Matching Items (30)
Description
As digital media practices become readily available in today's classrooms, literacy and literacy instruction are changing in profound ways (Alvermann, 2010). Professional organizations emphasize the importance of integrating new literacies (New London Group, 1996) practices into language-arts instruction (IRA, 2009; NCTE, 2005). As a result, teachers search for effective ways to incorporate the new literacies in an effort to engage students. Therefore, this study was designed to investigate the potential of digital storytelling as participatory media for writing instruction. This case study was conducted during the fall semester of 2012 in one first-grade classroom and one second-grade classroom in the Southwestern United States. The study addressed ten interrelated research questions relating to how primary-grade students performed in relation to the Common Core writing standards, how they were motivated, how they formed a meta- language to talk about their writing, how they developed identities as writers, and how they were influenced by their teachers' philosophies and instructional approaches. Twenty-two first-grade students and 24 second-grade students used the MovieMaker software to create digital stories of personal narratives. Data included field notes, interviews with teachers and students, teacher journals, my own journal, artifacts of teachers' lesson plans, photographs, students' writing samples, and their digital stories. Qualitative data were analyzed by thematic analysis (Patton, 1990) and discourse analysis (Gee, 2011). Writing samples were scored by rubrics based on the Common Core State Standards. The study demonstrated how digital storytelling can be used to; (a) guide teachers in implementing new literacies in primary grades; (b) illustrate digital storytelling as writing; (c) develop students' meta-language to talk about writing; (d) impact students' perceptions as writers; (e) meet Common Core State Standards for writing; (f) improve students' skills as writers; (g) build students' identities as writers; (h) impact academic writing; (i) engage students in the writing process; and (j) illustrate the differences in writing competencies between first- and second-grade students. The study provides suggestions for teachers interested in incorporating digital storytelling in primary-grade classrooms.
ContributorsFoley, Leslie M (Author) / Guzzetti, Barbara J. (Thesis advisor) / Hayes, Elisabeth R. (Committee member) / Gee, James P (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is experienced in a variety of ways within families particularly among siblings with and without ASD. The effects of ASD on sibling relationships are integral to family life. While some studies have examined sibling relationships, research regarding sibling roles exhibited during play activities and social interactions is lacking. Further, siblings' voices are rarely revealed in research on play. In response to a need for greater understanding of the role of play among siblings impacted by ASD, this dissertation used a cultural historical activity theory lens to understand how play and social interactions evolved among siblings since childhood development is informed by access to and participation in play. Siblings may be considered actors with unique cultural histories as they create and re-create their own identities through play. In this study, an emphasis was placed on the complex processes siblings experience while locating their own niche with their families. The study focused on the use of a variety of tools, division of labor, the rules families utilized to interact and how these rules were disturbed. As a result, the study offers a more complete understanding of how play and social interactions affect the ways ASD impact siblings, families, and community members. This study provides holistic views of the development and impact of sibling play on identity development and relationships.
ContributorsPapacek, Amy M (Author) / Kozleski, Elizabeth B. (Thesis advisor) / Tobin, Joseph (Committee member) / Swadener, Beth B (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
This study examined instructional and attitudinal changes influencing faculty members in a proprietary college after the parent company divorced itself from day-to-day leadership decisions during a "teach-out." A teach-out is the process of school closure, when the college stops enrolling new students, but teaches out currently enrolled students. It explores the strongest influences on faculty members during the teach-out process; how faculty members negotiate their work and how the changes appeared to impact students. Study findings revealed that the strongest influences were fellow faculty members. Several rose as leaders and essentially became educator activists starting a movement focused on what they believed to be an essential component of education and what had been missing previously, namely, creativity. They were supported in this endeavor by local leadership who served as "uplinks" and silently gave power to the movement. Students and the organization became beneficiaries of the renewed engagement of their instructors, which led to increased retention and placement rates. This study sought to understand the marked shift in the organizational culture and climate that governed faculty work life through the framework of organizational discourse as well as from a social justice context of freedom from oppression. Through the use of phenomenology and qualitative methods, including autoethnography, this study found that the structure of the teach-out effectively created a space for transformational leaders to emerge and become educator activists. This initial study provides a promising model for faculty engagement that appears to have positive outcomes for individual faculty members, students and the organization.
ContributorsGordon, Danielle (Author) / Swadener, Beth B (Thesis advisor) / Gee, James P (Committee member) / Sandlin, Jennifer (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
Small-group literacy instruction is frequently used in schools in order to engage students in discussions around texts. Instructional settings vary and produce a range of results. They are complex social spaces in which students position one another and themselves as they enact different identities. These identities are associated with sets of literacy practices. This paper describes the results of a study examining the ways in which 3rd and 4th grade students and their teachers positioned themselves and one another in three different small-group literacy settings and the literacy practices that they used as they performed their identities. Using a multimodal discourse analysis (Kress, 2012) and D/discourse analysis (Gee, 2005, 2011), the form and function of language and gestures were used to look at the kinds of identities that the participants enacted and the literacy practices that the students engaged in the different settings. The results of the analysis suggested that the identities that the participants performed were related to the context in which interactions around texts took place. The identities themselves were connected to the use certain literacy practices. The literacy practices used by the participants were also related to the classroom context. The findings suggest that it is important for teachers to consider the figured worlds active in small-group settings, the identities performed within those worlds, and the literacy practices in which students engage.
