Award Date

May 2018

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

Education

First Committee Member

Hasan Deniz

Second Committee Member

David Vallett

Third Committee Member

P. G. Schrader

Fourth Committee Member

Matthew Bernacki

Number of Pages

180

Abstract

The economy of tomorrow is uncertain, so students today need to be prepared for the known and unknown careers that lie ahead. Currently, not all students are expected to have equal career opportunities based on evidence from dropout and testing data (Brown & Brown, 2007; Kirsch, Braun, Yamamoto, & Sum, 2007), so educators should consider different methods of helping all students reach their potential. Modeling instruction is one method that might help diverse learners improve their scientific understandings and allow them to pursue careers in technology-oriented fields. A quasi-experimental study was conducted with 128 sixth grade students as participants. A multiple choice assessment and modeling prompts were used to explore the effects of modeling instruction on student’s science content knowledge. Findings from the study include (a) modeling instruction was effective in helping students of different abilities learn science content and (b) modeling instruction was more effective than regular instruction in helping students learn science content that was explicitly taught.

Keywords

education; modeling; science

Disciplines

Science and Mathematics Education

File Format

pdf

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

Rights

IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

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