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- All Subjects: Music
- All Subjects: Mental Health
- Creators: Barrett, The Honors College
Description
Businesses stand to face many uncertainties from the moment they start up to every moment in between. A business can try to recognize them and plan ahead, react to them as they occur, or be rocked by a black swan they never saw coming. How a business deals with unforeseen events can increase its potential for success or failure. With this in mind, there is no better bridge between the here and now and the future than planning for change in order to move a company toward preparing for change, adapting to change and achieving optimal results. Interested in taking a step toward the digital age, Alpha Homes Management, Inc. (Alpha Homes) sought our help to explore ideas and options to take their company to a new level. This Barrett Creative Project was centered on designing a system for Alpha Homes that will replace their outdated paper-based system with a more digital one. This aligns with the project also featured as a capstone project as required by the information technology degree expectations. In supplement to the capstone, and for the Barrett Creative Project, the final product was presented to the owners of Alpha Homes Management, Inc. to be utilized by the business. The end goal is to provide a platform which provides a paperless environment for documentation and bring the company a step closer to having a robust internet presence. Now that the web-based application product has been created and presented, the testing phase can now begin to evaluate its efficacy.
ContributorsBrice-Nash, Tristan (Co-author) / Alfawzan, Mohammad (Co-author) / Doheny, Damien (Thesis director) / Rodriguez, Carlos (Committee member) / Information Technology (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
Social-emotional learning (SEL) methods are beginning to receive global attention in primary school education, yet the dominant emphasis on implementing these curricula is in high-income, urbanized areas. Consequently, the unique features of developing and integrating such methods in middle- or low-income rural areas are unclear. Past studies suggest that students exposed to SEL programs show an increase in academic performance, improved ability to cope with stress, and better attitudes about themselves, others, and school, but these curricula are designed with an urban focus. The purpose of this study was to conduct a needs-based analysis to investigate components specific to a SEL curriculum contextualized to rural primary schools. A promising organization committed to rural educational development is Barefoot College, located in Tilonia, Rajasthan, India. In partnership with Barefoot, we designed an ethnographic study to identify and describe what teachers and school leaders consider the highest needs related to their students' social and emotional education. To do so, we interviewed 14 teachers and school leaders individually or in a focus group to explore their present understanding of “social-emotional learning” and the perception of their students’ social and emotional intelligence. Analysis of this data uncovered common themes among classroom behaviors and prevalent opportunities to address social and emotional well-being among students. These themes translated into the three overarching topics and eight sub-topics explored throughout the curriculum, and these opportunities guided the creation of the 21 modules within it. Through a design-based research methodology, we developed a 40-hour curriculum by implementing its various modules within seven Barefoot classrooms alongside continuous reiteration based on teacher feedback and participant observation. Through this process, we found that student engagement increased during contextualized SEL lessons as opposed to traditional methods. In addition, we found that teachers and students preferred and performed better with an activities-based approach. These findings suggest that rural educators must employ particular teaching strategies when addressing SEL, including localized content and an experiential-learning approach. Teachers reported that as their approach to SEL shifted, they began to unlock the potential to build self-aware, globally-minded students. This study concludes that social and emotional education cannot be treated in a generalized manner, as curriculum development is central to the teaching-learning process.
ContributorsBucker, Delaney Sue (Author) / Carrese, Susan (Thesis director) / Barab, Sasha (Committee member) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor, Contributor) / School of Civic & Economic Thought and Leadership (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-05
Description
The saxophone is privileged to have a wide variety of repertoire from contemporary composers. Due to its invention in the later half of the nineteenth century, it has no repertoire written by baroque composers, including Johann Sebastian Bach. There are several published arrangements of Bach’s three solo violin partitas including that of Ronald Caravan and Raaf Hekkema. These collections either do not present every movement of each of these three partitas, or they do not present them in their original keys. An advantage to arranging these works in their original keys is that saxophonists have the opportunity to learn more about the works by playing along with recordings of great violinists such as Itzhak Perlman and Hilary Hahn, something that would be very difficult to do if they were not in the original keys. In Ronald Caravan’s Bach for Solo Saxophone, Caravan includes a collection of many unaccompanied works by Bach for saxophone but does not include all of the movements from the three partitas and they are not in the original keys that Bach wrote for. In Raaf Hekkema’s Bach for Saxophone, Hekkema arranges the entirety of the three partitas, however they are not set in the original keys that Bach wrote for. In addition to these points, those collections do not provide information of the life of J.S. Bach, baroque performance practice, mechanics of the baroque violin, baroque dances, and advice on going about the mechanics of these pieces from a saxophonist’s perspective. This information is very useful to a young saxophonist who is trying to fully understand and perform Bach’s three solo violin partitas.
