Students may fall behind in their academic grade-level standards. Some students may be able to adjust to follow along with grade-level content; however, what happens when a student falls two or more grade levels behind? Those students are tested and based upon the results of the assessments, they may be assigned to Response to Intervention to…

Virtual instruction and blended learning are two of the fastest growing learning modalities in K-12 education. Blended learning is a formal education program in which students learn at least in part through online learning with some element of student control over time, place, path or pace and at least in part at a supervised brick and mortar…

The purpose of this semester-long project was to redesign the ninth grade English language arts curriculum to include a literacy-based multicomponent intervention to meet the needs of developing readers, while simultaneously maintaining a rigorous curriculum challenging proficient readers in a general education classroom. I examined peer-reviewed…

Feedback from teachers is critical for student academic success, but is all feedback created equal? Within this critical participatory action research study, a teacher and her students in ninth-grade English language arts (ELA) classes in a suburban high school endeavored to transform their mindsets and practices related to giving, receiving, and…

While teachers and schools across the country actively work to impart curricula that is relevant and meaningful to their students, the written standards and reading lists too often represent a Eurocentric perspective and reinforce inequities perpetuated by the status quo. Too frequently, teachers are inadequately supported with or provided…

Students in the local school district have continued to score below the state average on the standardized American Literature end-of-course (EOC) assessment. It was unclear what 9th-, 10th-, and 11th-grade teachers in the district were doing to prepare students for success on the American Literature EOC. The purpose of this basic qualitative study…

Adolescents' in-school identities, out-of-school identities, and literacy practices are intertwined and connected. This research project aimed to explore the development of adolescent identities and out-of-school literacy practices in students' English Language Arts classes. As a high school teacher and administrator, the researcher adopted a…

This explanatory sequential mixed methods study sought to understand the influences of teaching experience on perceptions of autonomy and competence on 7th through 12th grade English language arts teachers' text selection decisions through a survey and interviews. The findings of this explanatory sequential design survey study could affirm…

Reading comprehension in high school involves students developing knowledge, skills, and experiences to understand, retain, and apply concepts of English as a written language. For ninth grade students to gain mastery in reading comprehension, ninth grade teachers implemented scaffolding teaching techniques to support their students. This study…

This quantitative research project identifies if a performance gap exists between student performance and student expected performance on the last two administrations of the FCAT 2.0 in Reading and the first two administrations of the FSA ELA for 9th and 10th grade students using descriptive statistics to identify the mean and distribution of the…

Students classified as English learners (EL) are a protected class of students with core legal rights. There are clear opportunities to strengthen education policies and practices to improve opportunities and outcomes for EL-classified students. This dissertation is comprised of three studies examining key issues in EL education with the goal of…

Researchers using VAM (Value-Added Models) methods have found that student achievement is substantially impacted by both schools and teachers. However, most of this work has been conducted within the context of the United States. Information is lacking about the educational system in China. This first study examines methodological concerns…

The purpose of this study was to examine whether the concept of the ninth grade academy structure in Texas high schools affects a variety of variables indicative of student achievement. Data representative of performance by students served in 30 schools with a separately structured ninth grade academy were compared to data representative of…

Students' initial eagerness and excitement for learning to read are evident when they enter primary grades. Their levels of enthusiasm for reading diminish through elementary (Eccles, Wigfield, Harold, & Blumenfeld, 1993; Mazzoni, Gambell, & Koreamaki, 1999) and middle school (McKenna & Kearn, 1990; Oldfather & McLaughlin, 1993)…

Professional learning communities (PLCs) have become one of the most talked about ideas in education today. Many K-12 schools are working to become PLCs in the hope that student learning will improve when adults commit themselves to talking collaboratively about teaching and learning and then take action that will improve student learning and…