Teaching, Learning, Policy & Leadership Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2759
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Item Structured Literacy: Teacher Understanding and the Instructional Implications for Reading Achievement(2022) Taeschner, Brandi Marie; Neumerski, Christine M; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Literacy is a critical life skill which impacts individuals and society. Knowledge to practice gaps in the field of education have existed for many years, specifically while teaching all students to become proficient readers. The intention of this qualitative study is to explore teacher understanding and perspectives about early literacy components used while instructing students to read. In 2021, eight K-3 general education teachers from the focus school LEOES, a Targeted Assistance Title I elementary school in southern Maryland, were interviewed and asked to provide information about the current status of their literacy instruction. Teacher reported information about evidence-based literacy practices implemented were explored to identify and suggest future professional development needed to address low literacy achievement and comprehensive literacy planning. As the literacy coach for this school, teacher input was gathered about current early literacy instructional practices through individual interviews. The self-reported instructional approaches described by the participating teachers were then considered in relation to the six evidence-based components of Structured Literacy to determine teachers’ understanding of these components and the challenges teachers identify which impact foundational reading instruction. Participating teachers mostly named balanced literacy as the literacy approach implemented with an emphasis on the five areas of reading. The Structured Literacy components were not identified or described as critical components of daily literacy instruction implemented at LEOES. Teachers identified challenges related mostly to curricular weaknesses and student factors, rather than the daily instruction provided to students. Implications for LEOES and District A were developed to build teachers’ awareness of the invaluable impact of the classroom teacher to implement a proactive approach to literacy instruction using the evidence-based components and guiding principles of Structured Literacy.Item Explicit Instruction on Rhetorical Patterns and Student-Constructed Graphic Organizers: The Impact on Sixth-Grade Students' Comprehension of Social Studies Text(2011) Scott, Deborah Beth; Dreher, Mariam J; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Using a pretest, posttest two group design, this study investigated the effect of explicit instruction on rhetorical patterns and using those patterns to represent the content graphically on sixth-grade students’ ability to comprehend social studies text. Students in 13 classes from four middle schools in Pennsylvania received either explicit instruction in identifying rhetorical patterns found in social studies textbooks and representing that text graphically or routine social studies instruction. Routine social studies instruction was identified as the instructional activities documented during observations conducted six weeks prior to the intervention. When the intervention began, intervention group students learned to identify rhetorical patterns, construct graphic organizers using the rhetorical patterns, and write summaries of textbook content. Comparison group students continued with routine social studies instruction. All students were assessed with (a) pre- and posttests in which they constructed graphic organizers and wrote summaries using social studies passages and (b) comprehension quizzes during on-going instruction. Randomly selected students from each group engaged in think-aloud tasks at the end of the study. The pre- and posttests results indicated a statistically significant interaction between time and group for both graphic organizer construction (with a very large effect size) and summary writing (with a moderate effect size). Intervention group students outperformed students in the routine social studies group in both constructing graphic organizers based on rhetorical patterns and writing complete summaries. For the comprehension quizzes, students receiving routine social studies instruction outperformed students in the intervention group when answering multiple-choice and essay questions requiring recall of content. Think-aloud responses demonstrated that students in the intervention group were able to graphically represent social studies textbook content using rhetorical patterns as well as transfer that knowledge to a textbook from a different domain while students in the comparison group recognized there was a structure to the content of the text but did not accurately represent that content graphically according to the appropriate rhetorical pattern. Observational data showed intervention students were more engaged with graphic organizers and work samples demonstrated they were able to identify key information in the text and represent it in graphic form.Item Positioning and Identity in the Academic Literacy Experiences of Elementary English Language Learners(2011) Hickey, Pamela J.; Martin-Beltran, Melinda; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This study investigates the academic literacy experiences of elementary English Language Learners (ELLs) in first grade, fourth grade, and sixth grade. Participants included students as well as their reading/language arts mainstream teachers and their English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) teachers. Informed by both cross-sectional cross-case study and narrative inquiry methodology, this study used positioning theory and identity theory as complementary analytic lenses. Students' positionings, both reflexive self-positioning and interactive positioning by others, were identified and named through analyses of their interactions in academic literacy events during reading/language arts. In order to consider the ways that students' positionings may afford or constrain their access to and engagement with academic literacy events, the researcher created an analytic framework naming student positions. Additionally, positions were considered in light of the ways that they mediated students' levels of engagement as literacy events unfolded. To investigate the construction of students' literate identities, the researcher examined students' patterns of positioning during literacy events and considered interview data from students and teachers as well as field notes that documented conversations with participants. The researcher also gathered two self-portraits from student participants, including one self-portrait showing the student engaged in an academic literacy task at school and one showing the student engaged in a fun activity outside of the school context. The study demonstrated that students' positionings, both positive and constraining, may work to construct and re-construct students' literate identities even as students' literate identities may inform the ways that students take on and negotiate positions in a recursive process. The study also found that students with strong literate identities bridging home and school contexts took on more positive positions thus engaging more deeply with academic literacy tasks than students with striving literate identities. Students with striving literate identities often took on positions of constraint in strategic moves that allowed them to get through literacy tasks without engaging deeply. Finally, this study demonstrated the powerful ways that teachers may support students' deep engagement with literacy tasks through positive positioning and following through on their lesson implementation by offering opportunities for re-positioning and the use of scaffolds.