New Education Articles

Alabama Squabble Stalls BP Spill Reimbursement

2010-09-22T18:08:00.000-07:00

Alabama school districts are bracing for a cut in state aid, as the governor and attorney general clash over the best way for Alabama to quickly get reimbursements from a $20 billion fund set up by the White House and BP to compensate victims of the energy company’s massive oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico.

In August, Alabama Gov. Bob Riley, a Republican, filed an initial $148 million claim with BP to help restore revenue that the state says was lost because of the spill. Tourists who typically visit Alabama’s beaches in droves over the summer stayed away this year, leading to a significant drop in sales tax revenue, the governor’s office contends.

Most of that money—$112 million—would have gone to the state’s Education Trust Fund, Gov. Riley said in a statement.

Complicating matters, the state’s attorney general, Troy King, also a Republican, filed a lawsuit Aug. 12 seeking damages, although he has not specified an amount. BP will not pay on Alabama’s claim because of the pending legal action, said Ray Melick, a spokesman for BP.

Now, Gov. Riley says he has no choice but to cut state aid to school districts by 2 percent.

“One man made a brash, reckless decision to sue BP while the state was still working to recover lost tax revenue from the company,” Gov. Riley said in a statement released Sept. 16, explaining his decision. “He did it without consulting me or local officials on our coast. No other state’s attorney general has sued BP at this time, and King’s lawsuit stopped our ability to recover these tax dollars before the end of this fiscal year.

“BP can’t escape blame either,” the governor said. “As the admitted responsible party, the company should live up to its commitments, even though the lawsuit stands in the way.”

BP had already paid Alabama $77 million to reimburse the state for clean-up efforts and other activities to respond to the oil leak that started after an April 20 explosion on an off-shore oil rig, and Gov. Riley was confident that BP would pay the claim based on conversations with the company’s leaders, said Todd Stacy, a spokesman for the governor. The lawsuit has slowed down that process, he added.

Mr. King said that he took action, because, in his view, BP has not followed through on its promise to provide quick reimbursements to individuals and businesses.

“BP’s promise to put the Gulf back the way they found it rings hollow to the tens of thousands of individuals and businesses who are still waiting for their claims to be paid,” Mr. King said in a statement. “In fact, it is precisely because of BP’s record of not living up to their commitments that I sued them.”

He appealed directly to BP to pay the state’s claim, contrasting his approach to Gov. Riley’s.

“Governor Riley has chosen to negotiate with you from a position of weakness,” Mr. King said in a statement, directed at BP. “The governor seems unable to see beyond the end of the few months left in his term and has approached you as a panhandler begging for crumbs. … I have chosen an approach of strength. If you will not pay Alabama what it owes, a court will force you to do so.”

District Difficulties

School districts in Alabama are also asking BP for reimbursement dollars. For instance, the Baldwin County Public Schools system filed a claim for $4.3 million, to make up for a loss in local sales tax revenue, said Terry Wilhite, a spokesman for the 28,3000-student district, located in the Gulf Coast region.

“The BP oil spill essentially wiped out our summer revenue,” Mr. Wilhite said. The district, which has a budget of $268 million, is slated to lose an additional $2 million because of the impending cuts. “We are hit from two sides, the state-funding side, but also the local-funding side,” he said.

It’s unclear what impact the lawsuit will have on the district’s efforts to recoup revenue, he added.

Before the spill, the district had already reduced its budget by more than $65 million and laid off more than 800 employees. And Baldwin County has nearly drained its rainy day fund, which had $20 million in it about a year ago, and is now down to $3 million.

Losing revenue because of the spill “added insult to injury,” Mr. Wilhite said.

Merit Pay Found to Have Little Effect on Achievement

2010-09-22T18:05:00.000-07:00

The most rigorous study of performance-based teacher compensation ever conducted in the United States shows that a nationally watched bonus-pay system had no overall impact on student achievement—results released today that are certain to set off a firestorm of debate.

Nearly 300 middle school mathematics teachers in Nashville, Tenn., voluntarily took part in the Project on Incentives in Teaching, a three-year randomized experiment conducted by researchers affiliated with the National Center on Performance Incentives at Vanderbilt University. It was designed to study the hypothesis that a large monetary incentive would cause teachers to seek ways to be more effective and boost student scores as a result.

But it yielded only two small positive findings, limited to 5th graders in the second and third year of the experiment. No effects were seen for students in grades 6-8 in any year of study.

