Dissertation
Classroom Without Walls excursions and their impact on the affective growth of international middle school students
Doctor of Education (Ed.D.), Drexel University
Sep 2018
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17918/D82Q1N
Abstract
Each school year, it is common for international middle schools to offer outdoor experiential education programs that take them off campus for three to seven days. The programs aim to extend learning beyond the school campus into environments that allow for the extension of one or more of the following categories of activities, adventure, leadership, team-building, service learning, and academic. The setting for these excursions is primarily outdoors, in nature, with additional activities in areas or edifices of cultural or historical significance. Although the specific objectives of each school may vary, these trips are invariably viewed as an opportunity for students to develop deeper relationships with their teachers and peers, to promote personal affective growth, and to foster a deeper understanding of the local culture that they are visiting. The term for this type of program at the school in which this study takes place is Classroom Without Walls (CWW). Looking through a social constructivist lens, and based on three literature streams, (a) friendship skills and a sense of belonging, (b) perceived competence and self-efficacy, (c) locus of control and personal responsibility, this non-experimental, pre-test/post-test quantitative study applied the ROPELOC instrument as a pre and post survey tool in order to explore the effects of CWW excursions on perceived personal abilities and sense of personal responsibility of both host national and foreign national participants. Results showed, using responses from 167 middle school students in an international school in Colombia, statistically significant gains in perceived personal abilities as well as statistically significant gains in perceived personal responsibility, while showing no statistically significant changes in ROPELOC scores based on type of student.
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Details
- Title
- Classroom Without Walls excursions and their impact on the affective growth of international middle school students
- Creators
- Jonathan Glenn Chenier - DU
- Contributors
- Salvatore Falletta (Advisor) - Drexel University (1970-)
- Awarding Institution
- Drexel University
- Degree Awarded
- Doctor of Education (Ed.D.)
- Publisher
- Drexel University; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
- Number of pages
- x, 92 pages
- Resource Type
- Dissertation
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- School of Education (1997-2026); Drexel University
- Other Identifier
- 8041; 991014632258604721