, this has come from the years studying and working as a librarian where I have had a wide exposure to books and people from diverse origins. As the participants were going through the books, they were distinguishing more details and becoming more aware of their own perceptions and the details in the books that supported their perceptions. They became more aware of the stereotypes and of the way the culture was represented. An important aspect to point out is that the authors of more recent books like Too Many Tamales, Abuela, or Chato and the Party Animals are authors who have lived in the United States for a long time, so they are setting their stories in this country. This aspect can be absolutely helpful if we consider that these books have been created for use in the United States. Therefore, children and readers in the United States will identify more with the characters and settings. Consequently, they will feel the pride and may wish to continue their traditions. At the same time, children will be able to establish comparisons and differences with other ethnic groups; and other children can learn about the Hispanic culture.

This eight-week descriptive study examined the impact of the incorporation of a Life-Application Learning Methods Program on struggling middle school readers. Two questions were explored: 1) How did incorporating lifeapplication learning into the middle school curriculum impact reading motivation?, and 2) How did incorporating life-application learning in the middle school curriculum impact the reading levels? Participants in the study were eight eighth-grade students considered to be struggling readers Qualitative methods were used for this study utilizing responses from a survey, two inventories, student journals, and researcher observations. Data gathered suggested that students are more likely to become motivated and engaged readers when the subject matter directly relates to their lives and that students are more likely to invest in learning reading skills and strategies in order to pursue information they find relevant. The Life-Application Learning Methods Program incorporated the skills outlined in the lesson plans of regular classroom teacher with current reading materials including, but not limited to, novels, magazines, newspapers, recipes, instruction booklets, job applications, and internet resources. Activities included oral reading, group activities, presentations, research, internet exploration, and creative writing. Results of the descriptive study indicated that struggling readers involved in a Life-Application Learning Instructional Program demonstrated gains in both motivation and reading ability. A reexamination of the study identified the immediate usefulness and personal application as being the significant catalyst for becoming active readers. The findings highlight the students desire to find meaning in their reading assignments. In addition, findings suggest that integrating multiple sources of reading materials invite greater student participation. Implications resulting from these findings could be instrumental in improving student engagement in the classroom. By knowing and understanding what motivates student to learn, educators can provide instruction interesting to the students and in compliance with state mandated curriculum guides.

The main research question of this study was: How do selected high school chemistry students' understandings of the elements, structure, and periodicity of the Periodic Table change as they participate in a unit study consisting of inquiry-based activities emphasizing construction of innovative science graphics? The research question was answered using a multiple case study/mixed model design which employed elements of both qualitative and quantitative methodologies during data collection and analyses. The unit study was conducted over a six-week period with 11th-grade students enrolled in a chemistry class. A purposive sample of six students from the class was selected to participate in interviews and concept map coconstruction (Wandersee & Abrams, 1993) periodically across the study. The progress of the selected students of the case study was compared to the progress of the class as a whole. The students of the case study were also compared to a group of high school chemistry students at a comparative school. The results show that the students from both schools left traditional instruction on the periodic table (lecture and textbook activities) with a very limited understanding of the topic. It also revealed that the inquiry-based, visual approach of the unit study helped students make significant conceptual progress in their understanding of the periodic table. The pictorial periodic table (which features photographs of the elements), used in conjunction with the graphic technique of data mapping, enhanced students understanding of the patterns of the physical properties of the elements on the periodic table. The graphic technique of compound mapping helped students learn reactivity patterns between types and groups of elements on the periodic table. The recreation of the periodic table with element cards created from the pictorial periodic table helped students progress in their understanding of periodicity and its key concepts. The Periodic Table Literacy Rubric (PTLR) proved to be a valuable tool for assessing students conceptual progress, and helped to identify a critical juncture in the learning of periodicity. In addition, the PTLR rubric's historical-conceptual design demonstrates how the history of science can be used to inform today's science teaching.