ContributorsKrauter, David (Author) / Marsh, Josephine P (Thesis advisor) / Gee, James P (Committee member) / Serafini, Frank (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
This dissertation explores the various online radicalization and recruitment practices of groups like al-Qaeda and Hezbollah, as well as Salafi Jihadists in general. I will also outline the inadequacies of the federal government's engagement with terrorist / Islamist ideologies and explore the ways in which early 20th century foundational Islamist theorists like Hasan al-Banna, Sayyid Qutb, and Abul ala Mawdudi have affected contemporary extremist Islamist groups, while exploring this myth of the ideal caliphate which persists in the ideology of contemporary extremist Islamist groups. In a larger sense, I am arguing that exploitation of the internet (particularly social networking platforms) in the radicalization of new communities of followers is much more dangerous than cyberterrorism (as in attacks on cyber networks within the government and the private sector), which is what is most often considered to be the primary threat that terrorists pose with their presence on the internet. Online radicalization should, I argue, be given more consideration when forming public policy because of the immediate danger that it poses, especially given the rise of microterrorism. Similarly, through the case studies that I am examining, I am bringing the humanities into the discussion of extremist (religious) rhetorics, an area of discourse that those scholars have largely ignored.
ContributorsSalihu, Flurije (Author) / Ali, Souad T. (Thesis advisor) / Miller, Keith (Thesis advisor) / Corman, Steven (Committee member) / Gee, James P (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2014
Description
One of the critical imperatives for the development of inclusive school systems is the capacity to nurture and develop teachers who have the skills, critical sensibilities, and the contextual awareness to provide quality educational access, participation, and outcomes for all students; however, research on teacher learning for inclusive education has not yet generated a robust body of knowledge to understand how teachers become inclusive teachers in institutions where exclusion is historical and ubiquitous. Drawing from socio-cultural theory, this study aimed to fill this gap through an examination of teacher learning for inclusive education in an urban professional learning school. In particular, I aimed to answer the following two questions: (a) What social discourses are present in a professional learning school for inclusive education?, and (b) How do teachers appropriate these social discourses in situated practice? I used analytical tools from Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and Grounded Theory to analyze entry and exit interviews with teacher residents, principals, site professors, and video-stimulated interviews with teacher residents, observations of classroom practices and thesis seminars, and school documents. I found two social discourses that I called discourses of professionalism, as they offered teachers a particular combination of tools, aiming to universalize certain tools for doing and thinking that signaled what it meant to be a professional teacher in the participating schools. These were the Total Quality Management like discourse (TQM-like) and the Inclusive Education-like discourse. The former was dominant in the schools, whereas the latter was dominant in the university Master's program. These discourses overlapped in teachers' classrooms practices, creating tensions. To understand how these tensions were resolved, this study introduced the concept of curating, a kind of heuristic development that pertains particularly to the work achieved in boundary practices in which individuals must claim multiple memberships by appropriating the discourses and their particular tool kits of more than one community of practice. This study provides recommendations for future research and the engineering of professional development efforts for inclusive education.
ContributorsWaitoller, Federico R. (Author) / Artiles, Alfredo J. (Thesis advisor) / Kozleski, Elizabeth B. (Committee member) / Gee, James P (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
ABSTRACT This study examined the schooling experiences and perceptions of resettled sub-Saharan African middle school refugee students in a metropolitan area of the United States Southwest. The research questions underpinning this study included: What are the schooling experiences and perceptions of resettled sub-Saharan African middle school refugee students in a southwestern U.S. state? 1a) How do they view their relationships with their teachers and peers? 1b) Can they identify a teacher or school staff member in their school community who is a significant resource for them? and 1c) What factors contribute to their challenges and successes in their school community? This qualitative study documented and analyzed the schooling experiences and perceptions of resettled refugee middle school students, who are relatively new to the U.S. educational system. Purposive and convenience sampling were sources utilized in selecting participants for this study. Semi-structured interviews and focus groups were used to capture the stories of 10 resettled sub-Saharan African refugee students enrolled in 7th and 8th grade, who have lived in the U.S. not more than 10 years and not less than three years. Among the participants, half were male and half female. They came from six countries: Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Somalia. Findings of the study revealed six major themes: teachers' helpfulness, positive perceptions of school, friends as resources at school, disruptive students in the classroom, need for better teachers, and before and after school activities. Overall, the participants in the study expressed a positive perception of their teachers and their schools, yet presented a dichotomous view of their schooling experiences and perceptions.
