Teaching, Learning, Policy & Leadership Theses and Dissertations
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Item Plans, Targets, and Trends in Ethiopian Education(1970) Bjerkan, Ole-Christian; van Zwoll, James A.; Education; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, MD)The purpose of this study was to trace the progressive recognition of educational needs as expressed in targets and objectives in educational and development plans in Ethiopia from 1944 to 1968, and to discover the relationship between the needs and the actual attainment of the goals and targets. A study was also made of the contribution of the non-government schools to the fulfillment of presentday educational needs. By reviewing the literature pertaining to the development of the educational system in Ethiopia, some of the forces which have and are influencing educational policies and plans were discussed. An analysis of the educational and development p lans revealed clues to the progressive identification of educational needs as expressed in the different plans. After crystallizing the educational needs as expressed in educational objectives and targets, an attempt was made to find to what extent these needs have been fulfilled. The needs in Ethiopia were found to be similar to those in many of the African nations in spite of a different cultural background and political history of the country. The differences in problems were rather in degree than in kind. The educational plans for Ethiopia have, with the exception of the Addis Ababa Plan of 1961, been made without any relation or comparison with other African nations. In most cases the targets and goals of the local plans were surpassed, but when related to educational "desired averages" for the African countries taking part in the Addis Ababa conference, the educational development in Ethiopia proved to be seriously lagging. compared with the "desired averages" of the Addis Ababa Plan, of an age-group population enrollment of 100 per cent for the first level, 23 per cent for the second level and 2 per cent for the third level to be reached within the year 1982, a projected enrollment in keeping with the historical trend for the last ten years in Ethiopia indicates that these targets would not be reached within the target date.Item INTENDED AND INCIDENTAL LEARNING OUTCOMES RESULTING FROM THE USE OF LEARNING OBJECTIVES WITH A SELECTED AUDIOVISUAL PRESENTATION(1978) Main, Robert Gail; Berman, Louise M.; Administration, Supervision, and Curriculum; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, MD)Problem: The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of the use of learning objectives with an audiovisual presentation on the intended (objective relevant) and incidental (non-objective relevant) learning outcomes. This study was conducted to provide evidence regarding the facilitative effects of using learning objectives as an organizer with a fixed-pace, fixed-format, non-print medium. The investigation was based on one phase of David P. Ausubel's theory of meaningful verbal learning: the advance organizer, Ausubel hypothesized that organizers facilitate learning when presented to students in advance of a learning passage. In this investigation, the organizer consisted of the learning objectives for the students, and the curriculum material was an audiovisual slide-tape presentation. The organizer was presented prior to the presentation, following the presentation, and interspersed within the presentation immediately preceding the objective relevant content. Procedure : An experiment was conducted to determine the effect and interaction of five independent variables with an audiovisual slidetape program: presence of learning objectives, location of learning objectives, type of knowledge, sex of learner, and retention of learning. A factorial design replicated for retention of learning was selected for the analysis. Student learning of intended knowledge and incidental knowledge, as measured by paper and pencil tests, were the dependent variables. A commercially produced educational slide-tape presentation concerning advances in communication technology was used as the stimulus. The participants were 108 college students enrolled in an introductory mass communications course at a California State University. Students in the class were stratified by sex and randomly assigned to four groups. Each experimental group viewed the slide-tape presentation either without learning objectives (control group), with learning objectives grouped at the beginning of the presentation (advance organizers), grouped at the end of the presentation (post organizers), or located throughout the presentation immediately preceding the relevant content (adjunct organizers ). Viewing and listening factors were carefully controlled for each of the four groups. Students completed an immediate posttest measuring intended and incidental knowledge as well as their feelings toward the subject and the manner of presentation. They were tested again two weeks later for intended and incidental knowledge only. The data were subjected to analysis of variance and other selected statistical procedures for testing differences between the experimental groups. Results : Although all three treatment groups had higher intended learning scores, only the performance of the group receiving the learning objectives before the slide-tape presentation achieved significance at the .05 level. The comparison of the immediate and delayed posttest analyses indicated that the relative effects of the experimental treatment did not change over time for the intended learning. No significant differences were found between experimental groups in the learning outcomes of incidental knowledge. No interactions were found between treatment and the grade point average or sex of the student. Significant differences did occur in the participants' evaluation of the slide-tape presentation. While there was no significant difference between the treatment groups and the control group, the group receiving the learning objectives before the presentation gave a significantly higher evaluation rating to the slide-tape program than did the group where the learning objectives were interspersed during the presentation. Conclusions: As a result of this experiment, the author concluded that the use of learning objectives facilitated