At the same time, however, participating teachers did not report finding the pay program’s goals for students out of reach or its impact on school culture damaging, two concerns that have been among those voiced by opponents of performance pay.

The implementation of the pay program “did not set off significant negative reactions of the kind that have attended the introduction of merit pay elsewhere,” the study’s authors write. “But neither did it yield consistent and lasting gains in test scores. It simply did not do much of anything.”

The findings arrive in a highly charged teacher-quality policy environment, in which many states and districts, with support from the Obama administration, are overhauling current practices for preparing, evaluating, and compensating teachers.

And they come at a particularly inopportune time for the U.S. Department of Education, which is scheduled to announce a fresh slate of grantees this month under a federal program designed to seed merit-pay programs for teachers and principals.

Union Cooperation

The study, known as POINT for the Project on Incentives in Teaching, was designed by the researchers, with the input of the 76,000-student school district and the support of the local teachers’ union affiliate and the Tennessee Education Association. Matthew G. Springer, the director of the Nashville-based center, cited the unions’ cooperation as a crucial factor in the study’s successful implementation.

The executive director of the Tennessee Education Association said the reputation of the researchers played an important role in the union’s decision to sign on. “We thought it was a chance to work with researchers whose processes and reputation we trust, and they were coming at this question with no particular ideology,” said Al Mance. “We said, ‘OK, this is something we really want to know. We won’t have a better opportunity than this.’ ”

The program was instituted in Nashville between 2006-07 and 2008-09 and covered 296 middle school math teachers in grades 5-8.

Participating teachers, all volunteers, were assigned to either a treatment group eligible to receive significant pay bonuses or a control group earning normal wages. Those in the treatment group were rewarded with bonuses between $5,000 and $15,000 based on whether their students’ achievement rose by a specified amount over the course of a year. The gains were calculated using a value-added methodology designed to filter out other aspects that could have influenced the scores.

The teachers were also randomized in clusters, so that there was at least one treatment and one control teacher in every middle school. And the program contained no quotas, so all teachers whose students performed at the specified targets earned the additional pay.

Over the course of the study, attrition reduced the number of participating teachers to only 148, and researchers carefully tracked that pattern over time to make sure it did not change the equivalence of the two groups in such a way as to skew the results. Only one teacher withdrew from the study; most of the attrition occurred because teachers were reassigned or left the district.

On average, students taught by the teachers taking part in the program did not make larger academic gains than those taught by teachers in the normal wage group.The sole exception was in grade 5 in the second and third years of study.

Related Blog

In those years, the incentive pay was linked to statistically significant increases in student scores—an increase, the report states, equal to between a third and a half year of learning. But the effect did not appear to persist.

“By the end of 6th grade,” the study states, “it does not matter whether a student had a treatment teacher in grade 5.”

The researchers performed a number of tests to try to make sense of the grade 5 findings, including to see whether there was evidence of a reallocation of time from other subjects to math, or cheating on the exams. But none of them turned up any firm explanation.

“It really is puzzling,” said Mr. Springer. “It just raises questions about what’s different about 5th grade and what factors played a role. Was it student development? The curriculum? Teaching or classroom structures?”

In interviews, scholars who study performance-based pay and teacher incentives and who were familiar with the POINT findings but not involved in the experiment, widely praised its rigorous design.

“It’s a really well-designed study, and it’s really important because a lot of the debate about performance pay has been evidence-free,” said Steven N. Glazerman, a principal researcher at Mathematica Policy Research, a Princeton, N.J.-based evaluation firm.

The existing empirical research literature on incentive pay has been limited in scope, size, and relevance. Much of the experimental research concerns programs in other countries.

What’s more, many of the existing performance-pay programs studied in the United States award far smaller bonuses, and scholars have questioned whether those amounts were enough to affect a change in teacher behavior.

But the POINT findings, said some researchers and advocates, appear to put to rest the idea that incentive pay in and of itself is enough to spur better teacher performance.

“A lot of the discussion about performance pay is based on a faulty assumption that the reason we don’t have higher test scores is that teachers are shirking their responsibilities,” said Helen F. Ladd, a professor of public policy and economics at Duke University in Durham, N.C., about the findings.

Ms. Ladd added, however, that she was “a little surprised” that the findings were not more mixed. She anticipated that teachers might work even harder over the short term to win bonuses. But that supposition was not borne out by the study.

