This research project aims to understand the multimodal composing practices and social relationships within the context of my third-grade writing workshop when an alternate approach to teaching writing is employed. This alternate approach disrupts a traditional workshop as the theory of writing is changed to a theory of making in a multimodal…

This qualitative action research study examines how middle and high school STEM teachers create and implement lessons that connect concepts to the real-world and develop student metacognition. The researcher collected data through interviews, focus groups, document analysis, and survey questions. Participants from vocational, private, and…

This dissertation focuses on identifying essential characteristics of initiatives that build cooperative relationships and solidarity to advance democratically engaged community-campus partnerships. As such, it involves understanding the conditions that undermine these relationships, the critical practices that strengthen them, and the role of…

Many stakeholders emphasize the importance of diverse populations' participation in the sciences, though the motivations for this vary. Some reference an economic standpoint by emphasizing the importance of either recruiting more science workers to compete in a global economy, or of individual financial success for people from historically…

The purpose of this study was to to determine whether there is a relationship between management characteristics of writing center directors and the ability for writing centers to overcome challenges as perceived by writing center directors at public, four-year, historically black colleges/universities. This study also provides directors with…

Developing models, using mathematics, and constructing explanations are three practices essential for science inquiry learning according to education reform efforts, such as the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS Lead States, 2013). However, students struggle with these intersecting practices, especially when developing and interpreting…

Mathematics literacy, which encompasses vital life skills such as learning to communicate and justify reasoning, is important for all people throughout their lives. Technology tools such as technology-based graphic organizers (TBGOs) provide universal accessibility supports for learners who experience difficulties with a variety of aspects of…

The exponential growth of digital libraries and the proliferation of scholarly content in electronic formats have made data mining and information retrieval essential tools for effectively managing, organizing, and disseminating knowledge. This thesis provides a comprehensive analysis of the advancements and challenges in these fields, with a…

Written scientific argumentation is a common practice among scientists, yet it is relatively absent from science K-12 classrooms (Applebee & Langer, 2013). However, recent research shows that opportunities to engage in collaborative discourse and argumentation provide students enhanced conceptual understanding and reasoning. Since one of the…

The writing of legally compliant Individualized Education Programs (IEP) has been a difficult task for many educators. Poor quality writing of IEPs has caused a myriad of issues. Parents have brought lawsuits upon school districts and inaccurately written IEPs have been interpreted erroneously or presented an incorrect picture of the student.…

Along with a global mobility of NNESTs around the world (Canagarajah, 1999), there has been an expanding population of NNEST trainees in the U.S. higher education institutions (Park, 2012). This brought an assumption that there will be an increasing number of international college composition teachers in the U.S. college contexts (Ruecker et al.,…

A translingual approach to writing as a new paradigm has been proposed to challenge English monolingualism, question traditional ideas on language difference, advocate for writer agency in shaping their own language, and legitimize additional languages/varieties as resources rather than deficits in the target language teaching, learning, and…

Students will very often write incomplete explanations when asked to do so. This may be due to various reasons, including but not limited to a lack of understanding of the content or a lack of motivation. Developing an understanding of how students form and orally express scientific explanations (i.e., participating in scientific discourse) and…

Writing is an essential skill for success in many academic and professional settings. Despite receiving individualized feedback on their writing, many students struggle with writing in postsecondary education. This dissertation addresses this gap by focusing on the writing process--the moment-by-moment actions taken during writing--rather than the…

The purpose of this dissertation was to explore ways for multilingual students to draw on their background knowledge and culture during writing instruction. In addition, I wanted to investigate how newcomer multilingual students (Canagarajah, 2013) understood and assessed their writing, the relationship between students' self-assessments, their…