ContributorsSalazar, Nathan John (Author) / Creviston, Christopher (Thesis director) / Saucier, Catherine (Committee member) / School of Music (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-05
Description
This honors thesis outlines a method for teaching argument writing in the secondary classroom, including the elements of an argument based upon the Toulmin method, and diverse ways to help students who are all types of learners become engaged and receive the support they need. It includes all elements of argument, including evidence, warrants, backing, counterargument, claims, theses, the rhetorical triangle and the rhetorical appeals, including definitions and how they fit together in an argumentative essay. The largest portion of the project is dedicated to activities and resources for teachers based upon all of those elements, along with activities for the writing process as a whole. These activities are based upon the student's individual experience as well as various scholarly resources from leading professionals in the curriculum development field for English Language Arts. This is not meant to be an end-all be-all solution for teaching argument writing, but rather one of many resources that teachers can use in their classroom. This 30-page paper, including references, are condensed into an accessible website for teachers to use more easily. Each tab on the website refers to a different element or focus of the argument writing process, with both a definition and introduction as well as one or more activities for teachers to implement into the classroom. The activities are versatile and general for the purpose of teachers being able to include them into whatever curriculum they are currently teaching. The goal is that they can add argument instruction into what they are already either willingly or being required to teach in an easy and logical way. The website is available for any secondary teachers to use as they see fit at www.teachingargumentwriting.weebly.com.
ContributorsBrooks, Jenna Nicole (Author) / Blasingame, James (Thesis director) / Barnett, Juliet (Committee member) / Division of Teacher Preparation (Contributor) / School of Film, Dance and Theatre (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
This creative project explores the concept of how music is like a language and how, as a teacher, I plan to enforce this concept through my teaching. The aim of this project is to highlight the importance of completing research and acquiring knowledge of aspects, such as the composer's life, historical background and literary references, when learning a piece of music. Through this project, I address connections between the brain and music pertaining to memorization, the components of language, the similarities between language and music, the role of the teacher and the development of a "toolbox" of knowledge for studying a piece of music. I present my own research on Schumann's Novelette Op. 21, No. 8 in f-sharp minor as well as my own experiences of learning the piece to demonstrate an example of the process and discoveries I hope my students will make in their own studies of repertoire.
ContributorsLee, Kara Jia-Shan (Author) / Pagano, Caio (Thesis director) / Creviston, Hannah (Committee member) / Division of Teacher Preparation (Contributor) / School of Music (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-12
Description
The SolarSPELL is an offline, ruggedized, digital library, created by Dr. Laura Hosman for the U.S. Peace Corps. It has thousands of pieces of educational content that can be accessed through a self-contained Wi-Fi hotspot on the device itself. Currently, there are more than 200 deployed in several Pacific Island nations. After visiting one of these nations, Tonga, in December of 2016, I learned that almost all of the Peace Corps volunteers stationed around the Pacific Islands suffered from a lack of resources due to a variety of reasons. While the SolarSPELL helps to remedy that, the device is lacking classroom activities and resources for creative work and educational drama. Furthermore, for many students in these environments, schools are for learning information and producing high scores on exams, not for learning about creative strengths and identity. After researching curriculum development and the use of drama in an educational setting, I compiled over 50 pieces of content to include on the SolarSPELL involving art, drama, music, movement, and most importantly, imagination. These resources will allow Peace Corps volunteers to explore additional ways to teach English in their schools, while also creating a classroom environment that allows for creative expression. All the content is compiled into one folder as "Teaching Resources", and is then broken down into seven sub- categories. In the first sub-category, Art Projects, there is a collection of several hands-on projects, many of which involve recyclable or readily available materials. These projects will allow for a greater understanding of conservation and "green" living, concepts that are crucial to the stability of these island nations. The next 5 categories are Drama Readings, Music, Movement, and Video, Group Exercises, Creative Writing, and Worksheets. The second sub- category is a collection of beginner-level "Reader's Theater" scripts. The third sub-category involves music and video to engage students in movement activities. The fourth sub-category is a compilation of group games and activities to help students express themselves and learn social skills. The fifth sub-category includes a collection of activities such as fill-in-the-blank story worksheets and journal prompts which will aid in creative thinking and the practice of the English language. The sixth sub-category involves a collection of worksheets that mainly focus on self-reflection and identity. The seventh and final sub-category, Content Guide and Information, works to explain the benefits of using of drama and creative play in the classroom, as well as strategies teachers can implement in order to further engage their students in dramatic learning and play. Overall, these pieces of content are meant to be used as resources for the Peace Corps volunteers in order to provide alternative ways to practice reading, writing, and speaking the English language, a critical part of education in the Pacific Islands.
