The purpose of this study was to explore the impact of and potential factors associated with utilizing high-school-aged students as on-site tutors to assist elementary students in a Spanish distance education program. The study focused on the qualitative and quantitative exploration of the participants' affective attitudes toward learning Spanish, mode of instruction, high school tutors, and Spanish culture. To document the achievement, attitudes, and motivation of the elementary and high school students, a combination of quantitative and qualitative data was collected through five methods: student questionnaires, self-assessment, prochievement interview, journal entries, and final exam.
The distance education foreign language program randomly divided fifth-grade classrooms into two equal groups. One-half was exposed to the high school tutors and the other half was not. Thirty-six fifth-grade elementary students participated in this study; nineteen were tutored students and seventeen were nontutored students. Three high school seniors served as tutors. The findings indicated that the presence of cross-age tutors in a distance education setting does not seem to make a difference in either attitude or achievement. Although the tutors provided useful assistance and benefits in terms of motivation and increased interest in learning a foreign language, the most important finding in this study is that learning occurred in both the tutored and nontutored Spanish distance education classroom.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:PITT/oai:PITTETD:etd-04182007-171434 |
| Date | 27 June 2007 |
| Creators | Singleton, Michele Ann Lowers |
| Contributors | Dr. Dan Dewey, Dr. Anne Green, Dr. Louis Berry, Dr. Richard Donato |
| Publisher | University of Pittsburgh |
| Source Sets | University of Pittsburgh |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.pitt.edu/ETD/available/etd-04182007-171434/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Pittsburgh or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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