Theses and Dissertations at Montana State University (MSU)
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Item The impact of technology on engagement and content mastery in high school biology(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2022) Livesay, Jennifer Marie; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: C. John GravesThe use of technology-mediated versus traditional paper-based delivery methods as a means of increasing student mastery and engagement was studied in the areas of notetaking and simulations. Data collection instruments included pre- and post-content tests with confidence response measures as well as both Likert-item and open-ended response surveys. Data was analyzed using both quantitative and qualitative methods. The results indicate that technology leads to increased levels of engagement and mastery when utilized as a way to model scientific processes, but a decrease of mastery and engagement when used as the medium for notetaking.Item The analysis of teaching an online student-centered classroom with mastery learning to high school biology students(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2021) Knowlton, Rodney Albert, II; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Greg FrancisEducation is developing a continually evolving practice with the implementation of new styles of teaching and uses of technology becoming more and more prevalent. Mastery learning allows for the ability of students to work at their own pace with more frequent feedback compared to a traditional learning environment. The classroom under study will be implementing a mastery learning technique while also having students be completely online. This study investigated the perceptions of students within an online mastery learning classroom. The study also investigated the effect on students' performance through a standardized assessment and observation of grades. Students and parent perception data were collected through survey and interviews. The results indicated that students disliked online learning and wished to return to in-person environments. Mastery learning methods seem to impact perceptions and engagement of students in a positive way. Student performance appeared similar throughout this method of teaching, but more research would be beneficial to implement into the future.Item The effects of using learning progressions for student mastery(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2021) Hill, Michael Frederick; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Greg FrancisIn order for students to achieve a high level of knowledge, teachers and students should be able to identify areas of understanding and areas that need improvement. Designing a progression that identifies concepts help guide teachers and students through the learning process. Students have the opportunity to show mastery in a concept before progressing to the next level. This action research provided students with a progression to guide their learning. Students reflected on each concept before moving to the next. As a result, students were able to show significant growth as well a sense of confidence in learning.Item Investigating the benefits of mastery learning in the high school physics classroom(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2017) Holloway, Sara Carse-Patchet; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Walter WoolbaughTeaching general physics in public school wass never an easy task, but with our students' lack of proper math preparation, many of our students struggled with physics. We had to come up with a better way to steer these students through our curriculum. The best way was to allow students to move through the curriculum at their own pace and to require mastery of topics within each unit of the curriculum. We decided to utilize the mastery learning approach. To tackle this, we spoke to our Instructional Specialist to gather ideas for how to help these students who were struggling due to gaps in their knowledge. She suggested we use the mastery learning approach to better help our students get the time they need to complete our curriculum. This created a starting point from which to build our mastery framework, but also to begin my classroom research project. The project aimed to combat the negative effects we were seeing in our physics students, while still maintaining academic integrity, student learning and the requirements of the district and state curriculum. By combining self-paced instruction with frequent formative assessments, students could begin to learn where their knowledge gaps are, as well as learn skills for academic success such as time management, self-advocacy, and learning from their mistakes. It should be known that due to constraints of the school in which I was conducting research, this is only an observational study. There was no control group, or treatment group. All students in the study received the same treatment, with no non-treatment units. My research questions for this project were to evaluae how implementing mastery framework affected student performance in on-level physics classes. In order to measure this, I also had to consider how mastery would impact student performance on common formative assessments, how it impacted student perceptions of physics/science, as well as how mastery encouraged student motivation. Finally, it is also important to see how implementing mastery impacted me, as an educator.