Teaching, Learning, Policy & Leadership Theses and Dissertations

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2759

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Problems and Possibilities: The identities and challenges of early career science teachers
(2024) Mesiner, Jennifer Elizabeth; Levin, Daniel M; Elby, Andrew; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Learning to teach is multifaceted and dynamic resulting in a turbulent, fast-changing era of professional life for early career science teachers (ECSTs). Teaching practice is uncertain and tensions are endemic to the profession (Ball, 1993). This dissertation connects to and extends current research of the challenges ECSTs face and how those challenges affect ECSTs’ work, identity, and experience. In the first chapter, I introduce my research focus and offer a personal narrative to provide context of my positionality and experiences between myself and my research. In Chapter 2, I offer a systematic review of the literature to provide a contemporary update to Davis and colleagues’ (2006) review Challenges New Science Teachers Face to answer the question: What challenges do ECSTs face while navigating their first years of teaching? Chapter 3 describes the research design, data sources, and general analysis for the longitudinal case study of an ECST, Alexa. The remaining body chapters build upon Chapter 2 and each other in answer to my remaining research questions: What challenges does Alexa face as an ECST? How does Alexa’s teacher role identity develop over time? In what ways do challenges shape Alexa’s teacher role identity? Chapter 4 builds upon the themes drawn from Chapter 2’s systematic review to explore the challenges Alexa experiences. Chapter 5 describes how Alexa’s identity develops across her early years as an ECST using a Dynamic Systems of Role Identity framework (Kaplan & Garner, 2018). Chapter 6 explores how those challenges impacted Alexa’s science teacher identity using a productive friction framework (Hagel & Brown, 2005a). In Chapter 7, I close by summarizing the research, describing its implications, and offering future directions for research and practice.
TOWARD A DATA LITERACY ASSESSMENT THAT IS FAIR FOR LANGUAGE MINORITY STUDENTS
(2023) Yeom, Semi; O'Flahavan, John; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Data literacy is crucial for adolescents to access and navigate data in today’s technology-driven world. Researchers emphasize the need for K-12 students to attain data literacy. However, few available instructions have incorporated validated assessments. Therefore, I developed and implemented the Data literacy Assessment for Middle graders (DLA-M) that can diagnose students’ current stages fairly and support future practices regardless of their language backgrounds. I initiated the study with two research questions: a) How valid is a newly developed assessment to measure middle-grade students’ data literacy? b) How fairly does the new assessment measure data literacy regardless of students’ language backgrounds?A new assessment purported to measure two competencies of data literacy of 6th to 9th graders: a) Interpret data representations and b) Evaluate data and data-based claims. I used the Evidence-Centered Design (ECD) as a methodological framework to increase the validity of the assessment. I followed the five layers of the ECD framework to develop and implement the DLAM. Then I analyzed the data from implementing the assessment and gathered five types of validity evidence for validation. Based on the collected validity evidence, I concluded that the assessment was designed to represent the content domain that is purported to measure. The assessment had internal consistency in measuring data literacy except for nine eliminated items, and the data literacy scores from the overall assessment were reliable as well. Regarding item quality, item discrimination parameters met the quality criteria, but difficulty estimates of some items did not meet the intended design. Empirical cluster analyses revealed two performance levels from the participants. Differential item functioning analyses showed that item discrimination and difficulty were not differentiated between language minority students (LMSs) and their counterparts with the same data literacy level. These results did not reveal the possibility of unfair interpretations and uses of this assessment for LMSs. Lastly, I found significant interaction effects between the DLAM scores and the two variables about students’ English reading proficiency and use of technology. This study delineated how to develop and validate a data literacy assessment that could support students from different linguistic backgrounds. The research also facilitated the application of a data literacy assessment to school settings by scrutinizing and defining target competencies that could benefit adolescents’ data literacy. The findings can inform future research to implement data literacy assessments in broader contexts. This study can serve as a springboard to provide inclusive data literacy assessments for diverse student populations.
