Preparing students to be college or career ready in the 21st Century starts with the foundational skills they acquire in elementary school. Elementary school principals must work to ensure that, not only do they have a belief in their own abilities to provide this foundation, but that their school improvement efforts are reflected in the results…

This study explores the use of historical short stories as nature of science (NOS) instruction in thirteen secondary science classes. The stories focus on the development of science ideas and include statements and questions to draw students' and teachers' attention to key NOS ideas and misconceptions. This study used mixed methods to examine how…

Preparing school administrators to support effective instruction of English language learners (ELLs) is an important dimension of today's school leadership programs, yet often difficult to enact. This paper reports a comprehensive needs analysis of a school leadership advanced certificate program carried out by Teaching English to Speakers of…

Background: Literacy-rich environments (LREs) reflect characteristics such as abundance of materials, daily literacy routine, and layout conducive for reading and writing. Shifting from previous conceptualizations, LREs are not confined to schools but are ubiquitous in formal and informal educational settings; they include libraries, museums,…

Presentation software is an important tool for both student and professorial communicators. PowerPoint has been the standard since it was introduced in 1990. However, new "improved" software platforms are emerging. Prezi is one of these, claiming to remedy the linear thinking that underlies PowerPoint by creating one canvas and…

The purpose of this study was to examine Jordanian early childhood teachers' perspectives toward science teaching and learning and understand the contextual lived science experiences as realized by teachers in early childhood settings. The study has utilized mixed methods approach. An Arabic-validated version of the Early Childhood Teachers'…

The objective of this paper is to present certain results of my doctoral research, concerning the application of "Competence Pedagogy" in the teaching of geography in Portugal, particularly an analysis of Portuguese geography textbooks in order to improve our understanding of how they incorporate, or do not incorporate, this new…

The purpose of this study was to (a) identify factors contributing to the success of Hispanic students in four Early College High Schools (ECHSs) in El Paso County, (b) identify components of the ECHSs that can be realistically considered for implementation by administrators of larger public high schools in El Paso County, and (c) determine…

The focus of this research was to determine methodologies in environmental education that would promote transformation in each student leading to improved personal pro-environmental behaviors. Incorporating spirituality and religious themes in environmental education is a way to link learners to their meaning systems. Research has shown that…

An increasing number of students are selecting for-profit universities to pursue their education (Snyder, Tan & Hoffman, 2006). Despite this trend, little empirical research attention has focused on these institutions, and the literature that exists has been classified as rudimentary in nature (Tierney & Hentschke, 2007). The purpose of this…

Teachers have the responsibility to educate a diverse group of students in heterogeneous classes. One way in which teachers meet this challenge is to differentiate the curriculum to meet the needs, interests, and abilities of each student. One particular group of students in need of a differentiated curriculum to maximize learning potential is the…

E-learning has become a powerful player in the world of academia as well as in the corporate arena and the demand for online learning continues to increase. Even with demand increasing, a consistent practice for the design of self-paced, standalone online learning has yet to be accepted by the instructional design community. Creation of online…

Focusing on a suburban Philadelphia high school's social studies classes, this research study investigated the influence of tracking on student achievement, on teachers' and students' perceptions of self-efficacy, and on teachers' instructional practices in the classroom. In order to address these research questions, the researcher used a…

The aim of this study was to investigate whether the pre-service teachers' language teaching beliefs changed as a result of two different post-observational reflective feedback modes; teacher mediated and peer feedback, during their teaching practice. For each post-observational feedback mode, two groups of eight Turkish pre-service language…

Providing post-secondary education in correctional settings has emerged as one of the best ways to reduce recidivism, save taxpayer dollars, and promote post release employment and community reintegration. While a number of studies exist, this paper argues persistent challenges connected to research design, data collection, and the communication…