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The purpose of this research is to strengthen the knowledge base on preservice teachers’ expectancy-values, self-efficacy, and commitment beliefs to the teaching profession. The second purpose is to understand how the constructs of expectancy-value and self-efficacy may predict preservice teachers’ commitment to the teaching profession. The quantitative data will be collected to examine whether self-efficacy and expectancy-value differ among preservice teachers at different stages of the teaching profession, commitment to the teaching profession differ at different stages of the teaching profession and self-efficacy and expectancy-value can predict the commitment to the teaching profession. The context of this study is Jamaican and all the participants were all Jamaican preservice teachers attending a teacher training institution in urban St. Andrew, Jamaica.

Bullying continues to be recognized as a significant problem in schools. Teachers are confronted with dealing with bullying at times on a daily basis. It is unclear whether teachers are fully prepared for this task. Bullying among children and adolescents has been the focus of many studies. There is little research regarding teacher training and preparation in this area of school bullying. For the purpose of this study, a professional development workshop and handbook; Bullying and Social Dynamics in the Classroom: A Guide for Pre- and In-Service Teachers were developed. These were created with the idea to help guide teachers through different elements of bullying such as definitional foundation, roles people play, social processes in the classroom, and managing their classroom. This study specifically focuses on pre-service teachers and the social process module of this professional development workshop and handbook. This study is based on the theory of planned behavior and focuses on pre-service teachers’ knowledge, perceptions, attitudes, self-efficacy beliefs, and behavioral intentions. A measurement tool was created with the intent to capture pre-service teachers’ knowledge, perceptions, attitudes, self-efficacy beliefs, and behavioral intentions before and after participating in the professional development workshop. Although, research has suggested the use of social dynamics as related to bullying in an intervention program, none has been done, until now. The study’s finding indicated that the measurement tool was a successful measurement of the subscales of the theory of planned behavior. Also, findings showed a positive change in pre-service teachers’ knowledge, perceptions, attitudes, self-efficacy beliefs, and behavioral intentions.

As the American K-12 student populations grows increasingly diverse, so does this importance of ensuring that teachers are well prepared and capable of serving these culturally and linguistically diverse student populations in an equitable manner that ensures assess to a high quality educational experience. The purpose of this study was to have a direct institutional impact on the restructuring of teacher preparation programs with the ultimate goal being to prepare and certify teachers who are adequately prepared to serve culturally and linguistically diverse student populations. To accomplish this purpose a convergent parallel mixed methods design was utilized to analyze course content from a current teacher preparation program and analyze data from graduating teacher candidates of the program. The research study revealed that similar to current findings across the field of education, the teacher education program in this study utilized a superficial approach to multicultural education that ultimately failed to facilitate the development of skills and dispositions required to be a successful culturally responsive practitioner.

Research in the eras has highlighted the significance of noncognitive factors in students’ school-related outcomes. Although many reliable and valid measures to assess noncognitive factors have been extensively developed in past decades, the ensemble of constructs lack a unifying framework to integrate them. Before assessing the predictive power of noncognitive factors, research suggests, it is more important to move the measurement of noncognitive factors toward a clear and integrated system. The action-control theory, established using the human agency perspective, has been noted as a well-validated formulation to connect individuals’ beliefs, attitudes and volitional behaviors. Agency assumes that humans are the agent of their own development. The constructs built in this domain can represent people’s ability to control their actions under the external environment. As such, it provides precise and circumscribed operational characteristics to define and measure noncognitive variables. Using human agency perspective and action-control theory, a multidimensional set of constructs was generated. Primarily, this dissertation aims to verify the psychometrical reliability and validity of this new measure (AME, standing for agent, mean, and ends in action-control theory) in a longitudinal study comparing with the often-used existing measures. Findings from a series of confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) showed that the AME measure had a relative higher reliability, convergent and discriminant validity in current longitudinal data. In the multigroup CFA of longitudinal and gender variation, the equivalency was confirmed in all the AME constructs, suggesting that an equal change in students’ rating to the AME surveyed questions across time and gender was comparable; that is, any comparison made between genders and time points using the AME constructs should be meaningful. In addition, a series of t-test and Cohen’s effect size provided strong evidence of the response-shift bias in self-reported longitudinal data. The presence of response shifts in AME measure was relatively consistent against the often-used existing measures over time, meaning that students were more likely to provide accurate self-reflection in AME items. In other words, the AME reveal the changes and reduce the deleterious effects from a traditional pretest better than the often-used old measures. Taken together, this study developed a coherent evidence-based framework for considering the role of noncognitive factors in students’ performance. Consistent with the previous empirical studies, findings in this dissertation support the use of the action-control theory and the human agency perspective in measuring noncognitive factors.

