Elementary Education and Middle Grades Education
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Item Open Access Our World, Our Fight: Teaching Advocacy and Activism as a Pivotal Practice for Talented Youth(2024) Novak, Angela; Anderson, BrittanyTeaching advocacy and activism is a pivotal practice for talented youth. Advocacy is broadly defined as championing a cause, from self-advocacy and community/local issues to sociopolitical and global awareness contexts. Activism is the shared struggle for the “inalienable right of all people to human be—to be liberated from any project of violence that treats… persons…less than fully human” (Valdez et al., 2018, p. 247). This chapter first builds background in the three characteristics of pivotal practices: authentic, cognitive, and holistic. Each of these characteristics has a Pivotal Practice in Play section, providing the reader with an exemplar of grassroots activism or advocacy using relevant examples that readers can connect with from history, collective peace movements, Dolores Huerta, and Ella Baker. Finally, the chapter ends with a discussion and a present-day case study about this pivotal practice through an intersectional lens, and how teaching advocacy and activism impacts and is impacted by identity and agency.Item Open Access Bringing PLCs to K-20: Student Learning Communities as a Pivotal Practice for Talented Youth(2024) Novak, AngelaThis chapter describes how professional learning communities, an educator practice, can be brought to K-20 classrooms as a pivotal practice for talented youth as Student Learning Communities (SLCs). Several research-based models are used as the theoretical framework, including Professional Learning Communities (PLCs; DuFour, 2004; DuFour et al., 2010), Culturally Relevant Intentional Literacy Communities (CRILCs; Parker, 2022), and Learner-Centered Classrooms (Tomlinson, 2021). The SLC Model is composed of three levels; the first two parts lay the groundwork of the learning environment (Community Space and Place) and curriculum (Progress-Based Learning Goals with Relevant Content) for the successful implementation of the SLCs (Student Learning Communities) in the third level. The chapter concludes with examples of operationalizing the pivotal practice.Item Open Access Weaving KidLit into Professional Learning for Gifted Educators: Shifting Perspectives and Coaching for Equitable Practices(2022) Novak, Angela M.; Lewis, KatieItem Open Access Developing Expertise: Using Video to Hone Teacher Candidates’ Classroom Observation Skills(2014) Cuthrell, Kristen; Steadman, Sharilyn; Stapleton, Joy; Hodge, ElizabethThis research explores the impact of a video observation model developed for teacher candidates in an early experiences course. Video Grand Rounds (VGR) combines a structured observation protocol, videos, and directed debriefing to enhance teacher candidates observations skills within non-structured and field-based observations. Findings illuminate that VGR teacher candidates (TCs) demonstrated significantly greater growth than non-VGR teacher candidates in their abilities to focus on salient features of classroom interactions, to identify the complexity of classroom interactions, and to readily transferred observation skills from a video platform to an in-school platform.Item Open Access Using Video Segments to Enhance Early Clinical Experiences of Prospective Teachers(2013) Cuthrell, Kristen; Vitale, MichaelThis poster outlines a perspective for framing an early clinical experience course by using a model in which video segments of typical K-5 classrooms are used in conjunction with a structured classroom observation instrument as a focus for subsequent classroom observations. By introducing a conceptual framework for student observations using video segments, students are provided with an efficient and conceptually coherent means for guiding their classroom observation experiences in school settings in the remainder of the course.Item Open Access Providing effective, high quality support for every ECU teacher candidate(2014) Morgan, Susan; Smith, Judy; Steadman, SharilynItem Open Access Clinical Internship Support: Instructional Coaching(2013-07) Smith, Judy; Cuthrell, KristenThe Instructional Coaching Model is a product of the Teacher Quality Partnership Grant funded 2009-2014. Over the last four years, instructional coaches have been introduced in the traditional internship model with the intent of strengthening the internship experience and leading to positive gains in internship performance measures and K-12 student achievement.Item Open Access Listening to the most important voice in teacher education: The voice of the teacher candidate(2014) Steadman, Sharilyn; Lys, Diana BThe conversation surrounding the current state of public education in America has become increasingly negative and harsh. The focus of that criticism is often directed at funding issues, charter schools, vouchers, graduation rates, political agendas...and teachers themselves. Understandably, in an effort to address concerns about the quality of teachers, notably new graduates, colleges of education are implementing new programs, new forms of assessment, new forms of student teaching internships, and other reforms. In their attempts to improve teacher quality, however, teacher educators can learn much about the impact of their efforts by listening to the voices of those most closely affected by those changes: their teacher candidates. This study examines what one university learned when they asked for and listened to their new graduates feedback.Item Open Access An Integrated Assessment System Model for Supporting a Large-scale Teacher Preparation Program(2013) Lys, Diana; Dobson, Ellen E.Item Restricted Developing formal thinking skills in upper middle grades students(East Carolina University) Wooten, Phyllis L.; Spence, DonItem Restricted The association between handedness and pervasiveness of academic difficulty in fourth grade students with learning disabilities(East Carolina University) Rojeski, Hallie Janae; Engleman, MelissaItem Open Access The academic, social, and emotional effects of early grade retention on fourth and