This study investigates the role of Immersive Virtual Reality (IVR) in facilitating Transformative Experiences (TE) and enhancing everyday engagement with learning. Using the Teaching for Transformative Experiences in Science (TTES) model, this research integrates IVR's unique affordances--presence and agency--to examine how immersive learning…

Online teaching and learning has become a primary focal point for higher education administrators. Institutions have focused their strategic plans to maximize opportunities to grow their campuses, through distance education. A consistent issue that has surfaced with distance education initiatives is teacher preparation for online education. The…

Efforts to improve technology integration for K-12 teaching and learning focus on professional development for teachers. This research study, however, implemented a professional development course in technology integration for educational content writers at a publisher in the Southeastern United States. This research is strategic because most…

With increased technology use in classrooms, teachers must design lessons that integrate technology use and stimulate cognitive processing. This dissertation explored science teachers' perceptions of integrating technology-based instruction on cognitive processing in secondary school science. It is vital to understand the neuroscience behind…

The purpose of this investigation was to identify components that might logically be included in a model transformative correctional education program aimed at making correctional education programming within the New Mexico Corrections Department (NMCD) more effective. Grounded in current theory and research, this investigation relied on a…

Virtual reality (VR) provides significant opportunities for students to experience immersive education. In VR, students can travel to the international space station, or go through a science experiment at home. However, the current tactile feedback provided by these systems do not feel real. Controllers do not provide the same tactile feedback…

As global challenges such as climate change, shifting job markets, and technological advances intensify, educational systems must adapt to equip students with essential 21st-century skills. While countries like Singapore, Ireland, Australia, and Finland have created flexible education systems to meet these demands, the United States faces a…

Digital media is becoming increasingly important to learning in today's changing times. At the same time, digital technologies and related digital skills are unevenly distributed. Further, deficit-based notions of this digital divide define the public's educational paradigm. Against this backdrop, I forayed into the social reality of one rural…

LGBTQ representations in media and novels, especially in young adult (YA) literature, have become more recurrent and reliable in recent years. While little research exists on youth and transgender stories, existing LGBTQ texts predominantly deal with men, chiefly White gay men (Cart & Jenkins, 2006; Garcia, 2013). To address this imbalanced…

This study applied the stages of transformative learning to faculty perceptions and application of best practices to online learning. Research questions included: Can transformative learning theory constructs be used to identify potential barriers in faculty development and delivery of online instruction?; How does the stage of transformative…

Professional Development for Transformational Technology Integration: An Experimental Study of In-Service Teachers' Self-Perceptions of Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge Elena M. Tachau Drexel University Chairperson: Brian K. Smith, Ph.D. The rapid advancement of technology tasks K-12 schools with providing professional development…

Despite laws enacted to provide students who have special learning needs with the educational opportunities to prepare them for employment and independent living, special needs students often cannot gain access to traditional vocational programs in large part because of the nature of their disabilities. High-stakes testing has changed entry…

Achieving effective learning via digital media continues to be a major concern in contemporary education. The daily use of all forms of digital media is part of our lives and therefore becomes a key component of education. Educators must consider the process of digital media curriculum as a learning model and form of experience adapted to…

Music uniquely provides for human beings what cannot be provided in any other way. Affording opportunity for undergraduate general education students to express musical identity and experience musical otherness through musical decision making in an e-learning environment propelled the creation of the two courses that became the context for this…

The integration of technology into classroom instruction in K-12 schools remains problematic. The problems associated with this integration are troubling, as technology integration may change a teacher's pedagogy toward more innovative approaches that increase student achievement. The purpose of this study was to document teachers' experiences as…