Teachers play a central role in the growth and development of students that leads to academic, social, and vocational success. Teachers also influence the effectiveness of the school counseling program. The purpose of this study was twofold. First, this study attempted to strengthen the knowledge base, specifically correcting the misconceptions and clarifying what is known about teachers’ perceptions of the responsibilities of school counselors. Additionally, the present study endeavored to generate new ideas related to understanding the relationships between teachers’ perceptions of the responsibilities of school counselors and their subsequent willingness to refer students to their resident school counselor(s). To accomplish these research purposes, a concurrent, embedded mixed methods design was utilized (Creswell, 2003). The research revealed a number of models suggested significant relationships among selected teacher characteristics, school characteristics, perceptions, past referring behavior, and willingness to refer. Additionally, strong positive correlations existed among most variables. The universal theme among the selected participants was “availability, training, and communication could improve referrals.” None of the selected participants had received any formal training or had participated in any professional development opportunities that explicitly indicated the responsibilities of school counselors. As such, their responses reflected a lack of willingness to refer and a negative view of the effectiveness of counseling.

Enrollment in online education has grown exponentially over the past 10 years, altering both the U.S. educational landscape, and the manner in which education is being delivered on a worldwide scale. A recent statistic reported approximately 6.7 million students in the United States are engaged in online learning, supporting claims of a rapid transition from face-to-face (traditional) classroom instructional settings to online learning environments. This transition has at times left educational practitioners at a disadvantage regarding their understanding of ways in which students adapt their use of SRL strategies to effectively learn in online educational environments. Self-regulated learning (SRL) is the process whereby learners metacognitively initiate and sustain their cognition, motivation, and behavior, bounded by their goals and contextual features of the learning environment. SRL does not refer to the ability a student possesses, rather, it is the intentional use of adaptive strategies to transform ability into successful learning and achievement outcomes. The most widely used measure of SRL strategy use is the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ). This measure was created based on the confines of traditional learning environments to evaluate SRL strategies students use while engaged in learning in traditional (brick and mortar) classrooms. Consequently, findings from studies that administer the MSLQ to students in the online learning environment have at times been inconsistent with the field’s understanding of, and the prevailing body of literature about SRL. Guided by Bandura's (1986) Social Cognitive Theory, and Zimmerman's and Campillo's (2003) three-phase cyclical model of self-regulation, a bottom-up approach to item development was used to create the MillerLan-Measure of Online Self-Regulated Learning (ML-MOSL). The ML-MOSL is specifically appointed to assess the use of SRL strategy use in online educational settings. The new measure consists of eight sub-scales and 50 items; it was administered to a sample of 584 college students from 14 academic fields of study and achieved an acceptable internal reliability coefficient (α =.793). Additionally, goodness-of-fit statistics, and canonical correlation coefficients indicate that a psychometrically sound measure was designed to assess college students’ use of SRL strategies in the online learning environment.

Early exposure to nonfiction literature is an important aspect of literacy development necessary for future success in school. Previous research documents that classrooms for young children are deficient in providing adequate amounts of nonfiction books, yet this research fails to examine why there is a lack of this resource. Informed by social capital theory and social cognitive theory, the current study extends prior work on children’s early exposure to nonfiction literature in two ways. First, this study extends educational settings to child care center preschool classrooms. Second, this study explains the proportion of nonfiction books in classrooms by investigating the influence of structural and process factors. This study employed a parallel mixed methods research design in which quantitative and qualitative data were obtained through classroom observations and interviews with teachers. The findings from the research show that the proportion of nonfiction books in child care preschool classrooms is more than that reported in other studies and accounted for nearly half of the books in the classroom. Findings also show structural and process factors indirectly, rather than directly, influence the amount of nonfiction books in the classroom. Most importantly, findings show that teachers do not intentionally chose nonfiction books for their classroom. Instead, teachers inadvertently select this genre because it is available within the center and fits other selection criteria they employ. The implication of these findings is a need to address the resources available to child care centers and teachers that enable teachers to select nonfiction books for their classrooms. Additionally, teachers’ inadvertent selection of nonfiction books suggests that teachers are not providing familiarity with text type distinctions that equip children with the foundational skills necessary to later be successful with nonfiction literature.

