This paper summarizes how collaborative online projects (COPs) are used to facilitate science content-area learning for English Learners of Hispanic origin. This is a Mexico-USA partnership project funded by the National Science Foundation. A COP is a 10-week thematic science unit, completely online, and bilingual (Spanish and English) designed to…

Originating from the literature on resiliency, adult learning, and professional development, this qualitative study investigated how the relationship between resiliency and adult learning influenced professional development in one suburban-rural school district in Litchfield County, Connecticut. Data represent findings on the perceptions of…

The K-8 Cajon Valley Union School District (Cajon Valley USD) is one of forty-two school districts in the greater San Diego, California metropolitan area. Serving approximately 16,000 students, the Cajon Valley USD is extremely diverse; 36 percent of students are Hispanic, 46 percent are white, 7 percent are African American, and many students are…

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 case study explored the use of students' personal mobile devices in the classroom for learning. The context was a district with an initiative called Bring Your Own Technology (BYOT), whereby students regularly utilized their personal technology as part of the curriculum. The focus of this study was to better understand how students' personal…

Given the rising prevalence rates of autism spectrum disorders (ASD), schools are serving an increasing number of students with ASD (Scull & Winkler, 2011). Researchers have highlighted active engagement as a critical component of effective interventions for students with ASD (National Research Council, 2001), yet there is limited research…

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…

This chapter focuses on the instruction of diverse students in mainstream classrooms. The first part summarizes academic achievement of diverse students from different ethnicity, gender, language and social class. The second part discusses the characteristics of different diverse instruction. The third part suggests specific instructional…

Over the past decade, it has been argued that technology-enhanced learning (TEL) could respond to the needs of the new knowledge society and transform learning. However, despite isolated achievements, TEL has not succeeded in revolutionizing education and learning processes. Most current TEL initiatives still take a centralized technology-push…

The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of explicitly differentiated reading instruction groups on eighth-grade students' achievement, behavior, and engagement in a school seeking to reestablish adequate yearly progress benchmarks. The results of this study supported student participation in explicitly differentiated reading…

Heuristics are deeply-held, tacit knowledge structures connected to our feelings. A heuristic study explores a phenomenon crucial to the researcher's self-discovery (Moustakas, 1990). Like me, many undergraduate composition instructors feel both fear and hope at the crossroads of composition and technology. Technology and composition shape one…

This study investigated the effect of direct instruction in rhetorical analysis on students' critical thinking abilities, including knowledge, skills, and dispositions. The researcher investigated student perceptions of the effectiveness of argument mapping; Thinker's Guides, based on Paul's model of critical thinking; and Socratic questioning.…

The quality of relationships between teachers and students has been associated with academic achievement and performance outcomes for students at all levels of their education. Extensive literature examining characteristics of positive relationships between teachers and their elementary age students exists, but is less abundant in regard to…

Background: This paper was written for a graduate level action research course at Muskingum University, located in New Concord, OH. Purpose: The purpose of this research was to determine which method of instruction best serves ALL high school students. Is it more advantageous to track ("ability group") students or not to track students…

College students enrolling in the calculus sequence have a wide variance in their preparation and abilities, yet they are usually taught from the same lecture. We describe another pedagogical model of Individualized Additional Instruction (IAI) that assesses each student frequently and prescribes further instruction and homework based on the…