Though there is a great deal of research concerning second language instruction, the same cannot be said of research meant to guide the design and delivery of instruction for English Learners and how teachers' perceptions of their effectiveness can influence their daily instructional practices. Through this mixed method action research study, the…

This dissertation investigates inservice elementary teachers' nature of science (NOS) and nature of technology (NOT) implementation and development of NOS views. These investigations are done in three separate studies: views of NOS, implementation of NOS, and implementation of NOT. While the NOS is a necessary part of learning that should take…

Central to the conference theme "Research Impacting Practice", this paper presents the findings of a large-scale mathematics professional development (PD) intervention in disadvantaged communities in Indonesia. The study investigated the impact of a lesson design-driven PD on secondary mathematics teachers' content knowledge (CK). The…

The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the perceived impact of principal evaluation on leadership practices in Regional Office #28 Bureau, Henry, and Stark counties. This study used quantitative research methods with a descriptive and comparative research design. The research question that guided this study were: (1) To what degree…

The purpose of this study was to determine how higher education administrators, faculty, and staff are able to identify subtle sexism, and indicate how they perceive it in the higher education workplace. Past research has also shown micro-aggressions lead to hostility and uncertainty in the workplace (Swim et al., 1995, 1997; Tougas et al., 1995).…

This dissertation is presented to provide an initial examination of The Salvation Army, U.S.A. Eastern Territory's Continuing Professional Education Program begun in 2013. The study focused on three areas of growth and development. These areas include: holistic ministry outcomes, leadership and management development and the retention of officers…

Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) presupposes that contextual supports play key roles in the career development process. However, little research has examined the relationship between high school career development experiences and persisting in a college major. The present study examined the predictive influence of the contextual support…

This study was designed to identify professional development needs of classroom teachers and exceptional education assistants who teach regular and exceptional education students within the same classroom. The researcher assessed the needs of classroom teachers and exceptional education assistants using a Likert scale survey to identify areas of…

The story of the Teacher Institute's NIH-SEPA grant is about evolution and lessons learned in the time of NGSS. This final report is in four modules. Module 1 provides background, a summary of key takeaways from the evaluation, and an overview of Modules 2, 3, and 4. Module 2 summarizes why and how the Teacher Institute's NIH-SEPA work evolved…

Library storytime programs provide opportunities for preschool children to develop readiness skills in early literacy that are linked in research to later success in learning to read and write. Children with disabilities that do not demonstrate school readiness skills upon entry to kindergarten are often placed in self-contained special education…

Occupational therapists work with special education and general education students in public school settings to address the students' ability to fully participate in the educational environment. While existing literature focuses on the role of the occupational therapist in school-based practice, as well as teachers' perceptions of that role, there…

Relational reasoning is a hallmark of human higher cognition and creativity, yet it is notoriously difficult to encourage in abstract tasks, even in adults. Generally, young children initially focus more on objects, but with age become more focused on relations. While prerequisite knowledge and cognitive resource maturation partially explains this…

We compared 236 geoscience instructors' histories of professional development (PD) participation with classroom observations using the Reformed Teaching Observation Protocol (RTOP) that describe undergraduate classes as Student-Centered (score [greater than or equal to] 50), Transitional (score 31-49) or Teacher-Centered (score [less than or equal…

The purpose of this study was to investigate to what extent bi-modal input improves the word segmentation ability of L2 learners of Japanese. Accurately identifying words in continuous speech is a fundamental process for comprehending the overall message, but studies show that second language (L2) learners often find this task difficult, even when…

This dissertation follows a three-article format. The unifying theme for all three articles are the ways in which instructors face the challenges of facilitating access to course knowledge for undergraduate students enrolled in online introductory statistics courses. Each of the three articles are interrelated by the unifying theme but contributes…