The number of children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) continues to increase exponentially and their parents experience more stress than parents of children with no psychological disorder. We hypothesize that as more children will be diagnosed with ASD, more parents will concomitantly undergo more stress. Parents will need to use more coping strategies to address their child’s condition alongside the burden of their own lives. The purpose of this study was to add to the existing knowledge base regarding how parents cope with their child’s diagnosis of ASD and the factors that influence parents’ coping behaviors. To accomplish this, a multi-methods study was conducted. This two-phase study was designed to obtain statistical quantitative results from a sample and then follow up with a few individuals to probe the quantitative results in more depth. Survey data was first collected from parents of children diagnosed with ASD to examine the relationship between coping self-efficacy, coping outcome expectancy beliefs, and coping strategies. Then, the qualitative phase was conducted to describe how parents cope with their child’s diagnosis of ASD. Seventy four parents completed a demographic and background questionnaire, the coping self-efficacy, the outcome expectancy beliefs, and the Brief Cope questionnaires. Based on the results, six parents were selected for semi-structured interviews. Quantitative analysis indicated that there was no significant association between coping self-efficacy belief scores and coping strategy scores and there was no significant relation between coping outcome expectancy belief scores and coping strategy scores either. The qualitative analysis found seven themes that represent parents’ description of their coping strategies. Practical implications were drawn and recommendations were made for future research.

This study evaluated an attribute model for academic resilience in mathematics and examined its relationship with student performance. The first wave of data from the High School Longitudinal Study (2009) was used. The participants were a sub sample of 2398 ninth graders selected by using combined criteria of the lowest socioeconomic status (i.e., 1st quintile) and the ethnicity groups of interest (i.e., Hispanic, African American, and White). A total of 15 items were selected from the Student Questionnaire to measure the three attributes in the conceptual model, i.e., self-efficacy, coping skills, and educational aspiration. Three phases of analyses were conducted. Results of the first phase exploratory factor analyses lead to a reduction of the instrument from 15 to 12 items. Results of the second phase confirmatory factor analyses confirmed and validated the second-order attribute model. Results of the third phase structural equation modeling suggested that academic resilience as represented by the three attributes significantly accounted for the variance in students’ mathematics performance with Self-Efficacy and Coping Skills but not Educational Aspiration being significant predictors. Yet caution is warranted for the interpretation of the findings. The results were also discussed from a social cognitive theoretical perspective.

The purpose of this study was to develop a valid and reliable measure of peer leader self-efficacy in collegiate athletes. The second purpose was to advance the understanding of self-efficacy in peer leaders in order to develop stronger leadership training programs that can enhance weaknesses in peer leader self-efficacy. Participants were male and female U.S. college varsity athletes over the age of 18 from both independent and interdependent teams who had been a member of their current college team for a minimum of three months. Participants completed a demographic questionnaire, as well as the Athlete Peer Leader Self-Efficacy Inventory (APLSEI), a 57-item measure created by the author to assess peer leader self-efficacy among collegiate athletes. Following data screening, a principal axis exploratory factor analysis (EFA) with promax rotation was conducted to analyze the APLSEI. The finished solution resulted in a factor structure similar to the initial structure that was developed, comprised of eight subscales that retained 41 of the original items. Cronbach’s alphas were calculated for each subscale to assess reliability. Scores on seven of the eight subscales had good internal consistency; however one subscale was omitted from subsequent analyses due to the low internal consistency (i.e., Cronbach’s Alpha below .70). Finally, construct validity was evaluated by conducting a correlational analysis to determine the relationship between scores on the APLSEI and the Leadership Self-Efficacy Scale (LSE) and leader performance, as measured by the Peer Sport Leadership Behavior Inventory (PSBLI) and Peer Sport Leadership Behavior Inventory – Revised (PSBLIR). There was no significant relationship between any of the APLSEI subscales and PSLBIR subscales. However, there was a significant relationship between the APLSEI subscales and the three LSE subscales, and also between the APLSEI subscales and the majority of PSLBI subscales, suggesting the APLSEI does have validity.