the learning of objective relevant knowledge from a slide-tape presentation when the learning objectives were presented at the beginning of the program. Learning objectives used in this manner as "advance organizers" do not inhibit the acquisition of incidental (non-objective relevant) information contained in the instructional program. Furthermore, the use of learning objectives with a slide-tape instructional program does not detract from the students' evaluation of the program. Recommendation : Learning objectives can be developed by instructors for the audiovisual materials they use. The insertion of the learning objectives prior to the presentation of the audiovisual program can be accomplished rather easily. If the primary concern of the user of audiovisual materials is to increase intended learning, the insertion of learning objectives prior to the presentation is recommended.Item The Development of an Instrument to Differentiate Among Public School Teachers on the Basis of Attitudes Toward Professionalism(1978) Uhlan, Eugene Arthur; Goldman, Harvey; Administration, Supervision and Curriculum; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md)Purpose: The purpose of this study was to develop an instrument which would measure the level of professionalism attained by public school teachers. The development of such an instrument is based upon the assumption that there are degrees of professionalism rather than a simple dichotomy between the professional and the nonprofessional. Procedures: A review of the literature revealed that the characteristics of a profession are of two basic types. First are those characteristics which are part of the structure of the occupation including such things as formal education and entrance requirements, the formation of a professional organization and the adopting of a code of ethics. The second type is attitudinal. These attributes of professionalism reflect the way in which the practitioners view their work. If the occupation has met the structural prerequisites of a profession, the approach taken in practice determines the level of professionalism reached. In order to determine the extent to which the approach taken by public school teachers toward their work approximates the professional model, the researcher developed an initial pool of 104 items for a Teacher Attitude Scale based upon the following six attitudinal attributes of a profession: 1. The use of the professional organization as a major reference. 2 . Involvement of the individual in the professional culture. 3. A belief in service to the public . 4 . A belief in the right to self -regulation. 5. A sense of calling to the field. 6. A belief in autonomy. The initial pool of items was submitted to three professionally trained teachers who were provided full definitions of each attribute above and were asked to match each item with the attribute it was intended to measure. The work of this group indicated that the six attributes should be collapsed into three. Thus, use of the professional organization as a major reference and involvement in the professional culture were combine . A belief in service to the public and a sense of calling to the field were combined and autonomy was combined with a belief in the right to self-regulation. A second panel examined the items for clarity and unnecessary duplication. This process resulted in the selection of sixty (60) items, twenty designed to measure each of the three combined attributes. The sixty item Teacher Attitude Scale was then sent to a total of 500 randomly selected teachers in eight different county school systems in Maryland. The statistical analysis was based upon 408 usable responses or just over an eighty percent return. Twenty-two items were selected for use on a field test version of the Teacher Attitude Scale. Responses from 100 randomly selected teachers in Cecil County, Maryland, resulted in the selection of nineteen items for the final instrument. Findings: The research indicates that there are two factors contributing to the professionalism of public school teachers which can be measured through the use of a self-report instrument. These factors relate to the use of the professional organization as a major reference and a belief in commitment to the profession including a sense of calling to the field. Implications: The score a subject obtains on the instrument developed through this study should be considered an attitude score . In general, the interpretation of an attitude score on a summated- rating scale cannot be made independently of the distribution of scores of some defined group. This should present no problem since the purpose of using the instrument is to place the attitude of each subject in relation to the attitudes of other subjects. Scores on summated rating scales can be interpreted in this relative sense . In terms of further research, the purpose will be to compare the mean change in attitude scores as a result of introducing some experimental variable. A study of the teachers exhibiting the more professional attitudes, according to the instrument, may reveal training and/or organizational differences which relate to this professionalism. Administrators and teacher educators could then encourage the use of those training techniques which enhance professionalism.Item THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PERCEPTION OF LEADERSHIP BEHAVIOR, EFFECTIVENESS, AND CREATIVITY OF SECONDARY SCHOOL PRINCIPALS IN MARYLAND(1978) Matthews, Earl T.; McClure, L. Morris; Teaching, Learning, Policy & Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md)The broad purpose of this study is to contribute knowledge to the selection of school principals. Specifically, the purpose of the study is to examine the relationships among measures of the variables of creativity, views of leader behavior, and effectiveness of secondary principals to determine variables that can be used for the selection, placement, and evaluation of secondary principals. Selected for participation in this study were 50 schools from school districts in Maryland, All teachers within the identified sample were requested to complete the Check List for the Evaluation of Secondary Principals (CLESP). By random procedures teachers were identified to complete the Leader Behavior Description Questionnaire-XII (LBDQ-XII) which indicated their perceptions of their principal's leader behavior, Each principal was requested to complete the AC Test of Creative Ability, a paper-and-pencil test which can be administered to individuals or groups to estimate the creative potential of an individual. Findings: 1. The data provided evidence that at the .05 level creativity is not significantly related to perceptions of leader behavior of secondary principals. 