"Why Be Average When You Could Be Extraordinary?": A Case Study of an Exemplary African American Math Teacher
(2022) Buli, Tarik; Goffney, Imani; Brantlinger, Andrew; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
It is well documented that as an educational system we subject students from particular racial and socioeconomic backgrounds to unequal schooling experiences. Some researchers attribute the unequal schooling experiences and outcomes of minoritized students of color to their limited access to educational resources, like skilled teachers and quality curriculum. Other researchers identify that even in highly resourced American schools, African American students are specifically subjected to oppressive learning conditions. Given this context of schooling for African American students, this study explores how an African American 8th-grade mathematics teacher, Ms. Collier, may be a protective factor in her students’ education. Specifically, I use qualitative case study methods to examine how Ms. Collier’s instructional practice relates to historical conceptualizations of African American teachers of African American students, and how her mathematics instruction socially positions her students as learners of mathematics. For this case study, I conducted classroom observations in two differently tracked mathematics classes, as well as semi-structured interviews with Ms. Collier and her students in both classes. Ipay particular attention to how she enacts a historically situated practice of care for her students, through how she facilitates whole class discussions and maintains high expectations for her students. I then consider how her instructional practice positions the students as learners of mathematics and compare how the students are positioned in her honors and on-level classes. The findings of this study suggest that Ms. Collier’s instructional practices are rooted in a historical legacy of African American teachers resisting antiblack, deficit characterizations of Black students. Instead, Ms. Collier cares for her students by supporting them in their pursuit of mathematics learning in multifaceted and nuanced ways. Her care manifests in her teaching practice by cultivating a classroom culture that centers student belonging. She does this by allowing students to experience a range of emotions, like nervousness and joy, all the while still perceiving and treating them as mathematically competent. She also makes considerable demands of her students, including that they publicly participate in problem solving during whole class discussions, even when they do not know the answer. The classroom interactions reveal that all of Ms. Collier’s students, across both tracked classes, are positioned as mathematically competent. However, there are some distinctions in how the students are positioned across the two classes. Whereas the students in the on-level class are positioned as capable of making sense of and persisting in mathematical problem solving, in the honors class the students are positioned as capable of making mathematical connections and solving problems independently. Despite these differences, all of Ms. Collier’s students, across both tracked classes, are positioned as human.
ADDRESSING THE DISPROPORTIONALITY OF BLACK/AFRICAN AMERICAN STUDENTS IN ADVANCED PLACEMENT (AP) CLASSES
(2022) DiFato, John Paul; Imig, David; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Data at the national, state, and local levels all indicate disproportionately low enrollment of Black/African American students in Advanced Placement (AP) classes at the high school level. Black/African American students are missing out on educational opportunities and access to an equitable education by not participating in AP classes in high school. One method for high schools to address this issue is to explore the processes in place for recommending/selecting students for AP classes. The purpose of this study was to develop and pilot a talent-spotting tool using student data for teachers and school counselors to use in the AP course recommendation process. Specifically, this protocol was developed to identify more students, especially Black/African American students, whose data indicated that they might be ready for AP coursework. The researcher developed the talent-spotting tool, and the algorithm used to process the data, and tested its effectiveness in identifying students who should be recommended for AP classes. The researcher employed the following methodology for the study: (a) developed a data-based talent-spotting tool protocol draft; (b) obtained input from potential users regarding current course recommendation practices (including the use of AP Potential) and their perceptions of the talent-spotting tool and its potential usefulness via an anonymous, web-based survey; and (c) piloted the talent-spotting tool and compared the results with course recommendations based on SY1819 AP Potential data and with the SY1819 actual course recommendations. Based on survey responses from potential users, the majority indicated they want a process that is simple to use and can be a portion of the course recommendation process, but not the entire process. Participants appreciated the objectivity that the talent-spotting tool brought to the course recommendation process, but many were not ready to completely give up on the subjective human factors that are involved with course recommendations. Furthermore, the talent-spotting tool accurately identified students who were recommended for AP courses. But, more importantly, the talent-spotting tool identified more students who were not recommended for AP courses but who have the aptitude to succeed in those courses. In fact, the talent-spotting tool identified a higher proportion of Black/African American students than white students. The adoption of this talent-spotting tool as part of the course recommendation process has the potential to directly impact the disproportionate representation of Black/African American students in AP courses.