Differentiated teacher professional development designed for learning how to effectively integrate technology into classroom practice requires an instructional design model focused on complex learning and transfer to practice. In the case of small rural, private, and independent schools, the number of educators in unique faculty and administrative positions may put significant strain on a school’s ability to provide high quality, ongoing, authentic professional learning opportunities that meet the needs of individual educators. This multiple methods case study investigated influential design factors for differentiated professional development using a virtual learning environment that could have advantages for small or rural schools. Of particular interest were educators’ perceptions of the existing knowledge network within the school and the relationship between teachers’ self-efficacy for technology integration and other personal factors. The pilot study was conducted at a PreK-12 independent school to investigate the feasibility of the methodological choices and to explore the implications for conducting future larger-scale studies in K-12 schools. The results of the study suggest that virtual learning environments could serve to facilitate complex professional learning focused on transfer to practice for educators in small and rural schools by expanding the possibilities for interaction for both teachers and administrators in the online and local face-to-face environments. At each local site, school administrators would serve as change agents, which would require an additional layer of development in the instructional design phase paired with programmed facilitation during the implementation process in each school. In addition, the results indicate that combining traditional analyses of teachers’ personal characteristics with social network analysis for visualization of a school’s knowledge network may be beneficial to instructional designers or professional development facilitators as a pre-assessment of teachers’ needs for differentiation.

This study was designed to explore the relationship between teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs and their use of family involvement practices. Bandura’s concept of self-efficacy and Epstein’s typology of family involvement provided the theoretical framework for examining this relationship. The study employed both quantitative and qualitative data collection methods, justifying a two-phase sequential multi-methods study. In the first phase of the study, self-reporting instruments were used to discover the nature of the relationship between teacher self-efficacy, teacher’s family involvement self-efficacy, and the teacher’s use of family involvement practices. Teacher self-efficacy and family involvement self-efficacy were measured, respectively, using the Teacher’s Sense of Efficacy Scale and the Family Involvement Teacher Efficacy Scale. Family involvement practices were self-recorded using the Teacher’s Family Involvement Practices Survey. In the second phase of the research, qualitative data was collected via interviews with a purposeful sample of teachers to further investigate the relationship between the two constructs. Participants in the study included 49 teachers from three different school districts along Mississippi’s Gulf Coast region. Of those that participated, eight agreed to provide qualitative data in a follow-up interview. The findings of the research indicate that a moderately strong relationship exists between teaching self-efficacy and the use of parental involvement practices. In other words, higher levels of teaching self-efficacy were associated with more frequent use of parental involvement practices. Teaching self-efficacy in student engagement and instructional strategies were significantly associated to teaching self-efficacy. The research findings also revealed that communication is by far the most frequently used parental involvement practice. Other practices were largely neglected, which may be due to a variety of reasons, such as lack of appropriate training in the various methods available for parental involvement; variables within the school atmosphere that make parental involvement difficult, and logistical obstacles that teachers face as they try to involve parents. Finally, despite having been significantly established in previous studies, the relationship between teacher family involvement self-efficacy and the use of parental involvement practices was not found to be significant with this study. The instrumentation used in this study may play a role in this phenomenon and should be considered carefully before employing it in future research.

Family and Consumer Sciences (FCS) Education prepares students for family life, work life and learning through real-life experiences, while providing possibilities to develop the knowledge, skills, attitudes and behaviors to be successful in a changing, competitive, global environment (Redick, 1995). The purpose of this study was to examine if experiential curriculum delivered in a traveling trunk about a social issue changed student learning when experienced teachers facilitate learning. The embedded mixed method study collected quantitative and qualitative data in the form of pre/post testing to measure student learning. The trunk delivery method was used as the intervention to distinguish if improvements in the learning are dependent on the delivery method. The learning experience was explored with observations and teacher interviews to look at the relationships between teacher and student interactions with the trunk curriculum, teacher experience and student learning. This study showed learning gains occurred when experiential curriculum focused on global hunger was facilitated by experienced teachers, and delivered in a traveling trunk. The study conducted in three schools in West Texas in six FCS classrooms, (N=58) showed that active learning about social issues engages students. Paired t-tests revealed a significant difference in learning for the experimental group, (n=34) at the p < .05 level when comparing their answers on the pre-test about hunger with their answers on the posttest following the curriculum experience. Qualitative findings suggest an enriched learning experience with benefits including student interest and curiosity, prepackaged curricula, development of process skills, and the topic of a social issue.

Parent involvement with college students has risen from obscurity to an expected norm on the college campus. Over the years, parents have participated in varying levels in college students’ experiences, receiving varying degrees of responsiveness depending on the campus culture and the time in history. Numerous factors influence parental decisions related to their involvement with college students. This qualitative study investigated various variables that occur at college orientation in which parent attendance is involved. The focus was to study parental engagement at new student orientation and its influence in retention of first year college students. The goal was to enhance the current literature regarding parent involvement with college students as well as provide substantive evidence for higher education practitioners to develop or improve existing approaches to parent attendance at orientation. This research sought to investigate parental engagement factors at new student orientation and their impact on student transition in the first semester of college.

