Jessica Ivy - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Jessica Ivy

Integrative and Interdisciplinary Curriculum in the Middle School, 2020

International Journal of Computer Science Education in Schools, 2020

Although many practicing teachers have not experienced teacher preparation programs that teach cy... more Although many practicing teachers have not experienced teacher preparation programs that teach cyber security (Pusely & Sadera, 2011) or are familiar with cyber principles (Author), embedding these ideas into instruction in a variety of content areas is essential for promoting cyber literacy and citizenship. This study explores a professional development program that provided middle and high school teachers across disciplines with opportunities to explore, first as learners and then as educators, cyber citizenship and programming concepts with explicit connections to the cybersecurity principles and concepts. Participating teachers experienced inquiry-based learning, focused classroom discourse, and collaborative learning that centered on GenCyber Cybersecurity First Principles and GenCyber Cybersecurity Concepts (GenCyber, 2019). Results indicated the professional development enabled teachers to iteratively reflect on best practices in cyber education while learning and applying th...

Responsive to broadening participation challenges, Mississippi State University (MSU) established... more Responsive to broadening participation challenges, Mississippi State University (MSU) established the Bulldog Bytes Outreach Program in 2013 with a residential summer camp for middle school girls funded through the National Center for Women in Information Technology (NCWIT). Since then the program has grown to provide co-curricular activities to K12 students throughout the state. Following a pilot offering of an elementary camp in 2016, the Bulldog Bytes program delivered two of these camps in small towns during 2017, supporting a strategy of engaging under-resourced students with computing in their home communities. This paper will detail our project-based approach to learning and share experiences from the elementary camps.

2018 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition Proceedings

(MSU) where she recently received her doctoral degree in Instructional Systems and Workforce Deve... more (MSU) where she recently received her doctoral degree in Instructional Systems and Workforce Development. She received her undergraduate degree in Business Administration from MSU with concentrations in Finance, Insurance, and Management. Vemitra also received her Masters of Science degree in Instructional Technology from MSU. Vemitra has been involved with recruiting under-represented minority students in the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) areas at Mississippi State University since the summer of 2010. Vemitra is a member of Columbus Lowndes County Alumni Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc., the recent award recipient of the Outstanding Graduate Woman Award from the President's Commission on the Status of Women, a member of Phi Theta Kappa, Women's Basketball Collegiate Association, and Mississippi Educators Association. Her active participation in these organizations reveals her passion in helping others succeed. Vemitra is also a former collegiate basketball player where she played 2 years of women's basketball at Bevill State Community College in Fayette AL and her last 2 years at the University of West Georgia in Carrollton GA. She was a 4 year Academic All American. Dr. Sarah B. Lee, Mississippi State University Sarah Lee joined the faculty at Mississippi State University (MSU) after a 19 year information technology career at FedEx Corporation. As an assistant clinical professor and Assistant Department Head in the Computer Science and Engineering Department, she is co-founder and co-director of the Bulldog Bytes program at MSU that engages K-12 students with computing and provides professional development to K-12 teachers in computer science and cybersecurity. She is the PI for the NSF INCLUDES Mississippi Alliance for Women in Computing (MSAWC), partnering with stakeholders throughout the southern US to leverage, strengthen, and create awareness of existing programs and create new programs for young women in computing. Sarah holds a BS in Business Administration and Computer Information Systems from the Mississippi University for Women and a master's degree in computer science from MSU. She earned her PhD in computer science from the University of Memphis.

Middle School Journal, 2019

Education for young adolescents must be challenging, relevant, integrative, and exploratory. Inte... more Education for young adolescents must be challenging, relevant, integrative, and exploratory. Integrative teaching (e.g., interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary, cross-disciplinary, etc.) benefits middle-level learners as it potentially increases student engagement, motivation, and achievement. It provides learners with the opportunity to synthesize knowledge by exploring topics and ideas through multiple lenses. While the middle school concept certainly highlights the critical role of integrative teaching, many middle-level structures such as integrated teaching are "limited, absent, or not fully implemented". Given the reality in which we work (without a fully articulated middle level teacher education program), the faculty of elementary and secondary education are responsible for preparing future middle-level teachers. This article provides a description of how faculty in one university are preparing secondary education teacher candidates for the middlelevel classroom through interdisciplinary collaboration.