COMPUTATIONAL THINKING IN THE ELEMENTARY CLASSROOM: HOW TEACHERS APPROPRIATE CT FOR SCIENCE INSTRUCTION
(2021) Cabrera, Lautaro; Clegg, Tamara; Jass Ketelhut, Diane; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Researchers and policymakers call for the integration of Computational Thinking (CT) into K-12 education to prepare students to participate in a society and workforce increasingly influenced by computational devices, algorithms, and methods. One avenue to meet this goal is to prepare teachers to integrate CT into elementary science education, where students can use CT by leveraging computing concepts to support scientific investigations. This study leverages data from a professional development (PD) series where teachers learned about CT, co-designed CT-integrated science lessons, implemented one final lesson plan in their classrooms, and reflected on their experience. This study aims to understand how teachers learned about CT and integrated it into their classroom, a process conceptualized as appropriation of CT (Grossman et al., 1999). This dissertation has two parts. The first investigates how teachers appropriated CT through inductive and deductive qualitative analyses of various data sources from the PD. The findings suggest that most teachers appropriated the labels of CT or only Surface features of CT as a pedagogical tool but did so in different ways. These differences are presented as five different profiles of appropriation that differ in how teachers described the activities that engage students in CT, ascribed goals to CT integration, and use technology tools for CT engagement. The second part leverages interviews with a subset of teachers aimed at capturing the relationship between appropriation of CT during the PD and the subsequent year. The cases of these five teachers suggest that appropriation styles were mostly consistent in the year after the PD. However, the cases detail how constraints in autonomy to make instructional decisions about science curriculum and evolving needs from students can greatly impact CT integration. Taken together, the findings of the dissertation suggest that social context plays an overarching role in impacting appropriation, with conceptual understanding and personal characteristics coming into play when the context for CT integration is set. The dissertation includes discussions around implications for PD designers, such as a call for reframing teacher knowledge and beliefs as part of a larger context impacting CT integration into schools.
“IT’S BEEN A LONG JOURNEY”: EXPLORING THE IDENTITIES AND PEDAGOGY OF SECONDARY CRITICAL LITERACY EDUCATORS
(2021) Murphy, Olivia Ann; Turner, Jennifer D; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Critical literacy—which I define briefly here as a lens that assumes no text is neutral and therefore an important goal of reading and writing is to evaluate and critique the power and perspectives that all texts contain—has been continuously well-theorized over the past half-century but is less frequently taught or studied in practice, especially in the United States. To help bridge this gap and to contribute to the conversation that identifies critical literacy as an invaluable approach to literacy education, this dissertation study is a qualitative multiple case study that investigated the teacher identities and pedagogies of five high school English Language Arts (ELA) teachers who self-identified as critical literacy educators. Using critical literacy theory to frame my understanding of teachers’ pedagogy and taking a sociocultural approach to understanding teacher identity, I sought to answer the following three questions: (1) How do critical literacy educators’ lived experiences inform their critical literacy teacher identities? (2) How do critical literacy educators’ identities inform their critical literacy pedagogy? and (3) What supports and/or challenges do critical literacy educators face when implementing critical literacy pedagogy, and how do they navigate challenges? To answer these questions I administered a survey to, collected teaching artifacts from, and conducted a series of in-depth interviews with each of my five participants. Analyses of these data indicated that participants’ critical literacy identities are largely the product of a variety of methods of self-selected professional development, and are deeply connected to social justice beliefs. To enact these identities and beliefs into practice, participants employed a number of student-centered classroom strategies to build students’ capacities to consider multiple perspectives and counternarrative stories, critique power in texts, and move towards taking social justice action. Finally, when enacting their critical literacy pedagogies, participants felt most supported by curricular freedom and self-selected professional development, and encountered the most challenges when it came to normative education elements that reflected dominant ideals such as suggested canonical texts and standardized testing requirements. The findings from this study have implications for critical literacy research, literacy teacher education, and K-12 schools, and include the importance of teaching critical literacy in theory and in practice across pre- and in-service teacher training, re-thinking the relationship between current standards and curriculum and critical literacy, and considering the value of curricular freedom in achieving critical literacy goals in K-12 classrooms.