Mr. Mance of the Tennessee Education Association said the study confirms what many teachers and unions have long believed: that teachers are already hardworking. For this study to show positive results, he said, “you’d have to have teachers who were saving their best strategies for an opportunity to get paid for them, and that is an absurd proposition.”

Researchers cautioned, however, that the Nashville experiment does not provide answers to many other questions about incentive pay. For instance, it wasn’t designed to test the hypotheses that pay incentives might serve as a draw to a different population of teacher-candidates or as an incentive for other candidates to stay in the profession—thus potentially changing the quality of the teacher workforce.

“I personally believe that the biggest role of incentives has to do with selection of who enters and who stays in teaching—how incentives change the teaching corps through entrance and exits,” said Eric A. Hanushek, a professor of economics at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. “The study has nothing to say about this.”

And because the study looks at an incentive program strictly as pay, it remains unclear how far the findings can be extrapolated to incentives with more features, such as professional development, differentiated roles, or a new teacher-evaluation system.Many well-known incentive-pay models, including Denver’s ProComp system and the popular Teacher Advancement Program, sponsored by the Santa Monica, Calif.-based National Institute for Excellence in Teaching, contain such elements.

ver the use of test scores as a measure of student learning and teacher effectiveness remains a top concern for teachers. Surveys of participants for POINT found that a majority generally supported higher pay for teachers whose students made achievement gains. Yet in 2009, about 85 percent said they felt the test-based criteria for determining effectiveness were too narrow.

That lack of buy-in, the study’s authors postulated, might have contributed to the finding of no differences in how the control and treatment groups affected instruction.

Inopportune Moment

From a policy perspective, performance pay has experienced a type of renaissance over the past six years, following the introduction in 2004 of the ProComp and in 2006 of the federal Teacher Incentive Fund, or TIF, a program established under the administration of President George W. Bush to seed performance-pay systems.

Since 2008, the Obama administration has embraced TIF and has put its own stamp on performance pay through the Race to the Top competition, which encouraged states to institute new systems for evaluating teachers and for using the results of those evaluations to inform pay decisions.

“While this is a good study, it only looked at the narrow question of whether more pay motivates teachers to try harder,” a spokeswoman for the U.S. Department of Education said in an e-mail. “What we are trying to do is change the culture of teaching by giving all educators the feedback they need to get better while rewarding and incentivizing the best to teach in high need schools and hard-to-staff subjects.”

The effects of the report on that policy agenda are not clear, but in the short run at least, proponents of merit pay are likely to steer clear of replicating the features of the Nashville program.

“Anyone about to implement a performance-based pay system will want to pay very close attention to this study, to learn from the POINT program’s successes, but especially its shortcomings,” said Mr. Glazerman of Mathematica. “These groups bear a heavy burden to figure out how their own programs can demonstrate a greater impact than what we’ve seen so far.”

“I think most people today agree that the existing compensation structure for teachers is broken, but we don’t know what a better way is,” added Mr. Springer of the Vanderbilt center. “This experiment is one step in the right direction in terms of building our knowledge base, but we need to continue to build that base and test other program designs.”

And How They Could Undermine School Reform

2010-09-22T18:02:00.000-07:00

The quest for the perfect pay-for-performance plan has been the holy grail of management experts for decades. So it is no surprise that as education reformers want principals to act more like CEOs and to boost teacher performance, they are turning to pay incentives—for schools, principals, and individual teachers—as the panacea for turning around school performance.

If industry is any guide, the bid to use incentive pay to improve education and teacher performance is illusive at best. To the extent that individualized incentives undermine team-based collaboration, they could create more problems than they solve.

The pressure to offer educators pay incentives grows out of the powerful influence of corporate-management ideas on education. However, contrary to popular belief, there is virtually no evidence that pay is a driver of long-term good performance in industry. Indeed, some of the most respected business practitioners and thinkers oppose individualized incentives. The cultural resonance of differentiated pay, which conjures conflicting images of obscene Wall Street bonus checks and lofty notions of individual accountability, and the havoc that many incentive schemes have wreaked in industry suggest that the issue deserves closer scrutiny.

The key assumption behind pay for performance is that money motivates individuals to work harder and better. CEOs, in particular, have invested the paycheck with almost magical powers to manipulate performance, arguing that individuals respond to external incentives and that money is the best motivator. Even multimillionaire bankers respond to incentive pay—not because the extra money necessarily makes a difference, so the argument goes, but because it is a way to “keep score.”