Transformational school leaders at all levels are responsible for student achievement in public education in the 21st century. The purpose of this study is to examine transformational leaders’ motivation in a West Texas school district. This study utilized a sequential explanatory mixed method design. The study included a questionnaire that measured leadership style that was given to 113 principals and assistant principals; 44 surveys were voluntarily returned (39% response rate). Multiple regression analysis revealed a significant contribution to the prediction of the amount of ethical training and the self-reported score measuring transformational leadership with p < .05. Based on that self-reported survey score, six-purposefully selected participants were interviewed in an open-ended, semi-structured interview that contributed to the qualitative portion of the study. The qualitative findings revealed five themes: shared leadership/vision, innovation/creativity, morals/ethics, drive/motivation, and mentor/coaching. The quantitative phase results indicate a correlation between ethical training and self-reported transformational leadership. The qualitative theme of drive/motivation expanded upon the intrinsic motivation to be a transformational leader, and the quantitative results further substantiated ethics training as a component of transformational leadership. Implications of the study are that further research in transformational leadership as a tool for increasing student achievement is needed especially in the areas of ethical and intrinsic motivation research. Future research is needed on the entrepreneurial actions of transformational school leaders, and if those actions contribute to overall student achievement.

Questioning continues to be one of the most popular classroom instructional strategies. When appropriate questioning skills are used, students can be motivated and actively engaged in the learning process. However, researchers have found that the majority of questions asked by teachers are lower cognitive level questions that emphasize rote memory and recall of factual information, which do not help students develop conceptual understanding. In addition to posing questions, pre-service teachers have also demonstrated difficulty in listening and responding to students. Limited teacher's questioning techniques have been a hindrance to the discussion or interaction in the classroom. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of teacher's higher cognitive questions and to improve pre-service teacher's questioning techniques. To investigate the effectiveness of teacher's higher cognitive questions, a meta-analysis was performed which examined the statistics and characteristics of 18 studies focusing on questioning strategies that met the screening criterion. Many researchers have conducted similar studies, but their results were conflicting. Even three previous meta-analyses revealed inconsistent results. Additionally, there has been a lapse of 25 years since the last meta-analysis. Therefore, there was a need to conduct another meta-analysis that included additional literature and updated statistical analyses. The result of the meta-analysis concerning questioning types revealed a mean effect size of +0.259 (p < .001), which indicated that teacher's higher cognitive questions had a small effect on students' academic achievement. The homogeneity test showed a statistically significant difference in the effectiveness of higher cognitive question across the 18 studies (Q = 129.816, p < .0001). Therefore, analyses of moderator variables that might contribute to the variation in effect sizes were conducted. Although "teacher experience" was the only moderator variable that made a significant difference, analyses of moderator variables, such as grade level, training duration, and treatment duration, still revealed important findings. Classroom implications, recommendations for future research, and limitations of the study were also discussed. As a result of the study of various moderator variables, a practitioner paper was developed in order to make connections between research and practice. A review of the literature revealed difficulties teachers had in questioning and useful activities to include in teacher training courses. To help pre-service teachers to improve their questioning skills, several important techniques were discussed and research-based practices have been provided. The practitioner paper offered teacher educators practical suggestions as to how to improve pre-service teachers' questioning techniques. It is hoped that the meta-analysis and practitioner paper will provide an overview concerning results of studies focusing on teacher's use of higher cognitive questions, assist teacher educators in improving questioning technique training, and facilitate researchers in improving the design of future studies focusing on the popular instructional strategy of questioning students.

Secondary school principals face numerous challenges in public education. Twenty first century leadership involves navigating state and federal accountability mandates, which has created a paradigm shift within the educational system. Secondary principals and educators alike are also faced with embracing the changing student demographics that will continue to grow throughout the 21st Century. Hodgskinson (2000) projects that by the year 2025 the Hispanic and Asian population will represent 61% of the United States total population. The purpose of this study is to examine secondary principals and educators that serve as transformational and distributive leaders; further examining those that value, foster, and develop school communities to meet the educational needs of students and teachers. The study includes the administration of The Leadership Behavior Inventory Questionnaire to secondary teachers, assistant principals and principals. Purposefully selected participants contributed to the collection of qualitative data. This study utilizes an explanatory sequential mixed method design to chart transformative leadership in secondary schools.

