The Effect of Active Student Responding in Computer-Assisted Instruction on Social-Studies Learning by Students with Learning Disabilities: A Brief Report

Abstract: An alternating treatment design was used to compare the effects of three student response conditions (Clicking, Repeating, and Listening) during computer-assisted instruction on social-studies facts learning and maintenance. Results showed that all students learned and maintained more social-studies facts taught in the Repeating condition followed by the Clicking condition. Much of the research regarding the efficacy of computer-assisted instruction (CAI) in special education has favored its use with this population of learners. However, limited empirical research exists that isolates and identifies the curricular variables that contribute to its effectiveness. This study evaluated one instructional variable found to be critical to traditional instruction: active student responding (ASR). One of the most consistent findings in the educational literature is that students’ achievement increases as a function of the time spent actively responding during instruction. Much of the support for increasing ASR during instruction comes from large-group correlationa

A Study of Teacher Efficacy of Special Education Teachers of English Language Learners with Disabilities

Abstract: This research examined the perceived teacher efficacy of special education teachers of English Language Learners with disabilities. The results demonstrate the positive correlation between proficiency in the language of the target students and teacher efficacy. An analysis of responses yielded two major themes, organizational and teacher issues, affecting teacher performance. Teacher efficacy is the teacher’s belief in his or her capability to organize and execute courses of action to successfully accomplish specific instructional tasks or, more simply, his or her capacity to affect student performance (Bandura, 1995). Teachers with a high sense of efficacy have a strong conviction that they can influence student learning, even the learning of those students who may be more challenging (Guskey & Passaro, 1994). These teachers are open to new ideas and are more willing to experiment with and try new teaching strategies to better meet their students ’ needs (Ghaith & Yaghi, 1997; Guskey, 1988). Overall, efficacious teachers tend to engage in more productive, quality teacher behaviors (Ashton & Webb, 1986; Gibson & Dembo, 1984). In contrast, teachers with low efficacy feel they only have minimal influence on student achievement. These teachers give up more easily when confronted with a difficul

Effects of immediate and delayed error correction on the acquisition and maintenance of sight words by students with developmental disabilities.

We compared immediate and delayed error correction during sight-word instruction with 5 students with developmental disabilities. Whole-word error correction immediately followed each error for words in the immediate condition. In the delayed condition, whole-word error correction was provided at the end of each session's three practice rounds. Immediate error correction was superior on each of the four dependent variables

Effects of active student response during error correction on the acquisition, maintenance, and generalization of science vocabulary by elementary students: A systematic replication

We compared active student response (ASR) error correction and no-response (NR) error correction while teaching science terms to 5 elementary students. When a student erred on ASR terms, the teacher modeled the definition and the student repeated it. When a student erred on NR terms, the teacher modeled the definition while the student looked at the vocabulary card. ASR error correction was superior on each of the study's seven dependent variables

Effects of active student response during error correction on the acquisition, maintenance, and generalization of sight words by students with developmental disabilities.

We used an alternating treatments design to compare the effects of active student response error correction and no-response error correction during sight word instruction. Six students with developmental disabilities were provided one-to-one daily sight word instruction on eight sets of 20 unknown words. Each set of 20 words was divided randomly into two equal groups. Student errors during instruction on one group of words were immediately followed by the teacher modeling the word and the student repeating it (active student response instruction). Errors on the other group of words were immediately followed by the teacher modeling the word while the student attended to the word card (no-response instruction). For all 6 students, the active student response error-correction procedure resulted in more words read correctly during instruction, same-day tests, next-day tests, 2-week maintenance tests, and generality tests (words read in sentences)

Relative effects of whole-word and phonetic-prompt error correction on the acquisition and maintenance of sight words by students with developmental disabilities.

We used an alternating treatments design to compare the effects of two procedures for correcting student errors during sight word drills. Each of the 5 participating students with developmental disabilities was provided daily one-to-one instruction on individualized sets of 14 unknown words. Each week's new set of unknown words was divided randomly into two groups of equal size. Student errors during instruction were immediately followed by whole-word error correction (the teacher stated the complete word and the student repeated it) for one group of words and by phonetic-prompt error correction (the teacher provided phonetic prompts) for the other group of words. During instruction, all 5 students read correctly a higher percentage of whole-word corrected words than phonetic-prompt corrected words. Data from same-day tests (immediately following instruction) and next-day tests showed the students learned more words taught with whole-word error correction than they learned with phonetic-prompt error correction