2. The data provided evidence that at the .OS level creativity is not significantly related to effectiveness of secondary principals. 3. There was a significant (.05 level) relationship established between scores secondary principals receive relative to their perceived leader behavior and measures of their effectiveness. 4. No significant relationship at the .05 level was found between the interaction effect of creative ability of principals with measures of their perceived leader behavior and effectiveness. Conclusions: The findings of the study suggest that the following conclusions may be drawn. 1. The creative ability of secondary principals is not directly related to the leader behavior that they exhibit. 2. The effectiveness of secondary principals as measured in this study is not directly related to their creative ability. 3. Generally, the effectiveness of secondary principals is directly related to their exhibited and perceived leader behavior. Specifically, those principals who are effective are perceived by their teachers as individuals who can: handle conflicting demands; accept postponement and do not worry about outcomes of new procedures; have strong convictions and utilize arguments effectively; encourage initiative in their teachers and encourage teachers to use good judgement; are friendly and approachable; have things turn out right for them; build team work within their building; and are working to get to the top. On the other hand, the effectiveness of secondary principals is not related to their perceived ability to: act as a spokesman for teachers; let teachers know what is expected of them with regards to program balance; and, define his role as to his concern for his teachers as individuals. 4. There is no interaction of creativity, perceptions of leadership behavior with respect to effectiveness. However, for prediction purposes concerning administrative effectiveness the secondary principal's perceived ability: to pull together his teachers; work with his superiors; represent his staff; maintain a closely knit organization; and resolve internal conflict emerge as important.Item A STUDY TO DETERMINE THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE DEGREE OF PROGRAM OPENNESS, THE ATTAINMENT OF ORGANIZATIONAL PERFORMANCE OBJECTIVES AND SELECTED DEMOGRAPHIC VARIABLES AS PERCEIVED BY TEACHERS IN SELECTED PUBLIC ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS(1975) Lyons, Kevin John; Goldman, Harvey; Teaching, Learning, Policy & Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md)The problems of concern in this study were: (1) To investigate whether a relationship existed between teachers' perceptions of the attainment of organizational performance objectives and the degree of program openness exhibited by selected elementary schools; (2) to investigate whether a relationship existed between selected demographic variables and teachers' perceptions of program openness and the attainment of organizational performance objectives; and (3) to investigate whether organizational performance objective attainment could be predicted from the demographic variables and degree of program openness. The sample in this study was comprised of teachers representing sixty-four elementary schools. The schools were selected from twelve of the twenty-four school systems in the State of Maryland. Two instruments were utilized in this study. 1) The Dimensions of Schooling instrument (IV). This instrument was a thirty item questionnaire which was designed to measure the degree of openness exhibited by the educational program of a school. The instrument yields a score which describe s the program on a continuum of openness which ranges from one to thirty. 2) The Organizational Status Survey. This instrument was a sixty-three item questionnaire which was designed to measure perceptions about the quality of performance manifested by the public schools. The instrument yields scores on six performance objectives. Significant positive correlations were found between degree of program openness and the performance objectives Organizational Rational i ty and Individuality. Correlations between socio-economic status of the school and each of the performance objectives were not significant. A negative correlation was found between size of student enrollment and Individuality. In all cases, the correlations were linear in nature . The multiple correlation between the performance objective Organizational Rationality and the variables degree of program openness, socio-economic status, and size of student enrollment was found to be significant. Degree of program openness was found to be the best predictor of Organizational Rationality. Socio-economic status was also found to account for a significant amount of the variability, while size of student enrollment was not. The multiple correlation between the performance objective Individuality and the variables degree of program openness, socio-economic status, and size of student enrollment was also found to be significant. Size of student enrollment was found to be the best predictor of Individuality, while degree of openness was also found to account for a significant amount of variability. Socio-economic status was not found to be a significant predictor. Degree of program openness was found to have a significant positive correlation with socio-economic status, and a significant negative correlation with size of student enrollment. In both cases the relationship was linear in nature. Schools with open and mixed architectural designs were found to be significantly more "open" than schools with a traditional design. The results of this study represent an investigation of the attainment of specific performance objectives, as perceived by teachers in public elementary schools, in relation to degree of program openness and selected demographic variables. The results provide an indication of the way in which open education is associated with performance objective attainment and with certain demographic variables. They also provide an indication of some of the factors which may influence school effectiveness and open education .Item The Relative Effects of General versus Descriptive Praise on a Card Sorting Task(1976) Scheer, Robert Ryan; Pumroy, Donald K.; Psychology; Education; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md)It has frequently been postulated that descriptive praise, which labels the behavior being praised, is superior to general praise, which delivers an accolade without specifying the behavior being praised. Research investigating this postulate is meager. