Date of Award

8-2015

Degree Name

Specialist in Education

Department

Educational Leadership, Research and Technology

First Advisor

Dr. Dennis C. McCrumb

Second Advisor

Dr. Walter L. Burt

Third Advisor

Dr. William C. Skilling

Keywords

Cross cutting, literacy, high school, science, argumentative writing

Access Setting

Masters Thesis-Open Access

Abstract

This study sought to determine to what extent a centrally focused initiative concentrated on how to teach students to not just write, but how to think, read, and speak about real world problems in a persuasive manner based on multiple sets of data related to science concepts, increased scientific argumentative writing proficiencies among high school students. A secondary area this study attempted to explore was the correlation between the implemented processes in the initiative and high school students’ scientific argumentative writing proficiencies. The study was conducted in a mid-western high school, population 1,088, with a select group of students in 9th grade chemistry-physics N = 98. The students experienced evidence-based cross cutting literacy strategies and scientific argumentative writing strategies over the course of one academic year. The quasi-experimental, empirical study was designed to see if there was any significant difference in students argumentative writing proficiency based on the analysis of pre- and post-assessment scores. The descriptive measures used in the study measured the correlations between the results and the initiative. Findings in this study suggest that the strategies implemented caused student scientific argumentative writing to increase significantly at a 95% confidence level.

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