The purpose of this quasi-experimental non-equivalent control group study was to test theories of constructivism and motivation, along with research-based teaching practices of differentiating instruction and instructing within a child's Zone of Proximal Development, in measuring the effect of computer-aided instruction on fifth grade students'…

This dissertation describes the development of a state-of-the-art immersive media environment and its potential to motivate high school youth with autism to vocally express themselves. Due to the limited availability of media environments in public education settings, studies on the use of such systems in special education contexts are rare. A…

Providing a meaningful and experiential learning environment for all students has long created a concern for alternate ways to teach students who are reportedly demonstrating non-mastery on state standardized assessments. As the benchmark for showing successful academic achievement increases, so does the need for discovering effective ways for…

Information literacy--the ability "to recognize when information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed information" (American Library Association [ALA], 1989, para. 3)--has been widely and increasingly cited as an essential competency for college success, for the workplace, and for life…

Under-utilization of human potential coupled with the need to maintain alignment with the demands imposed by globalization (e.g. sustainable development, citizenship, self-actualization, ability to respond to the emergence of cutting-edge technologies) have led to calls for policy and practice reorientations in the field of education. In response,…

Business leaders, United States citizens, and American politicians continue to seek school reform as a means for providing the United States with a workforce consisting of employees who possess 21st century skills. The development of teacher transformational leadership and the use of distributed leadership practices are needed to create public…

In response to the diverse requirements of 21st-century police work and the increasing emphasis on community-policing philosophy, the Los Angeles Police Department has implemented changes within its academy curricula and methods of instruction, including the use of adult-learning concepts, a community policing problem-solving model known as…

The purpose of this mixed method study was to discover whether training in understanding relationships between variables would help students read and interpret equations for the purposes of problem solving in physics. Twenty students from two physics classes at a private Catholic high school participated in a one group pretest-posttest unit with…

This study investigated the effectiveness of a unit plan designed to enhance students' three-dimensional geometry and spatial ability skills. Research participants consisted of 50 students, 19 males and 31 females, and two teachers from a public high school in a suburban middle-class community. The students in this study were 9th and 10th graders…

The renewal of IDEA (2004) produced a number of changes in the identification process for children with Specific Learning Disabilities (SLDs). The requirement that students must present a severe discrepancy between IQ and academic performance has been modified to allow for a more flexible problem-solving approach commonly labeled "Response to…

Although it is difficult to find any current literature that does not encourage use of multiple representations in mathematics classrooms, there has been very limited research that compared such practice to student achievement level on standardized tests. This study examined the associations between students' achievement levels and their (a)…

The purpose of this study was to document the factors (i.e., motivation and perceived constraints) and processes (i.e., constraint negotiation) that influence students' selection of and satisfaction with their internship choice. The study was conducted using a quantitative approach, which included a focus group, a pilot study, and a…

Reciprocal teaching, a social constructivist instruction method, was explored in this study on the mathematical word problem solving skills of fifth grade students in two elementary schools within a suburban school district in upstate New York. Eighty-five students in four intact classes participated in this mixed methods study. Using a…

As more demands are being placed on faculty inside of the classroom, the debate surrounding the feasibility of faculty having the time and resources to be involved outside the classroom continues. At the same time there is a growing concern that in light of current advancements in technology; oral communication skills, basic to human existence is…

Representational fluency (RF) includes an ability to interpret, create, move within and among, and connect tool-based representations of mathematical objects. Taken as an indicator of conceptual understanding, there is a need to better support school algebra students' RF in learning environments that utilize both computer algebra systems…