Teachers’ Perspectives on the State of Writing in High School English Classrooms

Within the past ten years, the poor condition of writing in American high schools has been lamented in the media and academic studies. Those studies tend to focus on student writing results, student-reported opinions and attitudes, and college professor anecdotal evidence and typically leave out the voices of Minnesota’s teachers. This study examines the opinions, attitudes, and practices of English/Language Arts teachers in Minnesota. The literature review provides background information on national test scores, writing modes, instructional practices, and issues found in writing instruction. The methodology reflects data collection techniques on the key areas of modes and types of writing done, the frequency of writing completed, and what was creating barriers to writing instruction. The findings include discussion of both qualitative and quantitative measures in each of those areas. Finally, suggestions to address issues raised in the findings section are given at teacher, school, professional organization, and governmental levels

Chiasma

Newspaper reporting on events at the Boston University School of Medicine in the 1960s

De-grading Assessment: Rejecting Rubrics in Favor of Authentic Analysis

Assigning grades is the least joyful duty of the law professor. In the current climate of legal education, law professors struggle with issues such as increased class size, providing “practice-ready” graduates, streamlining assignments, and accountability in assessment. In an effort to ease the burden of grading written legal analyses, individual professors or law school writing programs or both may develop articulated rubrics to assess students’ written work. Rubrics are classification tools that allow us to articulate our judgment of a written work. Rubrics may be as extensive as twenty categories and subcategories or may be limited to only a few criteria. By definition, rubrics require the development of rigid, standardized criteria that the student must fulfill to earn a certain number of points. Points earned in each section of the rubric are totaled to form the basis for the student’s grade. In assessing legal analyses according to a standardized rubric, however, many subtleties of structure or content and much of the creativity of legal writing is lost or unrewarded or both. Using a rubric to assess legal analytical writing may result in the exact opposite of the intended result: an excellent and creatively written persuasive brief or legal analytical argument may “fail” the rubric and earn a lower overall grade, while a legal analysis that fulfills the exacting criteria of the rubric may earn a top grade despite lacking the intangible aspects of excellent persuasive writing. Good writing does not result when locked into the matrix of a rubric. Rubrics may impair writing and result in bad legal analytical writing. Rubrics replace the authentic, holistic analysis of writing and reasoning with inauthentic pigeonholing that “stamps standardization” onto a creative and analytical, that is, nonstandard, process. A holistic approach to grading and evaluating legal analytical writing, including engaging in authentic conversations about writing, leads to more comprehensible written work product and ultimately better lawyering

A Nation Deceived: How Schools Hold Back America's Brightest Students, Volume II

Provides a comprehensive review of research on the academic acceleration of gifted students

The identification of variables and factors related to preservice teacher candidates' passing a state teacher certification examination at an HBCU, 2014

This study sought to examine the outcome of teacher education candidates performance on a state content exam. Seventeen participants from the class of 2012 were identified for the study of which 12 participants fully participated in the study. This study utilized data collected from the participants through the Teacher Quality Enhancement Subcontract Grant Summer/Fall/Spring 2011-2012 Workshop Series held at the private HBCU. The research design used a QUAN- QUAL-QUAN to triangulate the data through three methods of data collection: GACE early childhood education (ECE) data, GACE ECE survey questionnaire and class of 2012 member interviews. The first QUAN correlations were run on the 17 participants. The survey instrument (qualitative and descriptive statistical constructs) was completed by 12 participants. The last QUAN correlations were run on the 12 participants who completed the survey instrument. Correlation analysis was used to determine if a significant relationship existed between the independent variables (Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), American College Testing (ACT), high school grade point average (HSGPA), grade point average prior to preservice teaching (GPAPST), cumulative grade point average (CGPA), number of failed attempts test # 001, number of failed attempts test # 002) and dependent variables (GACE ECE test # 001 pass or fail, GACE ECE test # 002 pass or fail, exam first time pass or fail). Descriptive statistical analyses were extrapolated from the selected Likert scaled items collected from the survey instrument to test selected research questions. The findings from the survey items related to program quality for the participants mean was 3.05 (n =12) on a 1 to 5 Likert scale. The findings from the survey items related to motivation for the participants mean was 4.35 (n=12) on a 1 to 5 Likert scale. A limitation was the total participants that were available for the case study of majors for the degree in the class of 2012 (n = 17). Correlation analyses revealed a statistically significant relationship between first time pass or fail and number of failed attempts on #001; first time pass or fail and number of failed attempts on #002; test failures after first attempt on test #001 and SAT; test failures after first attempt on test #002 and SAT; program quality and GPAPST; first time pass or fail rate and perception of program quality. Recommendations for future studies include a concentrated study from public and private HBCUs and or minority serving institutions with teacher preparation programs enrolling more than 30 candidates of color in their graduating classes. KEY TERMS: Historically Black Colleges, Quality Education, Teacher Education Programs, PreService Teachers, Teacher Certification, Teacher Education, Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research, Educational Leadership, Pre-Elementary, Early Childhood, Kindergarten Teacher Education, Teacher Education and Professional Developmen

