This project presents results from a year-long teacher-research study of 50 students in two sections of first-year composition. The goal of this project is to create writing pedagogy in touch with first-year students' everyday worlds and to represent students as people who enter the classroom with literacies, knowledge, and resources. Using funds of knowledge methodology, this project shows how to use students' existing literacy practices and rhetorical skills to move them to deeper levels of critical literacy. Employing frame analysis, this research shows how contemporary consumerist ideologies inform students' orientations towards their education and demonstrates how to use these ideologies as a bridge to getting students to both question the meaning of a college degree and take an active role in their education. To show some of the tensions that emerge for students moving between the spaces of student life, this project uses activity theory to compare the everyday practices of lecture-hall classes and composition classes. "Third Space" theory is suggested as a way for students and teachers to leave familiar practices and scripts to question larger assumptions about the creation of knowledge. Activity theory is also used to examine students' experiences in campus communities, where it is argued that students feel they are engaging in more authentic learning experiences, though they retain some of the attitudes they have towards their academic work in these communities. Combining activity theory, pedagogical action research, and principles of student-centered teaching, conclusions argue for a paradigm for "student engagement research," a methodology for teacher-researchers to both study students' everyday lives and incorporate student culture into the teaching of writing.

This study analyzed the academic impact of year-round calendar schools as compared with the academic achievement of traditional calendar schools. The population studied was the 1998 public elementary schools in Texas. The academic impact was based upon the 1998 Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) test administrated by the Texas Education Agency. The two groups of schools studied were Texas elementary schools that were on a year-round calendar schedule, and the Texas elementary schools on a traditional calendar schedule. Multiple regression statistics were used, in addition to means, and differences between the means of variables. Year-round schools (YRE), when compared to the means of traditional schools, have means lower in math scores (6.16 percent) than traditional schools. Year-round schools have fewer African Americans students (2.78%), White students (21.06%), and special education students (.25%). Year-round schools are higher in population size (72.72students), Economic Disadvantaged students (15.87%), Hispanic students (23.46%), and Mobility (3.23%).

The purposes of this investigation were (1) to examine the nine-month program and calculate a per-pupil cost, and (2) to evaluate a continuous-school-year program and calculate its per-pupil cost.

Thesis advisor: Karen D. Arnold / Taking a gap year between high school and college has become more common in the United States in recent years, yet little research attempts to describe or analyze the experience of the students who arrive on college campuses after such a year out. This qualitative study followed 12 first-year students attending highly-selective private institutions in the northeastern U.S. as they experienced the transitions from high school to gap year to college. With varying levels of family support and high levels of personal motivation, the students participated in a wide range of gap-year endeavors. The findings indicate that students were heavily influenced by their encounters during the gap year, leading to strong evidence of self-authorship among the participants, which in turn shaped the way students pursued their goals when they arrived at college. Particularly influential were encounters that involved independent problem-solving, participating in multigenerational relationships, and immersion in new cultural settings. The students' transitions to college during the first year were marked by patterns of Sovereign Engagement with regard to learning, relationships, and decision-making. Commonly marked by internalized goals, authenticity in relationships, and greater individual agency, "Sovereign Engagement" captures the self-authored perspective that these students brought to their college experience. Contrary to suggestions in the popular media, not all gap-year students found the transition to be seamless; nor were they uniformly motivated to earn good grades. As a summary of the findings, the Gap Year Impact Model provides an important frame of reference for understanding the experiences, needs, and sovereign decision-making patterns of gap-year students. The results offer students, parents, colleges and universities an introduction to the lived experiences of gap-year students, who are arriving on campus in increasing numbers each year. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2015. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Educational Leadership and Higher Education.

Master of Philosophy in Education / Literacy skills include expressive language, oral and written, and receptive language, comprehension. This study explores both aspects of language in six Kindergarten children differing in early literacy development- three judged by teacher assessment to be 'at risk', and three acquiring Kindergarten skills as expected. Oral retellings of a familiar narrative and an unfamiliar story just heard, and a personal recount were taped and analysed using Halliday's Systemic Functional Grammar. Comprehension responses to individually shared narratives were also collected and analysed. The children's use of language and comprehension responses varied significantly. Those 'at risk' were unable to retell narratives, needed high levels of support to comprehend texts and produced less cohesive personal recounts. The linguistic analysis revealed vocabulary and rhetorical organisation affected the reconstruction of oral narratives. These children also seemed to find comprehending difficult when questions or recall involved following reference, negotiating marked Theme or drawing inferences. The study was designed as a series of one to one literacy experiences. A listening comprehension test showed that all children except one benefitted from the experience. The findings underline the importance of oral language development and the value of interactive teaching experiences to the attainment of sophisticated literacy skills.