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether in fact descriptive praise is superior to general praise. Fifty fifth- and sixth-grade students from the Lida Lee Tall Center in Towson, Maryland were randomly selected to serve as subjects. Twelve boys and eight girls were randomly assigned to each of two praise conditions (i.e. descriptive praise and general praise) and six boys and four girls were randomly assigned to a control condition. Subjects were seen individually and pretested to ensure they could perform the experimental task. The assigned task was to sort 108 cards by one of three possible sorting methods. The first 54 card sorts served as a baseline to determine the preferred sorting method for each subject. During the final 54 card sorts, subjects in the two praise conditions received either general praise (e.g. "Great") or descriptive praise (e.g. "Great. I like the way you are sorting by shape") on a FR3 schedule for sorting cards by a randomly selected sorting method. Baseline data were collected for the entire 108 card sorts in the control condition. Multivariate analyses of variance were carried out on the extent to which the three groups changed their sorting method from their baseline method and on the extent to which the two praise groups sorted by the method they were reinforced for. The results indicated that the descriptive praise group performed significantly better than both the general praise and control groups. No significant difference emerged between the general praise and control groups. The male and female subjects did not significantly differ in their response to the two praise conditions. These results support the position that descriptive praise is more effective than general praise. It was suggested that the labeling of the behavior being reinforced in descriptive praise increased the informative value of the reinforcer thereby giving subjects in this condition an advantage over the subjects receiving general praise who had to, in effect, guess what response on their part elicited the praise.Item The Effects of an Integrated Learning Sequence on the Acquisition and Retention of Mathematics and Science Behaviors in Grade Five(1970) Gray, William Lee; Walbesser, Henry H.; Education; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md)For many years, educators have used the relationship between mathematics and science in the teaching of both subjects. Science examples have been introduced into mathematics programs and often with the intention of facilitating the acquisition of mathematics behaviors. In other cases, mathematics behaviors assumed necessary for the acquisition of certain quantitative science behaviors are taught prior to the presentation of the quantitative science behaviors. There is some support for the notion that teaching the mathematics behaviors assumed necessary for the science behaviors facilitates the acquisition of the science behaviors. In this experiment, a comparison is made of the effectiveness of two l earning sequences in facilitating the acquisition and retention of certain mathematics and science behaviors. In one l earning sequence, the related mathematics and science behaviors are integrated; in the other sequence, they are not. It was hypothesized that the integrated sequence facilitates the acquisition and retention of the mathematics and science behaviors more than the non-integrated sequence. Three quantitative science behaviors were chosen as the final objectives of the learning sequence. By means of a task analysis procedure, twenty-two objectives were identified as prerequisite for the three terminal objectives. The twenty-five behaviors were then structured in a hierarchy. The three terminal objectives were placed at the top of the hierarchy. The subordinate behaviors were arranged below the terminal objectives in an order suggested by the analysis. This hierarchy was used as a guide in the construction of the two learning sequences. Each of the twelve lesson sequences was designed to promote the acquisition of the behaviors included in the hierarchy. A test was constructed which consisted of assessment items designed to test acquisition of each of the mathematics and science behaviors in the hierarchy. This test was administered on two occasions; once, on the day following completion of the learning sequence and, again, nine weeks later. Nine hundred students in thirty fifth-grade classes in the Baltimore County Public Schools completed all facets of the experiment. The classes were randomly assigned to one of the two sequences. An analysis of variance procedure was used on the class means to test the acquisition and retention of the mathematics and science behaviors. The following results were noted: The coefficient of stability for the criterion measure was 0.79; The coefficient of internal consistency was 0.81; The integrated sequence produced a significantly higher overall performance than the non-integrated sequence in acquisition of the mathematical behaviors although there were no significant differences in the effects of the sequence on the rate of forgetting; The two treatments had no differential effects on the overall performance or the rate of forgetting with regard to the science behaviors. It was concluded that the integrated learning sequence was generally superior to the non-integrated sequence in facilitating acquisition of the mathematical behaviors for the population defined in this study. It could not be established that the two sequences had differential effects on the rate of forgetting of the mathematics or science behaviors. The results and conclusions suggest that further consideration should be given to the use of integrated learning sequences as an instruction strategy.