Building a culture of success in schools has been a goal in Texas public schools since standardized tests were developed in 1979. Many schools have begun instilling grit in the classrooms in hopes of increasing student achievement and teaching students how to push themselves through difficult tasks. The primary purpose of the study was to assess…

There is much concern regarding the underachievement of gifted students. Gifted students have the potential to make outstanding contributions to society. The present study analyzed the perceptions of teachers, principals, and one director of gifted education of gifted 4th and 5th grade students in the area of reading and explored constructs of…

Researchers and practitioners alike have noted that Hmong students in the United States do not achieve as well as their monolingual peers and other bilingual students. The current mixed-methods study is designed to describe reading development and achievement of 4th-grade Hmong students in one large, urban school district. This study explores the…

An existing school program in which therapy dogs are integrated into the reading curriculum was analyzed to determine the effect on student reading. Previous literature suggests an improvement in both reading skills and attitudes towards reading when students read in the presence of a therapy dog. Using a mixed method model, the researchers…

Improving foundational academic skills for elementary level students continues to be a challenge for classroom teachers. This study implemented weekly progress monitoring procedures using curriculum-based measurement assessments in conjunction with weekly individual student-teacher graphing and goal-setting conferences to determine the effect the…

The purpose of this mixed method study was to examine instructional practices in the Integrated Co-teaching classes and the roles of the Co-teachers in each class to determine if the instructional practices support meaningful learning. The participants in this study were two special education teachers and two general education teachers from two…

The purpose of this two-phase mixed-methods study was to describe the relationship of the ratio of the number of minutes of instructional classroom time to the number of minutes of scheduled unstructured recess time and the reading scores of fourth- and fifth-grade students in Title I schools in the state of Texas. Further, the beliefs of teachers…

Randomized experiments are often considered the strongest designs to study the impact of educational interventions. Perhaps the most prevalent class of designs used in large scale education experiments is the cluster randomized design in which entire schools are assigned to treatments. In cluster randomized trials (CRTs) that assign schools to…

The purpose of this study was to determine if there was a difference in the academic achievement in reading among students enrolled in single-gender and coeducational classes, as well as the impact of teachers' perceptions on the outcome of academic achievement. The study used a mixed-method approach to address this purpose. This study reported…

This study examined elementary school students' perceived support for recreational reading from their mothers, fathers, and friends. Participants, including 130 fourth graders and 172 fifth graders, completed the researcher-developed Reading Support Survey, which assesses how often children experience and how greatly they enjoy multiple types of…

Many of today's students are reading below grade level and schools are investigating methods for increasing student achievement in the area of reading. This mixed method research study investigated the achievement of students who were reading below grade level. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between reading response…

This dissertation was designed to provide a comprehensive data-driven evaluation of a Chinese language Immersion Program (CIP) for the stakeholders. CIP was implemented in 2006 with a goal for students to become proficient in the Chinese language and develop increased cultural awareness while reaching at least the same level of academic…

The ultimate goal of this concurrent embedded mixed-method study was to describe the implementation of Response to Intervention (RTI) and understand the role of Response to Intervention at the fourth-grade elementary school level on the academic performance. This study examined both qualitative and quantitative data. In the qualitative phase, a…

The goal of this QUAN-qual mixed methods study was to investigate how parents from various ethnicities and socioeconomic status construct their expectations of academic achievement and the impact these expectations have on academic success for the student. Data was gathered by using The Parent Survey of Family and Community Involvement in the…

Handheld technology devices allow users to be mobile and access the Internet, personal data, and third-party content applications in many different environments at the users' convenience. The explosion of these mobile learning devices around the globe has led adults to value them for communication, productivity, and learning. Outside of the school…