AN EXPLORATORY STUDY OF THE PHENOMENA: GLOBALIZATION AND SCHOOL VIOLENCE, AND THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THEM AS PERCEIVED BY VARIOUS STAKEHOLDERS FROM A SUBURBAN COMMUNITY IN TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO
(2020) James, Veronica; Ginsburg, Mark; Klees, Steven; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
The present study is an exploratory one which investigates the perceptions of the members of a suburban community, Sanaata, in Trinidad and Tobago, regarding the phenomena, school violence, globalization, and the relationship between them. It seeks to answer the questions: 1. How does the community of Sanaata in Trinidad and Tobago perceive the phenomenon of school violence in the country? 2. How does the community of Sanaata perceive the phenomenon of globalization? 3. How does the community of Sanaata view the relationship between the two phenomena, globalization, and school violence? 4. What other factors (besides globalization) do various stakeholders in Sanaata perceive as contributing to school violence? Apart from the theoretical concepts of the local and global, colonialism and postcolonialism, and dominance and subordination, the study is also based on discourses and theories of macro-social development, ecological perspectives, and developmental behavior. I used qualitative methodology inquiry for the study, employing methods of open-ended interviews, questionnaires, (limited) participant observation and document analysis to collect data for the study. Students, teachers, parents, and community members living or working in the vicinity of School S and School U communicated their perspectives via interviews or self-administered questionnaires. The findings of the study reveal that the respondents of Sanaata perceive that globalization can influence children to engage in school violence. In addition to globalization, it was found that other factors can also act as triggers for school violence. These include home socialization of children, teasing and rough playing in school, verbal abuse, abuse in the home, drugs and crime in the community, lack of good role models and lack of social services in the neighborhoods.
“DOING RESEARCH HELPS!”: NEWCOMER LATINX HIGH SCHOOLERS’ RESEARCH & WRITING CONCEPTIONS
(2020) Montoya-Ávila, Angélica; Martin-Beltrán, Melinda; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Drawing on critical pedagogy and sociocultural theories (SCT) of learning and literacy, this dissertation explored the relationship between recently arrived (or newcomer) Latinx immigrant students’ writing conceptions and their involvement in an afterschool program based on participatory action research (PAR). The study had a “two-tiered design” (Brown, 2010). In the first tier, a group of immigrant high schoolers (n = 15) and I worked together, as coresearchers, in PAR projects focused on students’ and teachers’ experiences at a newcomer school. Simultaneously, I conducted a qualitative critical inquiry on the writing conceptions and PAR experiences of four focal, Latinx, newcomer, youth coresearchers. The critical inquiry constituted the second study tier and the primary focus of my dissertation. For my dissertation study, I collected data from participant observation of the program sessions, literacy artifacts, and two rounds of semi-structured interviews with the focal newcomer Latinx high schoolers (NLHSs) and with two teachers who were familiar with the focal students’ writing. I analyzed the collected data inductively and deductively (Creswell, 2014). The study resulted in three main findings. First, the focal youth perceived PAR as an opportunity for conscientization and for challenging dialogue. Second, through the PAR process, the focal youth shifted from conceiving writing as a reproductive activity to view it as a tool for personal and social transformation. Third, the PAR process influenced the youth’s writing conceptions by being youth-centered, offering novel writing opportunities, and promoting dialogic talks. My research findings indicate that NLHSs’ conceptions of writing and research are tied to their learning experiences in their home countries and in the US. Their conceptions are therefore different from those of non-immigrant students. My investigation makes important contributions to educational theory, research, and practice. It demonstrates the effectiveness of employing both SCT and critical pedagogy (as a composite theoretical lens) to examine students’ conceptions of writing and research. It highlights the importance of studying NLHSs’ unique learning experiences and perspectives. It details research-based practices that help immigrant students develop their writing and facilitate their adaptation to a new country.