The Clearing House: A Journal of Educational Strategies, Issues and Ideas, 2019

Communicating mathematical ideas through writing, listening, and verbalizing allows students to t... more Communicating mathematical ideas through writing, listening, and verbalizing allows students to think about how they "think" about mathematics. By focusing this communication on a reflection of how one thinks about mathematics, metacognitive writing engages students as mathematicians and learners. In this article we describe a professional development that we implemented with middle grade mathematics teachers focused on metacognitive writing as a tool to support productive struggle in the mathematics classroom. Thus, this practitioner article adds to the knowledge base on how to develop middle grade teachers metacognitive writing through engagement in productive struggle. Recommendations for practice are included.

The Clearing House: A Journal of Educational Strategies, Issues and Ideas, 2017

The middle level classroom presents unique challenges to educators who strive to provide opportun... more The middle level classroom presents unique challenges to educators who strive to provide opportunities that acknowledge learner diversity in terms of social, cognitive, physical, and emotional development. This is confounded even further within inclusive middle-school classrooms where the responsibility to differentiate instruction is even more critical. One way to meet the needs of all students is through cooperative grouping. Through cooperative grouping, middle-level educators can differentiate instruction and promote active learning by leveraging the naturally social nature of young adolescents. In this article, the authors present research on cooperative grouping as well as several considerations for effectively designing and implementing cooperative grouping for middle-level learners in an inclusive setting. Suggestions and examples with regard to group size, membership, group structure and roles, and classroom management and clear expectations are provided. Additionally, the fourclue group strategy is presented as a specific instructional method to support effective group learning experiences in the inclusive middle-level classroom.

The Clearing House: A Journal of Educational Strategies, Issues and Ideas, 2016

ABSTRACT Often mathematical instruction for students with disabilities, especially those with lea... more ABSTRACT Often mathematical instruction for students with disabilities, especially those with learning disabilities, includes an overabundance of instruction on mathematical computation and does not include high-quality instruction on mathematical reasoning and problem solving. In fact, it is a common misconception that students with learning disabilities are not strong problem solvers in general. This article highlights the inherent problem solving strengths that students with learning disabilities possess; how they use those skills to address everyday barriers and challenges, and how teachers can relate these skills to academic mathematical instruction. Additionally, practical classroom examples, suggested teaching strategies, and questions for further examinations are discussed.

Journal of Digital Learning in Teacher Education, 2021

This article condenses five years of professional development based on Technological Pedagogical ... more This article condenses five years of professional development based on Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (TPACK) integration principles, National Council of Teachers of Mathematics Pr...

Handbook of Research on TPACK in the Digital Age, 2019

Technology has the potential to transform the classroom, build access to new mathematical content... more Technology has the potential to transform the classroom, build access to new mathematical content, and provide access to students through unique representations. For this study, the authors considered the transformational promise of digital fabrication technology, specifically 3D printing, in a setting comprised of pre-service teachers. An introduction to digital fabrication session was implemented in a secondary mathematics methods course. Participants were assessed both prior to the experience and after, using an adapted TPACK developmental self-report survey to consider TPACK themes and subthemes. In this chapter, the authors describe ideas that emerged from narratives provided by participants, patterns of change noted from pre- to post-assessment, and three cases that emerged representing students who experienced the most positive changes, most negative changes, and least amount of change on self-perceived levels.

Mathematics Teacher: Learning and Teaching PK-12, 2021

An activity connects the features of sinusoid curves to tangible manipulatives printed on a 3D pr... more An activity connects the features of sinusoid curves to tangible manipulatives printed on a 3D printer.

Common Core Mathematics Standards and Implementing Digital Technologies

This chapter examines the practices and beliefs of two secondary mathematics teachers with simila... more This chapter examines the practices and beliefs of two secondary mathematics teachers with similar demographic backgrounds. The influence of their practices and beliefs on teaching and student learning is considered through the lens of the TPACK Development Model and through evidence of student engagement in the Mathematical Practices. Even though they face common barriers to instructional technology integration, both teachers speak to their successes and positive impacts on student learning. Rich descriptions of conversations, classroom observations, and self-report survey data highlight critical contrasts between the practices of the two teachers. These differences represent the unique challenges faced by instructional technology researchers and other educational stakeholders. The purpose of this chapter is to highlight these subtle, yet far-reaching, areas of distinction in which the teachers unknowingly provide different levels of opportunity for teaching and learning in the mat...

Modern Journal of Language Teaching Methods, Jun 1, 2013