The Conceptual Survey of Electricity and Magnetism (CSEM) has been used to assess student understanding of introductory concepts of electricity and magnetism because many of the items on the CSEM have strong distractor choices which correspond to students' alternate conceptions. Instruction is unlikely to be effective if instructors do not know…

This qualitative study examined preservice teachers' (PSTs') ideas and beliefs regarding the use of rap for instructional purposes in P-12 classrooms, and the ways in which they proposed to use rap in the teaching of middle and high school social studies. Participants included the instructor of a social studies methods course, and thirteen PSTs…

Predisposing factors of perceived physical education (PE) ability and perceived PE worth within the Youth Physical Activity Promotion Model are positively associated with young people's daily physical activity. The aim of this study was to qualitatively investigate the origins of students' perceived PE ability (perceived competence and…

In L2 reading, words and the concepts they denote frequently constitute an important vehicle or obstacle in the comprehension process. However, this has been rarely explored from a language awareness perspective. The current research therefore tailors the constructs of lexical awareness and conceptual awareness to L2 reading contexts by using a…

The proliferation of technology brings innovated strategies to enhance learning with digital math gaming in order to optimize motivation, comprehension, and retention. The problem is the lack of opportunities for students to engage in math video games. The scope of this paper is to present findings from a qualitative case study that investigated…

This study examined the impact of school practice supervision on performance of student teachers in higher institutions of learning in Uganda. Purposive and random samplings were used to select respondents from the two universities. Data was collected using interviews, closed and open-ended questionnaires from a sample of 103 respondents, and 76…

School personnel are concerned that reading gaps of grade 3 and grade 4 students have persisted in 4 rural elementary schools in the southern United States despite the use of ability grouping to improve student reading proficiency scores. Between the 2014-2016 school years, less than 50% of students in grades 3 and grade 4 scored at the proficient…

College graduation rates have been on the academic and political agenda. The United States graduation rate is 59%, however, 68% of nontraditional students do not graduate with baccalaureate degrees within the time frame of six years. Scholars are attributing the decreasing graduation rates to barriers encountered by nontraditional undergraduate…

Teaching students to construct scientific understanding is complex. Teachers who develop noticing skills can attend and respond to students' science ideas to move understanding forward. Traditional professional development (PD) approaches limit teachers' opportunities to develop noticing skills. This study examined what aspects of a collaborative…

As the U.S. becomes more diverse, school leaders, major corporations, and areas of national defense continue to investigate science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education issues. African-American female students have historically been underrepresented in STEM fields, yet educational leadership research, examining this population is…

Despite being a protracted refugee crisis that entails international debates and controversies, discussions about Palestinian education have frequently sidelined the perspectives, needs and priorities of the Palestinian refugee population. Drawing upon a qualitative study in the West Bank and engaging with theoretical ideas of Johan Galtung, Paulo…

Even though the use of social media in education is a now widely-studied topic, there still does not seem to be a consensus for what social media may afford students or how best to use them in the classroom. In this critical review of current literature, I discuss some of the most prominent qualitative studies that explore the use of social media…

Theories guide many aspects of literacy research. In this article we describe four theoretical approaches that we have used in qualitative research with students who are perceived to struggle with reading in school, including: New Literacy Studies, Disability Studies in Education, Bioecological Systems Theory, and Cultural Historical Activity…

This paper examines how institutional positioning has emerged in the meaning-making activities between Finnish higher education institutions and the Ministry of Education and Culture. The study is based on a qualitative analysis of the performance agreement documents of all higher education institutions filed with the ministry for contract periods…

As qualitative research undertakings are not independent of the researcher, the "indissoluble interrelationship between interpreter and interpretation" (Thomas & James, 2006, p. 782) renders it necessary for researchers to understand that their text is a representation, a version of the truth that is the product of writerly choices,…