Theses and Dissertations at Montana State University (MSU)
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Item The ball's in your court: the effect of sports in rural English classrooms(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2020) Reierson, Elizabeth Anne; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Allison Wynhoff OlsenEducation in rural areas is affected by the place in which the education takes place. This affects how students interact with the community as well as the classroom. The most visible way in which the community interacts with the school is through spectating at high school games. The author interviews four English teachers in rural eastern Montana to explore the ways in which community, school, English classrooms and sports interact. Educators noted that while sports had many benefits, there was no sports literature being explicitly taught or being directly incorporated into the classroom. Furthermore, absences caused by school athletics create a tension between academic needs and extracurricular expectations. These absences are directly affecting the ways in which English teachers create their curriculum. The author offers next steps for teachers looking to create a connection between classroom and community through athletics.Item Teaching english on the moon: a memoir of teaching at a rural school(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2020) Hoffmann, Alan David; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Allison Wynhoff OlsenMontana is a primarily rural state. The majority of Montana's high schools are 'Class C' schools with enrollments under 107 students. Of these, over sixty Montana high schools have enrollments under sixty students. In these schools, high school academic departments normally consist of one person. This experience is rarely examined. Even existing literature that focuses on rural education focus on settings with higher enrollments than many of Montana's smaller schools. Drawing on the author's personal experience of teaching at high school with an enrollment of around 25 students, this memoir provides an account and guide for working in these settings. Through this, the author details the benefits of teaching in these settings, such as smaller class sizes that allow for more one-on-one interaction. It also examines the challenges of coming and teaching in rural places, including the stresses of prepping for seven different classes and difficulties of integrating into rural communities. Given the number of these schools in the state of Montana, many graduates from the Montana University System's education programs will go on to teach in these settings. This work aims to advocate for rural settings and to give teachers that may go into these areas an idea of what to expect.