The purposes of this mixed method study were to examine the relationship between student motivation and performance on large-scale, low- and high-stakes examinations and identify the types of incentive programs used by principals to promote test performance among high school students. The study took take place in California's Southern San Joaquin…

As part of a sequential exploratory mixed methods study, 9 months of ethnographically guided observations and interviews were used to develop a survey examining graduate engineering student retention. Findings from the ethnographic fieldwork yielded several themes, including international diversity, research group organization and climate,…

This investigation describes secondary mathematics teachers' learning and instructional change following their participation in a professional development workshop, the Enhancing Secondary Mathematics Teacher Preparation Project (ESP) (2004-2005), specifically focused on the selection and implementation of cognitively challenging mathematical…

Implementing inquiry in the outdoors introduces many challenges for teachers, some of which can be dealt with using mobile technologies. For productive use of these technologies, teachers should be provided with the opportunity to develop relevant knowledge and practices. In a professional development (PD) program in this design-based research, 24…

Social media technologies are being widely used by students in institutions of higher education and these are transforming their way of learning, social conduct, communication and networking. The intent of this research was conducted to determine value of social media technologies to students in higher education but with a focus that was directed…

This study sought to understand environmental knowledge and attitudes among young people to explain the relationship between environmental education (EE) and reported pro-environmental behaviours (PEB). A mixed-methods design was employed: 88 university students in the UK and Nigeria were surveyed and 6 were subsequently interviewed. The findings…

Social cognitive theory guided the design of a survey to investigate high school students' perceptions of factors affecting their career contemplations and beliefs regarding the influence of their participation in the international Science Olympiad on their subject interests and twenty-first century skills. In addition, gender differences in…

Research suggests it is difficult to learn mathematics in the fully asynchronous online (FAO) instructional modality, yet little is known about associated teaching and assessment practices. In this study, we investigate FAO mathematics assessment and feedback practices in particular consideration of both claims and findings that these practices…

In this article the author investigates how 20 White preservice teachers, who successfully completed a semester-long diversity course for teacher licensure, developed a critical self-awareness regarding the causes and consequences of linguicism in school settings. The conceptual framework draws from Nieto's 2006 five-level model of Multicultural…

Preparing college students to be active contributors to the next generation is an important function of higher education. This assumption about generativity forms a cornerstone in this mixed methods study that examined generativity levels among 273 college students at a 4-year public university. MANCOVA results indicated that college students who…

A new "controlled assessment" model was introduced in England, Wales and Northern Ireland in 2009. This paper describes a research project that explores teachers' experiences of this new assessment model in General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) level modern foreign language (MFL) speaking assessment. Focusing on teachers'…

This exploratory study introduces the systemic approach and the explicit teaching of a meta-language to provide conceptual tools for students for the analysis and interpretation of multimodal texts. Equipping students with a set of specialised vocabulary with conventionalised meanings associated with specific choices in multimodal texts empowers…

Current science education reforms and policy documents highlight the importance of environmental awareness and perceived need for activism. As "environmental problems are socially constructed in terms of their conceptualized effects on individuals, groups, other living things and systems research based on constructivist principles provides…

Although research shows college preparatory programs' effectiveness regarding academic achievement and college awareness, much less is known about whether programs affect college attendance and persistence. GEAR UP (Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs) and other college preparatory programs claim that this is a primary…

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of dynamic mathematics software on the achievement of pre-service mathematics teachers in the topic of polar coordinates and to solicit their opinions about computer-assisted instruction. The study was conducted for 11 weeks with 33 pre-service teachers in the Department of Mathematics…