Thesis (Ed.D.)--Duquesne University, 2004. / Title from document title page. Abstract included in electronic submission form. Includes bibliographical references (p. 259-298) and index.

The problem of this study is to determine the cause for the reading difficulties and offer remedial suggestions for the sixth-grade children in the Robert E. Lee School, Denton, Texas.

The purpose of the study is to make a comparison of the achievement and personality traits of a selected group of pupils to determine differences and relationships existing between these important factors, and to study their significance for the classroom teacher.

The purpose of this study is fourfold: (1) to determine the relationship between sociometric status and specific physique types; (2) to determine the relationship between personal appearance and sociometric status; (3) to determine the relationship between sociometric status and physical defects; (4) to determine the relationship between sociometric status and chronic absenteeism.

The purpose of this study is to determine the effects of three different types of in-service or preservice training on the attitudes of sixth-grade teachers in selected Texas school districts toward the "new" social studies. The types of preparation compared are the following: completion of a social studies methods course within the last two years, attendance at a social studies in-service training session at least three hours in length within the past year, a major or minor in one of the social science disciplines, or combinations of these. Additional variables such as age, teaching experience, classroom organization, degrees held, and textbooks being used are also considered. Three hundred twenty-four respondents from thirteen school districts completed a two-part questionnaire. Part A seeks biographical, educational, and experiential information. Part B contains thirty-nine statements about social studies education to which the participants respond on a six-point Likert-type scale. Data are treated with a one-way analysis of variance, and hypotheses are retained or rejected at the .05 level of significance. When a significant F-ratio is found on data having more than two groups, the Fisher's t for multi-type comparisons is applied to determine where the significant differences occur.

The thesis deals with the critical points of teaching Czech language at the elementary school. The aim of the work was to identify the citical points of teaching Czech language to the sixth grade of the elementary level. The identification of the critical points was done through a qualitative analysis of the discussions lead with teachers of Czech language. The theoretical part of the work characterizes the Czech language curriculum in the sixth grade and its didactic apporoach in commonly used textbooks. Conceptions, such as the cricital point and the mistake are defined. The practical part of the work contains the analysis and the interpretation of the discussions carried out with the teachers. The program Altas.ti was used for the evaluation of the obtained data. The critical points of Czech language in the sixth grade of the elementary school were found to be the phenomena in the realm of syntax, morphology, and spelling. In the realm of syntax, the critical spots of the greatest weight were: the ability to think logically, the knowledge of the basic linguistic phenomena, the understanding of the syntactic relationships and the terminology. In morphology, the ability to distinguish between the parts of speech, the case determination, and the recognition of the number of the collective and the...

Este trabalho teve como escopo detectar mecanismos presentes no processo de produção escrita de alunos que chegam ao sexto ano do Ensino Fundamental sem o domínio ortográfico esperado nesse nível de escolaridade, considerando o sexto ano como momento nodal para um apoio fundamentado àqueles que apresentem defasagem. Para tanto, analisa produções de quatro alunos de uma escola pública estadual da capital paulista, com base em postulados da Fonética e da Fonologia, em que são observadas as possíveis relações entre a consciência fonológica do português brasileiro e os processos de escrita. Reflexões da Psicolinguística concorrem para o entendimento de que os erros dos alunos são índices a serem considerados para intervenção didático-pedagógica. Para sintonizar intervenções na escola, postulados da Teoria da Atribuição Causal, voltados para a educação, são propostos com o intuito de compreender a disposição dos alunos diante das dinâmicas de ensino e aprendizagem. Uma sistematização das normas ortográficas do português embasa sugestões de abordagens em sala de aula para superação dos problemas apontados. / This dissertation aims to describe the mechanisms involved when sixth-grade students do not achieve expected levels in orthography. The sixth-grade is considered a critical time to provide appropriate support for those students who are under-achieving. Psycholinguistics have postulated that student errors are indicators of the need for pedagogical didactic intervention. The study analyses the written work of four students from a public school in the State of Sao Paulo, from a Phonetic and Phonologic perspective. A relationship between phonological awareness of Brazilian Portuguese and writing processes was observed. To understand the engagement of students with teaching and learning, the Attribution Theory is suggested in order to adjust school interventions. A system of Portuguese orthographic norms was part of the research, along with suggestions for practical intervention.