ContributorsSallu, Adama (Author) / Swadener, Beth B (Thesis advisor) / Klimek, Barbara (Committee member) / Miller, Lynn (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
This study is a feminist historiography of Al-Raida, a Lebanese feminist journal introduced in 1976 by the Institute for Women's Studies in the Arab World at the Lebanese American University. This study recovers foundations of modern Lebanese feminist discourses as they are articulated in the journal by employing Foucauldian CDA as a means to trace discourse strands, or conversations, which include Family Planning, development, politics and narratives of the Lebanese civil war. This study explores, by situating each discourse strand within dominant and local historical contexts, the shifting rhetorical function of the journal through various historical moments. Tracing the dominant discourse strands within the first decade of the journal, this study rhetorically analyzes the ways in which arguments are positioned, research studies are presented, and methodologies are employed to forge viable solutions to Middle Eastern women's issues. First, the study traces the conversation on Family Planning in Lebanon and its relevance to the economic and social situation during the late 70s. Second, the study presents the shift in the early 80s towards a discourse on development and explores how Al-Raida presents the issue of development, attempts to define it, and in doing so outlines some of the concerns at this time, including illiteracy, access to health care, access to paid employment, and women's access to developmental opportunities. Third, the study presents the discourse in the mid-80s on the civil war in Lebanon and highlights Al-Raida's rhetorical function by documenting trauma and war narratives through personal interviews, testimonies, and ethnographies. The shift in the methodologies of the research articles published in the first decade, from quantitative studies towards qualitative studies, indicates the journal is rhetorically situated within both the dominant international discourse and within the local context, exhibiting an ability to respond to the nuances in the local Lebanese women's movement while simultaneously maintaining international visibility.
ContributorsKhoury, Nicole (Author) / Goggin, Maureen D (Thesis advisor) / Ali, Souad T. (Thesis advisor) / Roen, Duane (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
ABSTRACT For many years, difference scholars, such as Cornel West, Iris Marion Young, and Janet Atwill have been reminding humanities scholars that if social equity is ever to be realized, difference needs to be reconfigured and reframed. As Janet Atwill puts it, "difference can no longer be the anomaly, the enemy, or the problem to be solved. Difference is the condition" (212). While these scholars insightfully recognize that difference needs to be accepted, welcomed and loved rather than merely tolerated, they have not sufficiently addressed the perceptual change that must occur worldwide if difference as an intrinsic underlying condition of human existence is to be embraced. This project provides a point of departure for carrying out such a dramatic epistemic change by arguing that hierarchical thinking, not difference, is the real agent underwriting societal violence and discord. Hierarchical thinking delineates a more appropriate critical space than does difference for social justice inquiry, invention, and intervention. This project also rhetorically theorizes the realm of intersubjectivity and provides two novel contributions to contemporary rhetorical theory: 1) privilege as a rhetorical construct and 2) the untapped inventional potential of the postmodern understanding of intersubjectivity. To illustrate the embodied and performative aspects of hierarchical thinking, this work draws upon the writings of Lillian Smith, a white southerner (1897-1966) whose descriptive analyses of the Jim Crow South allude to large systems of privilege of which Jim Crow is merely representational. Illustrating the invidious nexus of privilege, Smith's writings describe the ways in which individuals embody and perform practices of exclusion and hate to perpetuate larger systems of privilege. Smith shows how privilege operates much as gender and power--fluidly and variously and dependent upon context. Viewing privilege as a rhetorical construct, operating dynamically, always in flux and at play, provides rhetoricians with a theoretically important move that un-yokes privilege from specific identities (e.g., white privilege). When viewed through this more dynamic and precise lens, we can readily perceive how privilege functions as a colonizing, ubiquitously learned, and variegated rhetorical practice of subordination and domination that, as a frame of analysis, offers a more fluid and accurate perspective than identity categories provide for discussions of oppression, social justice, and democratic engagement.
ContributorsHoliday, Judy (Author) / Goggin, Maureen D (Thesis advisor) / Long, Elenore (Committee member) / Miller, Keith (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
During the first half of the last decade, there was a heated debate regarding what type of critical approach best suits the study of video games. Those who argued for approaches traditionally associated with narrative studies were primarily interested in video games as a new frontier for storytelling. The opposition claimed that video games are not systems for storytelling, and that applying literature and film theories to video games dismisses the interactive nature of video games as games. The argument was bitter, but ended abruptly with no clear results or consensus. Yet are narratology and ludology, the two proposed critical theories, so disparate that the use of one means the exclusion of the other? This paper suggests the possibility that narratology and ludology share more in common than critics have thus far realized. Both games and story share themes of conflict, and in focalizing on the antagonist of single-player video games it becomes possible to trace the development of conflict and how it functions in the video game medium. In analyzing antagonists and the conflict they embody, it becomes apparent that narratology and ludology are not so incompatible in their methodologies and assumptions. Finally, because video games themselves are a multifaceted medium, it is only appropriate that critics use multiple theoretical approaches in their analysis to broaden critical knowledge of how the medium functions.
ContributorsNeel, James (Author) / Hayes, Elisabeth (Thesis advisor) / Gee, James P (Committee member) / Daer, Alice (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012