Understanding how a spiritual retreat enhances the search for meaning and fulfillment in a large corporate workplace /

This study explored the concept of a spiritual retreat for frontline employees of a large corporate call centre. During a 1 day retreat, 4 call centre employees were introduced to various meditation and retreat activities. Follovsdng the retreat the participants were asked to incorporate the various meditations and activities into their workplace. The participants kept journals throughout the study in an effort to determine what occurred when these practices were transferred from the retreat setting to the workplace. This study examined how a working spirituality enhances one's sense of fulfillment, defined by certain critical elements: relationship, awareness, ritual, internal commitment, and choice. Although the retreat was a successful means of exploring these elements, the degree to which each employee could benefit from them was determined by the extent of their internal commitment not only to themselves, but also to their jobs.

Grade nine teachers' perception of how teachers, parents, peers, administrators, and community members affect the development of the grade nine student /

The purpose of this study was to examine grade nine teachers' perception of how teachers, parents, peers, administrators, and community members influence the overall development of grade nine students. Ten grade nine teachers (four male and six female) participated in the study which consisted of the completion of a one hour, tape-recorded interview. The central findings were as follows: 1) the grade nine student has evolved; 2) peers have an important impact on the four developmental areas (physical, emotional, social, and academic) of the grade nine student; and 3) the role of the grade nine teacher appears to have dramatically changed over the last seventeen years. Suggestions and recommendations for future research in this field are based on findings related to the enhancement of the secondary school experience for the grade nine adolescent.

The nature of the highly artistic student in visual arts at secondary school /

This qualitative investigation examined the nature of 7 highly artistic visual arts students at 2 secondary schools in southcentral Ontario. Through interviews, questionnaires, observations, and artwork documents, this study attempted to understand these highly artistic students in terms of creativity, motivation, social and emotional perspectives, and cognitive processes. Data collection occuned over a 3-monlh period. and the data analysis program NVivo 7 was used for coding to develop themes and categories for organizing data. The findings of this study illustrate the significant place that \ isual arts can lake in the growth and development for the youth of today. Participants idcniificd dcxclopnig critical thinking and problem-solving skills, taking risks, and meeting challenges ilirouuh their engagement in the creative process. The transferability of these skills \\ as referenced to numerous aspects of their lives. By enhancing individual perspectives through the study of visual arts, their local and world connections were extended, and environmental and societal concerns evolved. In addition, the communicative opportunities that visual arts provided for these students in terms of personal expression provided emotional health and paths of personal discovery. Through the participants' production of artwork with the many stages this involves, combined with insight into their needs, the participants relayed miportant suggestions for programming enhancements and educational settmgs lor \ isiial arts classrooms. These suggestions are meaningful for educators and curriculum developers of the future.

Web based content and hybrid teaching: student perceptions of the effectiveness of using web based content and hyper-linked teaching units in teaching hybrid business and marketing post secondary classes /

This exploratory, descriptive action research study is based on a survey of a sample of convenience consisting of 172 college and university marketing students, and 5 professors who were experienced in teaching in an internet based environment. The students that were surveyed were studying e-commerce and international business in 3^^ and 4*'' year classes at a leading imiversity in Ontario and e-commerce in 5^ semester classes at a leading college. These classes were taught using a hybrid teaching style with the contribution of a large website that contained pertinent text and audio material. Hybrid teaching employs web based course materials (some in the form of Learning Objects) to deliver curriculimi material both during the attended lectures and also for students accessing the course web page outside of class hours. The survey was in the form on an online questionnaire. The research questions explored in this study were: 1. What factors influence the students' ability to access and learn from web based course content? 2. How likely are the students to use selected elements of internet based curriculum for learning academic content? 3. What is the preferred physical environment to facilitate learning in a hybrid environment? 4. How effective are selected teaching/learning strategies in a hybrid environment? The findings of this study suggest that students are very interested in being part of the learning process by contributing to a course web site. Specifically, students are interested in audio content being one of the formats of online course material, and have an interest in being part of the creation of small audio clips to be used in class.

Grade 9 students' perceptions of the impact of a Drop Everything and Read (D.E.A.R.) program /

Educators continually look for strategies to enhance and improve the reading practices of their students. This is an especially challenging task for secondary level teachers as high school students often lack intrinsic motivation to read for pleasure (Bucher & Manning, 2004; Horton, 2005; Wooicott, Research Pty. Ltd. 2001). The purpose of this study was to detennine the effects of the Drop Everything and Read (D.E.A.R.) program on writing, on reading, and on grades, from the perspective of eight Grade 9 students. Of particular interest were the students' perceptions of the effect that participation in the program had on their grades, their writing, their motivation to reading, and their concept of themselves as readers. The eight participants were tracked over the course of a semester. Using qualitative research techniques, data were collected from four sources: two student surveys, researcher's daily field observations, students' weekly reading logs, and three open-ended one-on-one interviews. In order to gain an understanding of the impact of the D.E.A.R program, the data were corroborated, and analyzed with NVivo: N7 (2006). From the data analysis, five themes emerged as a function of the Grade 9 students' experiences in the D.E.A.R. program: Reading Preferences, Time Spent Reading, Making Associations with Reading for Pleasure, Perceptions of Self-as-Reader, and Evaluations of the D.E.A.R Program. In the interest of supporting students' positive reading habits and for the future implementation, these five themes are presented as a series of findings together with recommendations for practice.