Since the government of Kenya made inclusive education as apolicy requirement in the provision of education to all children including those with disabilities, educators have explored ways of making this requirement a reality. All children with disabilities should be educated with non-disabled children of the same and to have access to the general education curriculum. The philosophy of inclusive education aims at enabling all children to learn in the regular education classrooms. It is widely believed that the successful implementation of any inclusive policy is largely influenced by the teachers being positive about the expectations. Grounded in Positioning Theory, this study was conducted to examine the attitudes, perceptions and concerns of Kenyan teachers toward the inclusion of children with disabilities in the regular education classrooms. The study participants were 142 Primary School teachers from 10 schools in a school district in Western Kenya deliberately selected from schools identified as actively implementing inclusive education programs. A concurrent mixed methods design was used to collect, analyze and intepret data for this study. The overal findings indicate that the teachers have a positive attitude towards inclusion of children with disabilities in regular classrooms. However, the teachers also identified what they considered as obstacles to successful implementation of the inclusive philosophy.

The changing cultural composition of the United States necessitates preparing teachers to be able to meet the needs of students from a multitude of cultures. In 2009, the U.S. Census Bureau has projected that the Hispanic population in Texas is increasing rapidly, and consequently, teachers will be asked to deliver high quality instruction and ensure student achievement for this growing population. Current research has indicated that the achievement gap between White students and Hispanic and African American students are very real across disciplines (e.g. math, science, reading, language arts). This achievement gap between racial groups is of central concern and has left scholars with the need to investigate potential factors that may be causing Hispanic and African American students to fall behind in achievement or perform poorly. This mixed methods study aimed to investigate utilizing culturally responsive pedagogy as an approach to teaching and increasing achievement for culturally and linguistically diverse students. The purpose of this study was twofold. First, this study was designed to add to the existing knowledge base regarding the effectiveness of culturally responsive teaching practices. More specifically, culturally responsive pedagogy was utilized in the form of a reading task to examine its influence on students’ recall and reading comprehension performance. Second, this study was designed to inform educators about the relationship between culturally responsive pedagogy and self-efficacy beliefs. Results of this study indicate that a culturally familiar reading task increased achievement in recall and reading comprehension scores. This study also found that a culturally familiar reading task did significantly increase reading self-efficacy beliefs. A thematic analysis revealed that students attributed their reading self-efficacy beliefs based on their ability to relate to the reading task, their interest level, and the perceived difficulty of the task. The results may have implications for the school setting in that culturally responsive pedagogy can increase academic achievement and reading self-efficacy. This study demonstrated that culturally responsive pedagogy is beneficial for culturally and linguistically diverse students and can be utilized as a pedagogical approach to enhance learning.

A multitude of studies have revealed that considerable numbers of preservice teachers have impoverished understanding of many mathematics concepts and processes they need for teaching (Ball, 1988, 1990; Ball, Thames, & Phelps, 2008; Zaslavsky, Sela, & Leron, 2002). Ball, Lubienski, and Mewborn (2001) asserted, “Our insufficient understanding of the mathematical knowledge has meant inadequate opportunities for teachers to develop the requisite mathematical knowledge and the ability to use it in practice” (p. 433). A promising way to change teachers’ ingrained preconceptions in relation to mathematics is to improve their content knowledge level, which in turn impacts their practice actions. This study aimed to explore the effectiveness of hands-on or virtual manipulatives in advancing preservice teachers’ understanding of the algebraic concepts of linear function and slope. A mixed methods design was used to investigate and analyze the data. This study not only sought to examine the extent to which preservice teachers understood targeted mathematical concepts under the conditions with varied manipulatives, but also tried to provide reasonable explanations and insights as to their understandings. This study served as a facilitator to improve the quality of teacher preparation programs. Initial quantitative data reported that the participating middle school preservice teachers possessed a poor understanding of mathematical knoweldge in relation to linear function and slope, experiencing difficulties in four specific domains: identify points on the linear function, identify linear function (perpendicular), identify linear function (parallel), and properties of linear function and slope. A further qualitative analysis suggested that participants embraced varied misconceptions and knowledge deficiencies, which may account for their poor knowledge performance. Another set of quantitative data suggested that participants benefited from the virtual and hands-on manipulative interventions as to their understanding of linear function and slope. A further qualitative analysis engendered a surprising conclusion: the interventions had nothing to do with preservice teachers’ learning, but provided a context for peer discussion. Based on data from the after-intervention interviews and follow-up questionnaires, the results suggest that peer discourse maybe a more effective strategy in advancing preservice teachers’ grasp of specific points in mathematics.

