Public education depends on the collaboration of adults to promote the success of the students who are served. Principal-teacher relationships are a necessary part of the overall learning environment established for students to grow and thrive. In an urban educational setting these relationships can be tested, especially in the transitional grades…

A critical part of implementing a new instructional program is professional learning. Multifaceted training was planned and delivered to teachers in a Midwestern urban school district prior to and during implementation of an online accelerated English language arts curriculum in four middle schools. Working in partnership with two universities,…

Hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) has become an increasingly popular multilevel method of analyzing data among nested datasets, in particular, the effect of specialized academic programming within schools. The purpose of this methodological study is to demonstrate the use of HLM to determine the effectiveness of STEM programming in an Ohio middle…

The passage to middle school has been identified as a confusing period for adolescents, involving a series of major transitions. A new variable that permeates these already lofty transitions is the firm entrenchment of Generation Alpha in the middle grades classroom, a cohort that includes anyone born from 2010 onward, making them the first…

Disruptive student behavior in middle school is associated with negative outcomes, including poor grades, low achievement scores, dropout, lost teaching time, teacher burnout, and societal expenditures. Classroom Behavior Management (CBM) strategies are effective at reducing disruptive behavior, decreasing teacher stress, and increasing…

This dissertation sought to answer questions about the sensemaking processes of teacher leaders in a middle school that was part of a state-wide improvement process called the "Ohio Improvement Process (OIP)." The context of the research was a historically under-performing school that had been part of the OIP for 6 years at the time the…

Purpose: Our purpose was to gather and evaluate accurate, up-to-date information on physical education (PE) policy implementation across multiple U.S. states and regions. Methods: A U.S. Physical Education and Physical Activity Policy questionnaire was developed and completed by 4,845 public-school PE teachers from 25 U.S. states. The U.S.…

Currently, the state of Ohio has a separate licensure classification specific to middle-level education, but this was not always the case. Prior to 1998, core teachers were prepared by universities to focus on elementary (K-8) or secondary (7-12). Teachers who obtained their license after the reform are broken into three groups: Early Childhood…

This study investigated the impact of a year-long professional development (PD) program on mathematics teachers' knowledge, beliefs, and practice. The PD program of the study was designed to connect mathematics teachers' learning and teaching practice through integrating situated aspects of the teaching profession and teachers' reflections. Data…

Discipline disproportionality in education has been a topic of conversation for years. African American male students are suspended at much higher rates than their White peers. Although Black students represent less than half of the school population in the United States, they account for a majority of out-of-school suspensions and expulsions.…

The focus of this research was to test the impact of an authentic science experience on preservice teachers' self-efficacy and their beliefs about their perceived outcomes with middle level students. Data show that there was a statistically significant decrease in the levels of self-efficacy towards teaching science and no significant change in…

Guided reading is an instructional practice commonly used in primary and intermediate grades (Ford & Opitz, 2008; Fountas & Pinnell, 2001). It is used less in middle grades settings (Allen, 2000) where "one size-fits-all instruction" prevails (Allington, 2012). While teachers can read about the principles of guided reading in…

This paper describes how improving a teacher's content knowledge changes his teaching practices and its subsequent effects on student learning during a middle school volleyball instructional unit. The study was designed to challenge teacher educators' thinking about the importance of in-depth content knowledge for effective teaching by…

All but four states in the nation now permit teachers to come into the profession through an "alternate route," compared to only a few 30 years ago. Alternate routes into the classroom have grown so acceptable that about one in five teachers now enters the profession through one of these programs, which offer some real benefits to the…

The purpose of this study was to explore teachers' lived experiences in professional learning communities, conceptualized in Ohio as teacher based teams. This study was carried out against the backdrop of state policies addressed to poorly performing schools. School culture must change in failing schools. In order to change culture (Kowalski,…