This study presents findings from an investigation of the impact of teachers who graduated from a fully online master’s degree program with training in pedagogy and a content-specialization in elementary reading and literacy (oERL) on reading achievement in a large urban public school system in the northwestern United States. The research team used a non-equivalent group design and matched pairs of teachers based on degree, grade-level taught, and teaching experience to construct the study on three years of student and teacher data. The study consisted of 70 teachers and 3,828 student observations. Hierarchical linear modeling was employed to understand the teachers’ effects on student learning over time. Results indicate there was a significant positive effect of the oERL on student achievement. Broadly, this study is an example of a serious attempt to ascertain the impact of a high demand and fully online program on the community where graduates are employed. More narrowly, these results support the view that a fully online program aimed at training teachers, a rarity in graduate education, can provide opportunities for those teachers to obtain the pedagogical content knowledge that can positively influence instructional effectiveness.
This paper is an update of an ongoing project involving extensive use of video technology for classroom activities in a geotechnical engineering laboratory course. In particular, synchronous video conferencing was conducted between California Polytechnic State University (Primarily Undergraduate Institution) and Auburn University (Research-1 Institution). Synchronous video conferencing was conducted between university classrooms and practitioners. In some cases, international partners (both practitioners and universities) were involved in the conferencing activities. Video productions were assigned and completed by students in lieu of conventional written laboratory reports. For selected assignments, graphics-only (i.e., no words) or audio-only documentation of laboratory experiences was required. All of the activities have been undertaken to investigate the pedagogical benefits of incorporating unconventional learning styles into teaching of geotechnical engineering laboratory courses. Assessment of these learning activities is presented. Opportunities, challenges, and strategies for implementing this teaching methodology are described. Recent Project Activities and DevelopmentsRecent advances on the project have included in-class interactions with practitioners, incorporation of learning-style-specific (e.g., audio-only) format requirements for laboratory assignments, development of inter-university competitions based on laboratory experiments, incorporation of new technology, and expansion of film production in lieu of written laboratory reports. In addition, new project assessment has been conducted using various techniques
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