fifth grade students(East Carolina University) Greene, Carol; Peel, Betty B.Item Restricted An examination of assistive technology knowledge and use in a rural school district(East Carolina University) Ales, Joanna Charlotte; Warren, SandraItem Open Access Not White Saviors, but Critical Scholars: The Need for Gifted Critical Race Theory(2022) Novak, Angela MarieGifted Black and Brown students are not voiceless; their voices are suffocated under the knee of systemic racism and white supremacy. This chapter proposes that the field of gifted education advocates for needed structural and systemic change through the discourse of critical race theory. A model of gifted critical race studies (GTCrit) is presented and described as both a way to understand race and racism in gifted education and to drive social change. GTCrit theorizes about the ways in which race, racism, ability, potentiality, and deficit ideology are built into daily interactions and discourses, informal and formal policies and procedures, and systems and structures of education, which disproportionately impact students of color qualitatively differently than white students.Item Open Access Flagship: News for the Pirate Education Nation(2021-03) College of EducationThis is the Spring 2021 edition of the Latham Clinical Schools Network newsletter. The newsletter aims to highlight events within the College of Education and share information from ECU with partners in the Latham Clinical Schools Network.Item Open Access Flagship: News for the Pirate Education Nation(2020-10) College of EducationThis is the Fall 2020 edition of the Latham Clinical Schools Network newsletter. The newsletter aims to highlight events within the College of Education and share information from ECU with partners in the Latham Clinical Schools NetworkItem Open Access An Exploration of Teacher and Staff Collaboration during Elementary School Action Teams(East Carolina University, 2020-06-22) Ingram, Heather; Gregory, Kristen HTeacher collaboration has become an essential component of an elementary school. Student achievement, content area and pedagogy, and school relationships are some benefits that result from teacher collaboration. Five action teams (Staff Morale/Sunshine, Student Leadership, Technology, PBIS, and Clubs) are used at Stephens Elementary School to collaborate and accomplish goals for the school. This mixed methods study used a non-experimental descriptive design and examined the perspectives of 24 elementary teachers and staff regarding collaboration in their respective action teams. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected from an online survey and analyzed using descriptive statistical analysis, a priori coding, and open coding. Analysis revealed themes of perceptions on collaboration in action teams, benefits of collaboration, barriers to collaboration, and suggestions for future collaboration. Findings from this study revealed implications for administrators and participants regarding action teams.Item Open Access Impacts of Journaling on Mathematical Performance(East Carolina University, 2019-12-10) Sloop, Emily Evans; EducationThe purpose of this study was to determine the impact that journaling would have on students’ academic performance in mathematics. Alongside this, student perceptions on writing in the mathematics classroom were also observed through surveys. Journaling was chosen as the instrument to be given to the experimental groups. The study applied an explanatory mixed-methods research design which consisted of a pre-test and survey and post-test and survey to see what changes occurred between the two groups of students that consisted of a mixture of sixty ninth and tenth graders.Item Open Access Flagship: News for the Pirate Education Nation(2018-10) College of EducationThis is the Fall 2018 edition of the Latham Clinical Schools Network newsletter. The newsletter aims to highlight events within the College of Education and share information from ECU with partners in the Latham Clinical Schools Network.Item Open Access The effects of an afterschool STEM program on students’ motivation and engagement(2017-06-12) Chittum, Jessica R.; Jones, Brett D.; Akalin, Sehmuz; Schram, Asta B.Background: One significant factor in facilitating students’ career intentions and persistence in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) fields is targeting their interests and motivation before eighth grade. To reach students at this critical stage, a design-based afterschool STEM program, titled Studio STEM, was implemented to foster motivation and engagement in STEM topics and activities. The purpose of this study is twofold: (a) to investigate how Studio STEM affected students’ beliefs about science and whether these beliefs differed from their peers who did not participate in the program, and (b) to examine a case study of one Studio STEM implementation to investigate elements of the curriculum that motivated students to engage in the program. Results: After completing two Studio STEM programs, participants’ ratings of their values for science and science competence were higher than those of non participants. In addition, the Studio STEM participants’ motivational beliefs about science and intentions to pursue a college degree were more resilient over time than their peers. We also found that students could be motivated in a voluntary afterschool program (Studio STEM) in which they grappled with STEM concepts and activities, and could verbalize specific program elements that motivated them. Conclusions: Through this study, we found that students could be motivated in Studio STEM and that the experience had a positive impact on their perceptions about science as a field. Importantly, Studio STEM appeared to halt the decline in these students’ motivational beliefs about science that typically occurs during the middle school years, indicating that after school programs can be one way to help students maintain their motivation in science. Studying the program features that the students found motivating may help educators to make connections between research and theory, and their classroom instruction to motivate their students.