Research is one of the primary job functions of faculty members in institutions of higher education. To implement effective policies and practices that promote research productivity, administrators of institutions of higher education need to be aware of the relationship between research self-efficacy beliefs and research productivity. Several studies have examined the relationship between research self-efficacy and research productivity (e.g. Bailey, 1999; Kahn, 2001; Kahn & Scott, 1997; Landino & Owen, 1988; Vasil, 1992). However, the social cognitive factors within the higher education environment that influence research self-efficacy and research productivity have not been examined. This study has two primary purposes; the first is to add to the existing knowledge base on research self-efficacy beliefs of faculty members, its sources and its influence on research productivity. The second purpose is to inform higher education administrators about the social cognitive factors that influence the relationship between research self-efficacy beliefs and research productivity. A two phase mixed methods research study was conducted. One hundred and nine faculty members completed the Research Self-Efficacy Inventory and Research Productivity Index. Based on the results, eight faculty members were selected for in-depth interviews. Quantitative analysis indicated that there is a significant but small correlation between research self-efficacy and research productivity. Qualitative analysis revealed that the higher education environment experienced either as a graduate student or as faculty members plays an important role in research self-efficacy development and research productivity. Identifying and understanding factors that influence research self-efficacy within education environments provide a better understanding of the factors that facilitate research productivity among faculty members with implications for understanding the nature of work among faculty members in higher education.

Knapp, Kelly-Reid and Ginder (2010) reported that only 57.2% of students enrolled in four-year postsecondary institutions had graduated within six years of beginning their studies during the period of 2002-2008. Other studies have reported similar trends for college graduation rates, which have remained stable over the past decade (NCES, 2001). Kim, Newton, Downey, & Benton (2010) explain that students’ success in college is commonly defined as progress toward a degree, acceptable academic achievement, and attainment of necessary life skills. In order to reach these goals, students require high levels of independence and self-regulation (Bryde & Milburn, 1990). These regulatory behaviors are found to be related to enhanced self-efficacy as well as other positive self-beliefs (Cleary & Zimmerman, 2004). Several studies have shown that participation in physical exercise programs can improve regulatory behaviors in diverse domains of functioning such as study habits, health behaviors, punctuality, and impulse spending (Oaten & Cheng, 2006). The physiological and psychological benefits of physical exercise have been well-documented (Craft, 2005; Craft & Landers, 1998; Etnier, et al., 1997; Pedersen & Saltin, 2006). However, Lowry et al. (2000) found that fewer than 40% of college students are maintaining adequate amounts of physical activity for health benefits. Furthermore, compelling evidence exists for a positive relationship between physical activity and favorable academic outcomes; such as higher achievement test scores, fewer school absences, and fewer behavioral problems (Datar & Sturm, 2006; Grissom, 2005). The current study examined the relationships between physical activity engagement, academic self-regulatory behaviors, and academic achievement for college ix students. Findings from this study showed that students who engage in more frequent moderate and/or high intensity physical activity exhibited a higher degree of academic self-efficacy than students who engage in less physical activity. Results also showed that academic self-efficacy was associated with academic self-regulatory capabilities. The findings also suggest that students who engage in more physical activity attain more favorable academic outcomes than less physically active students. These findings add to our understanding of the physiological and cognitive benefits of physical activity and its impact on students‟ functioning from a social cognitive perspective.

With over 3.1 million students enrolling in at least one online higher education course in the fall semester of 2005, online education is emerging as one of the most prominent and pervasive forms of distance education (Allen & Seaman, 2006). The resulting implication for postsecondary institutions is that the necessary instructors are needed to meet the growth of online education. The challenge presented with this need revolves around the consideration of the integral pedagogical foundations involved in online instruction. The literature presents a potential link between the ambiguity of online pedagogy and instructors� self-beliefs to teach online (Easton, 2003). However, a measure to assess the specific dimensions of online teachers� self-efficacy beliefs is not available. Additionally, current teacher self-efficacy scales do not encompass the domain specific tasks of online instruction. The study had two primary purposes; the first was to develop the Online Teaching Self-Efficacy Inventory, a series of five scales to examine the teaching self-efficacy beliefs of online instructors. The second portion of the study explored the psychometric properties of the inventory scales. The key research questions were these: (1) How many factors are needed to summarize the pattern of correlations in the correlation matrices for the inventory scales? (2) Are the inventory scales reliable? (3) Within the inventory scales, how much variance does each factor account for? (4) How can the factors be interpreted from the derived variables of the Online Teaching Self-Efficacy Inventory scales? An exploratory factor analysis for each of the five online teaching self-efficacy inventory scales was conducted to ascertain item composition using factor extraction and factor rotation analyses. The analyses resulted in identifying items for each scale whose removal enhanced the instrument�s factor structure. The resulting inventory has 47 items allocated to five scales:(1) Web-Based Course Structure;(2) The Online Alignment of Objectives, Instruction, and Assessment;(3) Course Content Migration; (4) Virtual Interaction; and (5) Selection of Technological Resources. Internal consistency and reliability analyses were conducted to determine the extent to which items within each scale measured the same construct as other items within that scale. All of the retained items corresponding with each of the five inventory scales had factor loadings of at least 0.32. The alpha reliability coefficient for each scale ranged from 0.84 to 0.95. The development of the Online Teaching Self-Efficacy Inventory relied extensively on literature pertaining to online instruction and expert content validation techniques. It treats online instruction and associated instructional self-efficacy beliefs as distinctive entities encompassed by task-specific competencies and dimensions. The results of the study provide an initial measure for examining the self-efficacy beliefs of online instructors. Implications of the study and directions for future research are presented.