FINDING LOVE IN A HOPELESS PLACE: BLACK GIRLS’ TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY SELF-LOVE LITERACIES
(2020) Griffin, Autumn Adia; Turner, Jennifer D; Education Policy, and Leadership; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
This dissertation analyzes how nine adolescent Black girls enact their twenty-first century literacies (i.e. critical media, multimodal, and digital literacies) to develop and depict self-love. Building on bell hooks’s (2000) definition, I define self-love here as the will to extend one’s self for the purpose of nurturing, celebrating, preserving, or protecting one’s own or another’s physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual growth. Through the adoption of Black Feminist, Black Girlhood, and Black Girls’ Literacies I employed qualitative case study methods and integrated Participatory Action Research methods to answer the following questions: (1) How do adolescent Black girls articulate the ways they engage their twenty-first century literacies to develop self-love? and (2) How do adolescent Black girls use their twenty-first century literacies to depict self-love multimodally through a range of artifacts? I designed and executed weekly sessions that facilitated space for the girls to talk through and write about ideas pertaining to identity and digital media with regards to self-love for adolescent Black girls. Data from these sessions include introductory survey results, interview transcripts, partner artifacts and weekly reflections. Analysis of the data indicates that with regards to question one adolescent Black girls explained that they (1) manipulate algorithms; (2) spam the internet; and (3) use digital tools to support their future goals. Further, the girls employed their twenty-first century literacies to depict self-love multimodally by engaging such design elements as color, shape, and spatial location to design a digital homeplace where they could (1) name themselves and (2) claim space in the digital. This dissertation serves two purposes: (1) it provides pedagogical tools for educators of Black girls seeking to facilitate spaces where they can develop their identities and literacies simultaneously and (2) it details the ways contemporary Black girls engage their twenty-first century literacies to extend the literacy practices of their foremothers who used literacy to negotiate and challenge public perceptions about Black women. The findings from this study contribute not only to the field of education, but also gender studies and sociology, as they offer insight on adolescent identity development and formation.
FROM VISION TO PRACTICE: A CASE STUDY OF WRITING PROJECT TEACHERS
(2019) Singleton, Elizabeth M.; O'Flahavan, John; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
This dissertation examines the experiences of three practicing teachers involved in a professional learning program focused on writing instruction as they envisioned and enacted new practices for teaching writing in their classrooms. A secondary aim of the study was to uncover the supports and barriers the teachers encountered as they attempted to implement their new ideas for improving their students’ writing in the midst of a reform-oriented literacy initiative in their high-needs school district. This study employed a qualitative multi-case study methodology to take an in-depth look at each teacher’s vision-to-practice process. Data sources from an examination of the visions, practices, and reflections of each of the three case study teachers included semi-structured interviews, classroom observations, and analysis of documents produced during the professional learning program that captured teachers’ visions of good teaching. Findings lend insights into the dilemmas that teachers experience assimilating new teaching practices within their existing theoretical perspectives, beliefs, and established principles of practice. Teachers selected new practices that were aligned with their theoretical perspectives of writing development which informed their beliefs about students’ writing challenges and guided their implementation efforts in their classrooms. While beliefs about students’ challenges remained mostly unexamined, teachers developed new practices to address their beliefs about how they could help students improve as writers. Teachers engaged in productive struggle to balance the competing demands of content coverage, fulfilling their professional responsibilities, and meeting their students’ needs. Although teachers made different instructional decisions, they each prioritized preparing their students for their futures over other considerations. Teachers did not find many supports in their schools to encourage their efforts, and they experienced a lack of professional learning opportunities and a data-driven culture as barriers. Findings suggest that teachers require supports to enact professional identities as learners, knowers, and leaders within reform-oriented contexts. The study findings support the utility of teacher vision as a lens for examining practicing teachers’ professional learning and growth.

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