Theses and Dissertations from UMD
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New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a give thesis/dissertation in DRUM
More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.
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Item Transforming Knowledge: The Effects of Scaffolded Instruction in the Toulmin Model of Argument on the Problem-Solving Strategies of Four Sixth-Grade Writers(2014) Wilson, Adam Holmes; Slater, Wayne; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The purpose of this case study was to examine the effects of scaffolded instruction in the Toulmin Model of Argument on the problem solving strategies used by four sixth-grade writers while composing argumentative essays. Three major components of the Toulmin Model that were presented to participants were claims, data, and warrants. Participants for the proposed study were four sixth-grade students, two of whom were identified as "high ability" (one male and one female) and two of whom were identified as "average ability" (one male and one female). Results of the study were derived primarily from the analysis of intervention protocols and essays produced by participants. After completing a survey about their experiences with argument/persuasion, participating in a practice think aloud, and composing a pretest argumentative essay while providing a think aloud guided by the intervention protocol, participants received a total of six units of scaffolded instruction in the Toulmin Model over a period of four weeks. At the end of the instructional period, participants composed an "independent" argumentative essay under normal (non-protocol) conditions. For the posttest, participants provided a second think aloud guided by the intervention protocol while composing an argumentative essay. Pre-test, independent, and posttest prompts asked participants to formulate and support a claim about a proposed change to a school policy and were identical in form, audience, and task demands. As a result of the intervention instruction in the Toulmin model and the scaffolds I was able to construct through the intervention protocols, participants were able to move beyond knowledge telling to engage in knowledge transforming, moving back and forth between problem spaces of content and rhetoric, and thus more effectively handling the audience-related task demands of warranting claims and providing convincing supporting data - aspects of argumentative writing that existing research suggests pose the greatest difficulties for secondary students. I had hypothesized that the intervention instruction in the Toulmin model would also enable participants to more effectively handle the argumentative writing task demand of anticipating and responding to opposition, but this hypothesis was not supported by the study data.Item The Effects of Asynchronous Peer Review on University Students' Argumentative Writing(2006-05-02) Tsai, Ya-Chin; Slater, Wayne H.; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In contrast to oral response groups, asynchronous peer review (APR) has received relatively little attention in writing research. This study was motivated largely by the question of whether delayed peer commentary relayed by technology could lead writers to revise writing extensively and improve quality. The purpose of this within-subject, quasi-experimental study was to examine the effect of APR on the quality and revision of argumentative writing. A Web-based program, <u>Calibrated Peer Review<sup>TM</sup></u> (CPR), was used to support the peer review process. Two classes, consisting of 22 students and 16 students, volunteered to participate in this study. After taking the pretest, every participant wrote two argumentative essays and completed a survey. For one essay, participants wrote their drafts and revised their essays alone without APR. For the other essay, the participants completed their drafts, participated in the APR activity supported by CPR, and revised their essays. The treatment, i.e., APR, was administered to the two classes in a counter-balanced manner. Repeated-measure MANOVAs were used to gauge changes over time in holistic quality and the primary traits measured by a revised Toulmin model, and revision changes were coded. This study yielded four findings. First, by holistic quality, the final essays post APR were found to outscore the corresponding initial drafts and the revised essays completed without APR. Second, the final essays post APR were found to outscore the corresponding initial drafts in Claim, Data, Opposition, and Refutation and outscored the final essays completed without the treatment in Claim and Opposition. However, Qualifier did not change at all. Third, extensive surface-based and text-based revisions were produced post APR. Without APR, the participants appeared reluctant to revise. Fourth, the guiding questions used to prompt the peer review process and peer commentary were reported to predominate during the revising process. In conclusion, the entire APR process appears to serve as a catalyst for triggering a great number of surface-based and text-based revisions. Accordingly, revision frequency seems to enhance the holistic quality as well as the four primary traits of argumentative writing.