Recent reports have shown that the United States continues to fall short of achieving it educational goals set forth in the Goal 2000: Educate America Act signed into law by President Clinton in 1994 which set a high school graduation rate goal of 90% by 2000. However, in 2000, 27.8% of Hispanics, 13.1% of Blacks, and 6.9% of Whites dropped out of high school. Not only does the United States fail to meet its national goals, but on the global scene, the United States lagged behind Germany and Japan in high school graduation rates for young adults between the ages of 25-34. Although many investigations have acknowledged the importance of the environmental context when examining educational outcomes mass exodus from Skinner’s assertion that “A person does not act upon the world, the world acts him” has resulted in an explosion of perception related research in the literature. While it is agreed that “social address” variables on their own do not adequately explain the complexities of educational dynamics, the author believed that the complete abandonment of one thought in preference to another can result in the lost of key components that can assist in finding enduring solutions to the array of problems with which the education community is faced. The general purpose of this study was to examine the relationship among chosen environmental factors and personal factors on high school completion on a national sample of young adults. A secondary purpose of the study was to test the plausibility of a hypothesized high school completion model. The final purpose of the study was to develop a model of high school completion among young adults. A combination of descriptive analysis, logistic regression analysis and structural equation modeling were employed to answer two research questions. Results indicated that there was acombination of the variables that could satisfactorily predict high school completion. In addition, the proposed model, with a minor modification, provided an adequate fit for the data. Furthermore, five findings were noteworthy: 1)the environment was an important determinant of a young adult’s high school completion status, 2) the environment impacts personal and self factors, more so than personal and self factors impact the environment, 3) socioeconomic status played an important role in determining academic outcomes, 4) locus of control beliefs and self-concept were important components of the self-system with locus of control beliefs being a more significant component than self-concept, and they can be reliably utilized as measure of personal factors; and 5) school climate was an important component of environment. Implications for education and future research were also addressed.

While U.S. classrooms become increasingly diverse, teacher candidates remain predominantly White, middle-class, monolingual females who are unprepared to meet the needs of diverse students. Culturally responsive teaching holds potential for creating cultural congruence between teachers and students and for empowering students to succeed academically and bring about positive social change. The purpose of this qualitative study, which used constructivist grounded theory within narrative inquiry, was to examine preservice teachers’ understanding of culturally responsive teaching and to explore the use of a fictional story as a catalyst for narrative inquiry. The teacher/researcher began by writing an online fictional story of a first-year teacher to inform participants, who were student teachers, about culturally responsive teaching, to provide them a framework for organizing ideas and reflecting, to provide reference points for dialogue, and to encourage participants to tell their own stories. Data sources included responses to reflective questions, a pre- and post-survey, interviews, a focus group, and course assignments. Results showed that by the end of the study, participants had developed a working understanding of culturally responsive teaching, but application of it in their classrooms was limited. In exit interviews, participants shared their own poignant stories, adding to the narrative element in this study. Their stories were woven into a revision of the final chapter of the fictional story, as participants became new characters. Results imply that informing preservice teachers about culturally responsive teaching is needed and can have positive outcomes in knowledge, skills, and attitudes. Results also indicate that a fictional story can be useful for initiating narrative inquiry and prompting participants’ own storytelling. Further research is needed to examine the use of culturally responsive teaching one to five years into graduates’ teaching careers, and to examine preservice teachers’ understanding of additional topics of culturally responsive teaching. Additional studies are also needed to further explore the use of fiction in teaching and narrative inquiry.