Master of Philosophy in Education / Literacy skills include expressive language, oral and written, and receptive language, comprehension. This study explores both aspects of language in six Kindergarten children differing in early literacy development-three judged by teacher assessment to be 'at risk', and three acquiring Kindergarten literacy skills as expected. Oral retellings of a familiar narrative and an unfamiliar story just heard, and a personal recount were taped and analysed using Halliday's Systemic Functional Grammar. Comprehension responses to individually shared narratives were also collected and analysed. The children's use of language and comprehension responses varied significantly. Those 'at risk' were unable to retell narratives, needed high levels of support to comprehend texts and produced less cohesive personal recounts. The linguistic analysis revealed vocabulary and rhetorical organisation affected the reconstruction of oral narratives. These children also seemed to find comprehending difficult when questions or recall involved following reference, negotiating marked Theme or drawing inferences. The study was designed as a series of one to one literacy experiences. A listening comprehension test showed that all children except one benefitted from the experience. The findings underline the importance of oral language development and the value of interactive teaching experiences to the attainment of sophisticated literacy skills.

In 1976, following the recommendations of the Campbell Report, school-based course development and assessment replaced the New South Wales Higher School Certificate courses and public examinations. Under the auspices of the A.C.T. Schools Authority, the A.C.T. Accrediting Agency took control of administering the new system. Nine years after the system was introduced, the benefits of the new system were very clear in the area of English curriculum at Years 11 and 12 level. To a considerable degree, the hopes of the Campbell Report have been fulfilled in terms of providing students with greater freedom of choice and flexibility in the selection of options in an English course composed of a number of term or term equivalent units. Assessment instruments have become much more wide-ranging. Teacher/student relationships have become less authoritarian. Teaching strategies and learning approaches have generally made students more active participants in the learning process. The field study drew heavily on English course documents in the senior secondary colleges, presenting an overview of the workings of the English curriculum. Because courses are being continually reaccredited, it was necessary to set the curriculum overview at a particular time, in 1984. As the A.C.T. is a small education system in Australian terms, it was possible to gain some concept of the whole picture, although 428 term units is not an inconsiderable number. The field study, because of its significant data base, poses more questions than it answers. It does, to a degree, present "what is", or rather "what was" in the 1984 English curriculum at Years 11 and 12 level in A.C.T. colleges. And it points directions for further research.

In 1980, the A.C.T. Schools' Authority through the curriculum development section together with its curriculum consultants, helped to initiate and develop a pilot programme In relation to Year 6 students about to proceed to Year 7. This programme was made possible by the co-operative participation of both primary and secondary schools, their principals and staffs. The programme aimed at building bridges between primary and secondary schools, between primary and secondary teachers and between the curriculum of primary and secondary schools. This study began, as has been said,.where a Pilot Programme introduced by the A.C.T. Schools' Authority, by its Curriculum Development Section, left off. It aimed to explore further the nature of the 'day to day' reality experienced by some Year 6 students in the Australian Capital Territory. In addition, it aimed to explore and gain insights into the process of transition by following up those students who had been part of the sample in Year 6. It includes individual perceptions of the process. In designing research instruments and investigating the process of transition, certain theoretical concepts drawn from both psychology and sociology were used to crystallise the observations made. In addition, earlier studies concerning transition were assessed as well as those in related areas. In the process of this field study, many observations were made, some contradictory, and generally the field study seems to have raised as many questions as it has answered. As might have been expected, any study dealing with human reaction is complex-more so when there are different types of institutions to be considered. Nonetheless it is only apparently inconclusive enquiries like this which will add to the store of knowledge and allow assumptions to be replaced by more precise data.

This field study aims to identify and examine the consequences and influences of course selections and career choices made by students, their parents and college staff. Because of a lack of information regarding the implications of their selected programmes of study, many students choose unwisely and as a result, have become confused about the relevance of their choices in relation to the achievement of their ultimate career aspirations. To achieve the aims of this study, an analysis of the course selections and career choices of the Year 12 graduates of 1983 from Copland College was completed. This field study is divided into three main sections. The first section comprises Chapters I and II which outline the historical development of secondary colleges within the Australian Capital Territory. The author briefly discusses the influence of both the Hughes and the Campbell Reports and illustrates how these Reports were used as the basis for the establishment of the educational structure we now have for our senior secondary college students in Canberra. In addition, this section details the historical background of careers education within the Australian Capital Territory and the influences this has had on the status of career education at Copland College. The second section covers Chapters III, IV and V. In this section the function of the Student Services Faculty within Copland College is discussed and also a brief explanation given of the type of information gathered by college and administrative staff for career and course advice. The author provides a description of the procedures II used to obtain and collate the information collected for this field study. A questionnaire method of data collection was the basis used to examine the post-collegiate activities of over 240 graduate students of 1983, and part of the questionnaire relates specifically to the destinations of these ex-students. Finally, the third section incorporates Chapters VI and VII. It details the results of my research covered in earlier chapters and at the same time, synthesizes that of other educationalists as it relates to this field study. The concluding portion of this section sets out recommendations proposed to meet the problems identified in such areas as student course selections and careers advice.

Thesis (Ed. D.)--State University of New York at Binghamton, School of Education, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references.