Research spanning two decades shows that there is a continuing development of 3D virtual worlds and investment in such environments for educational purposes. Research stresses the need for these environments to be well-designed and for suitable pedagogies to be implemented in the teaching practice in order for these worlds to be fully effective.…

Evaluations should be issues driven, not methods driven. The starting point should be priority programs to be evaluated or policies to be tested. From this starting point, a list of evaluation questions is identified. For each evaluation question, the task is to identify the best available method for answering that question. Hence it is likely…

The present study focuses on the language attitudes underlying patterns of stylistic variation in the speech of a female former President of the Spanish local Government of Murcia. We build on previous quantitative work demonstrating that this speaker shows unexpectedly high usage levels for nonstandard Murcian Spanish features in public speech,…

This article presents the perceptions of approximately 300 experienced New Zealand principals who participated in a pilot leadership development initiative funded by the Ministry of Education. The Experienced Principals Development Programme (EPDP) underwent a rigorous evaluation that included formative (mid-point) and summative (end-point)…

Data from the Christchurch Health and Development Study, a 30-year prospective longitudinal study, were used to examine the associations between the quality of parent-child relations in adolescence and adult parenting behaviour 15 years later. At ages 14 and 15 years, cohort members were interviewed about the quality of their relationship with…

Based on Zimmerman, Bonner, and Kovach's (1996) academy model, an intervention consisting of seven weekly training sessions to increase students' awareness of and ability to plan and manage their study time was developed. Participant students reflected on the implementation of each phase of the learning model in their weekly journal entries,…

Objective: To describe a mixed-methods approach to develop and test a basic behavioral science-informed intervention to motivate behavior change in 3 high-risk clinical populations. Our theoretically derived intervention comprised a combination of positive affect and self-affirmation (PA/SA), which we applied to 3 clinical chronic disease…

Effective competition in a rapidly growing global economy places demands on a society to produce individuals capable of higher-order critical thinking, creative problem solving, connection making, and innovation. We must look to our teacher education programs to help prospective middle grades teachers build the mathematical habits of mind that…

Classroom-based continuous assessment (CA) has become an important component of Namibia's post-independence emphasis on learner-centred education. This paper compares continuous assessment results with end-of-year examination marks for Grade 10 Mathematics for the years 2008-2010. Against this backdrop, and given that classroom-based continuous…

Purpose. The purpose of this study was to establish among health educators a consensus in the definition of spirituality and health that would ultimately guide effective development of a curriculum or program in spirituality and health for undergraduate programs in college health science departments. Methodology. This mixed-methods research study…

The purpose of this exploratory mixed methods research study was to understand how the establishment of an online Community of Practice approach supports the completion of homework for third grade students in an urban school. The study focused on issues of my facilitation and development of such an online community as well as the impacts on…

Federal policy makers and school leaders increasingly recognize middle school math as a turning point in students' academic success. An i3 scale-up grant allowed grant partners to conduct a large-scale implementation of PowerTeaching (PT), a research-based reform to increase student math achievement. In a mixed-methods study during the pilot phase…

The purpose of this research study was to design school profiles of two elementary schools in order to investigate the potential relationship between school climate dynamics and levels of student achievement. The research design for this study included a mixed method approach of quantitative and qualitative techniques. These techniques included…

Nationally, 30% of high school students do not graduate. Among this percentage, 50% are African-American. This study focused on at-promise African-American male classroom engagement where the researcher employed a mixed-methods methodology. Findings reveal that in order to engage and keep at-promise African-American males in high school, educators…

This mixed methods action study examines the relationship of students' three psychological needs of autonomy, relatedness and competence as presented in the Self-Determination Theory (Deci & Ryan, 1985) to the level of achievement of high school seniors at Litchfield High School. In the quantitative phase of the study, the quantitative…