The purpose of this study was to compare the perception scores and the frequency of parental involvement for parents of students who have most recently completed elementary school (entering 6th grade) with parents of students who have most recently completed middle school (entering 9th grade) in a northeast Tennessee public school district. Data were collected by surveys containing a short demographic section, a perceptions section, and a participation section. The population consisted of the parents of 544 sixth grade students from the district’s 2 middle schools and the parents of 578 ninth grade students from 1 district high school. From that population 115 sixth grade parents and 105 ninth grade parents responded. This study took place at the onset of the school year to address parents as their children were either entering 6th grade in middle school or 9th grade in high school. Findings from the study indicate that there were significant differences between the parents of newly entering 6th graders and the parents of newly entering 9th graders in terms of home-based perception scores and frequency of participation. Specifically, parents of newly entering 6th graders had higher home-based perception scores and frequency of participation than parents of newly entering 9th graders. However, findings indicate that there was not a significant difference between the parent groups in terms of school-based perception scores and frequency of participation. When examined collectively (home-based and school-based combined), no significant differences were noted between the parent groups in terms of perception scores and frequency of participation. For each of these cases, independent samples t tests were used to determine if there were significant differences. Findings from the study also indicate that positive relationships are present between parents’ perception scores and their frequency of participation. This was true for both home-based and school-based involvement at both grade levels. Pearson r tests revealed these relationships. This study was important to help understand the perception scores and frequency of participation for parents of students in the middle school transition. Recommendations are made with the hopes of helping schools better tailor their parental involvement strategies to families they serve.

xvi, 120 p. : ill. (some col.) A print copy of this thesis is available through the UO Libraries. Search the library catalog for the location and call number. / Instructional use of the iPod Touch is increasing as evidenced by anecdotal reports of its efficacy as a learning tool. However, research documenting the impact of this technology has been limited. This study was based on the following research questions: (a) Does providing explicit reading comprehension strategy instruction using an iPod Touch increase students' reading comprehension outcomes based on standardized reading tests and multiple-choice probe measures when compared to a No Support comparison group? (b) Does providing different types of electronic text support increase students' reading comprehension outcomes, and if so, which type of support is most effective? (c) Does providing different levels of electronic text support influence students' attitudes toward the use of comprehension strategies as well as using an iPod Touch for this task? Participants included 155 sixth-grade students at a public middle school. Students were randomly assigned to one of three intervention groups; (a) Notational Only support (a note-taking sheet), (b) Notational + Instructional support (embedded prompts), and (c) Notational + Instructional + Translational support (audio version of the text and prompts) and received reading comprehension strategy instruction and text support using an iPod Touch. An intact No Support ( N = 61) group that did not receive instruction or text support but read the texts using an iPod Touch was used as a quasi-experimental comparison group. Two standardized reading comprehension measures were employed at pretest and posttest as well as researcher developed probe measures that were used throughout the study. An ANOVA analysis determined that no statistically significant differences existed between the groups at pretest. An ANCOVA with pretest scores as a covariate found no statistically significant differences between groups on the standardized reading comprehension measures. Because of a high level of variation among the probe measure data, including significant missing data, these results were not analyzed statistically and were reported descriptively. Students responded positively to survey questions about using the iPod Touch for summarization strategy instruction and the text supports. / Committee in Charge: Dr. Edward J. Kame'enui, Chair; Dr. Kathleen Scalise; Dr. Louis Moses; Dr. Lynne Anderson-Inman

The problem of this study was to measure, to compare, and to analyze the amount of stress, as indicated by heartbeat rate, experienced by students during teaching-learning activities in sixth-grade mathematics in a regular classroom. The bases for comparison were the heartbeat rates of selected students as recorded by a cardiotachometer and achievement scores on pretests and posttests dealing with verbal problems. All data were analyzed using the t-tests for the significance of the difference between the means. Findings of the study showed that students did experience increased heartbeat rates while solving verbal problems in sixth-grade mathematics. Also, during the teaching-learning activities, students who solved verbal problems using the realistic approach did not experience more stress than students who solved problems using the standard approach. The standard group did not perform significantly better than the realistic group on the standard pretest-posttest. However, students who were involved in the realistic method achieved better on all types of problems than did students who were taught by the standard method.