ContributorsTaylor, Amanda Nicole (Author) / Hosman, Laura (Thesis director) / McAvoy, Mary (Committee member) / School of Film, Dance and Theatre (Contributor) / Division of Teacher Preparation (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School for the Future of Innovation in Society (Contributor)
Created2017-12
Description
This creative project thesis involves electronic music composition and production, and it uses some elements of algorithmic music composition (through recurrent neural networks). Algorithmic composition techniques are used here as a tool in composing the pieces, but are not the main focus. Thematically, this project explores the analogy between artificial neural networks and neural activity in the brain. This project consists of three short pieces, each exploring these concept in different ways.
ContributorsKarpur, Ajay (Author) / Suzuki, Kotoka (Thesis director) / Ingalls, Todd (Committee member) / Electrical Engineering Program (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
Musical interpretation is challenging when one's goal is to evoke an emotional response from an audience. In order to develop a well-informed interpretation of Mozart's Fantasia in D minor K. 397, a study was conducted on the historical background of the piece and various performances by well-regarded performers. Fantasias are written works, but improvisatory by nature. Mozart's fantasias were influenced by C. P. E. Bach's, which included sudden changes in emotion. An Emil Gilels performance provided a classically trained approach, while Mitsuko Uchida's performance provided an emotional approach. Colin Tilney and John Irving performances elucidated the sound of the instruments that Mozart would have been composing with. Altogether, the research culminated in an interpretation of the D minor Fantasia that endeavored to capture the essence of fantasy, improvisation and emotion.
ContributorsMo, Gina Nan (Author) / Emmery, Laura (Thesis director) / Creviston, Hannah (Committee member) / Department of Psychology (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / School of Molecular Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
The purpose of this study is to analyze the stereotypes surrounding four wind instruments (flutes, oboes, clarinets, and saxophones), and the ways in which those stereotypes propagate through various levels of musical professionalism in Western culture. In order to determine what these stereotypes might entail, several thousand social media and blog posts were analyzed, and direct quotations detailing the perceived stereotypical personality profiles for each of the four instruments were collected. From these, the three most commonly mentioned characteristics were isolated for each of the instrument groups as follows: female gender, femininity, and giggliness for flutists, intelligence, studiousness, and demographics (specifically being an Asian male) for clarinetists, quirkiness, eccentricity, and being seen as a misfit for oboists, and overconfidence, attention-seeking behavior, and coolness for saxophonists. From these traits, a survey was drafted which asked participating college-aged musicians various multiple choice, opinion scale, and short-answer questions that gathered how much they agree or disagree with each trait describing the instrument from which it was derived. Their responses were then analyzed to determine how much correlation existed between the researched characteristics and the opinions of modern musicians. From these results, it was determined that 75% of the traits that were isolated for a particular instrument were, in fact, recognized as being true in the survey data, demonstrating that the stereotypes do exist and seem to be widely recognizable across many age groups, locations, and levels of musical skill. Further, 89% of participants admitted that the instrument they play has a certain stereotype associated with it, but only 38% of people identify with that profile. Overall, it was concluded that stereotypes, which are overwhelmingly negative and gendered by nature, are indeed propagated, but musicians do not appear to want to identify with them, and they reflect a more archaic and immature sense that does not correlate to the trends observed in modern, professional music.
ContributorsAllison, Lauren Nicole (Author) / Bhattacharjya, Nilanjana (Thesis director) / Ankeny, Casey (Committee member) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor) / Harrington Bioengineering Program (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
The goal of our study is to identify socio-economic risk factors for depressive disorder and poor mental health by statistically analyzing survey data from the CDC. The identification of risk groups in a particular demographic could aid in the development of targeted interventions to improve overall quality of mental health in the United States. In our analysis, we studied the influences and correlations of socioeconomic factors that regulate the risk of developing Depressive Disorders and overall poor mental health. Using the statistical software STATA, we ran a regression model of selected independent socio-economic variables with the dependent mental health variables. The independent variables of the statistical model include Income, Race, State, Age, Marital Status, Sex, Education, BMI, Smoker Status, and Alcohol Consumption. Once the regression coefficients were found, we illustrated the data in graphs and heat maps to qualitatively provide visuals of the prevalence of depression in the U.S. demography. Our study indicates that the low-income and under-educated populations who are everyday smokers, obese, and/or are in divorced or separated relationships should be of main concern. A suggestion for mental health organizations would be to support counseling and therapeutic efforts as secondary care for those in smoking cessation programs, weight management programs, marriage counseling, or divorce assistance group. General improvement in alleviating poverty and increasing education could additionally show progress in counter-acting the prevalence of depressive disorder and also improve overall mental health. The identification of these target groups and socio-economic risk factors are critical in developing future preventative measures.
ContributorsGrassel, Samuel (Co-author) / Choueiri, Alexi (Co-author) / Choueiri, Robert (Co-author) / Goegan, Brian (Thesis director) / Holter, Michael (Committee member) / Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law (Contributor) / School of Molecular Sciences (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05