Higher Education Faculty Members’ Experiences In Designing A Quality Syllabus For Online Education

Higher education is rapidly changing, and instructors are striving to match the needs of 21st-century digital learners. There is a growing demand and shift from traditional classes to the online mode of instruction for most post-secondary learning institutions. Additionally, with the recent pandemic (COVID-19), post-secondary institutions had to transform and revise their courses to online and hybrid models. Higher education institutions struggled with limited knowledge, skills, and resources to design syllabi and implement online education courses to meet the needs of their students to attain quality education. The purpose of this study was to explore higher education faculty members\u27 experiences in designing quality syllabi for online education. This study was grounded in the theoretical framework of Edmund Husserl\u27s descriptive phenomenology through interviews. Data obtained from interviews were recorded and stored on a flash drive reserved only for this research. The researcher analyzed interviews by carefully listening, reviewing, and reading the lived experiences of each participant. Then the researcher transcribed recorded interviews into written text using the FTW Transcriber software. This helped the researcher get a deep and rich understanding of the phenomenon (designing a quality syllabus) through finding “significant statements” and determining the “themes” of each participant\u27s experiences. Findings indicated that this phenomenological study about higher education faculty members’ lived experiences in teaching and learning will help faculty and researchers to understand how to design a quality syllabus for online education that will satisfy the needs of diverse students. Ten themes emerged from the in-depth interviews conducted to gain insights into higher education faculty members’ lived experiences. These themes included: title section, course description, learner outcomes, course organization, course evaluation, course accessibility, course policies and calendar, academic integrity, professional behavior, and equal opportunity. These themes are the components required in a quality syllabus for an online course. These research results will contribute to efficient pedagogical approaches to teaching and learning in online education setting

Teaching Neuroanatomy Through Clinical Cases

Learning neuroanatomy can be a daunting task for many students. Presenting brief case studies may help students (1) better understand the relationship between structure and function, (2) recognize how pathology affects behavior, and (3) encourage further discussions. This workshop will focus on several case studies with the intention of creating a more meaningful learning experience

A Causal-Comparative Study of Student Teachers\u27 Skill in Classroom and Behavior Management

Because many new teachers leave the field within the first five years of their first teaching job, a looming teacher shortage calls for further examination. An often-cited reason is new teachers’ perception of unpreparedness for handling classroom and behavior management tasks; thus, teacher preparation programs are under national pressure to design programs that produce well-prepared, effective teachers. The purpose of this study was to examine whether there was a difference in the classroom management performance of student teachers who are earning only a general education teacher license and those who are earning dual licensure in general and special education. The result was a longitudinal study using existing evaluative data. The archival data used was synthesized from cooperating teacher evaluations of all student teachers at Northwestern College during five semesters between the fall of 2009 and the spring of 2013. This quantitative study determined that there is a statistically significant relationship between preparation route and evaluation scores