If industry is any guide, the bid to use incentive pay to improve education and teacher performance is illusive at best.

Yet, the pay-for-performance mantra runs counter to the thinking of some outlier companies—most famously Whole Foods and Ben & Jerry's—whose pay philosophies reflect skepticism about the efficacy of individualized incentives. Proponents also are tone deaf to the cultural differences that may make a compensation system that works for, say, GE or Bertelsmann a disaster at PS 6.

Decades ago, Frederick Herzberg, whose 1968 treatise against incentive pay, "One More Time: How Do You Motivate Employees?," was the most-requested Harvard Business School article for decades, explained why money doesn’t motivate in the long term. Money, he argued, is a "hygiene factor": Not enough of it causes distress, but money alone has little to do with job satisfaction or performance. Not surprisingly, companies are perpetually dissatisfied with their incentive systems, which leads to constant tinkering and more business for compensation consultants.

The biggest problem with incentive pay is that it is inevitably seen as unfair. Evaluation systems linked to single metrics, like test scores, are easily gamed—consider states that have dumbed down tests. More-nuanced approaches that include multiple measures, such as graduation and attendance rates, are often seen as too subjective. (While group incentives are more successful, they are not as popular.)

The best that can be said for individualized incentives is that within some highly competitive organizations such as securities firms or companies like GE, they foster a culture of competitiveness that is considered important to the organizational DNA and independent of fairness or efficacy.

Yet, individualized incentive pay, even at the most successful companies, is usually a failure. Years ago, for example, IBM, even as it was marketing its employee-hiring and -training expertise, instituted a forced-ranking scheme that required all supervisors to identify and reward the "top" 10 percent of its employees and to give the "bottom" 10 percent a failing grade and just three months to improve their performance or be fired. It was no coincidence that the system was instituted during an economic downturn, and was widely seen as a way to get rid of employees without violating the company's no-layoff pledge. (IBM's bell curve violated—as it usually does—basic statistical rules: Bell curves only work when they are applied to large random samples—not to relatively small, carefully selected groups of employees.) Some IBM supervisors got around the problem by creating a "designated dummy" system, by which employees took turns getting a low ranking during performance reviews. Following an employee revolt, Big Blue eventually modified its forced-ranking system, but remained wedded to individualized pay and rankings.

More recently, as IBM has become a player in the open-source-software movement, the company is once again confronting the contradictions between its pay philosophy and the need to develop a flatter, more collaborative management style. Today, scores of IBM software engineers spend most of their time working on open-source software, precisely because the open-source world, a self-organized system still dominated by thousands of volunteers, produces higher-quality software than the private sector. Think Mozilla's Firefox Web browser vs. Microsoft's Explorer. The no-hierarchy, all-meritocracy culture of open source violates every assumption about the link between pay and performance: In open source, software developers collaborate without any monetary compensation at all; the incentives are purely reputational.

Individualized pay incentives also run counter to the logic of a systems approach to organizations. According to this view, a well-run school or company will have a much narrower range of performance among its employees than will a poorly run organization. That is because the hiring and management processes in a well-run school will attract and foster—via teamwork and training—high-caliber teachers. Conversely, poor management—and poor hiring and training processes—will produce less consistency among teachers. But throwing money at teachers in low-performing schools will not fix a broken system. Moreover, argued W. Edwards Deming, a leading proponent of systems thinking, merit pay "nourishes short-term performance, annihilates long-term planning, builds fear, demolishes teamwork, nourishes rivalry and politics."

Ironically, outside the compensation arena, the systems approach is gathering followers. Teachers, classrooms, and schools are being viewed, less and less, as self-contained entities, but rather as interlinked actors. Professional development is seen as a systemwide endeavor, with teachers learning from each other and from outside experts. As digital technology plays an ever-greater role in school curricula and infrastructure, it creates unprecedented opportunities for sharing lesson plans and expertise, and for linking kids and teachers to each other and to outside experts.

To the extent that individualized incentives undermine team-based collaboration, they could create more problems than they solve.

Systems thinkers know that it is the employees closest to a process—in a nuclear-power plant, the maintenance worker who knows that trace amounts of rust can be a harbinger of systemic failure; in the classroom, a teacher who knows from experience the texts that resonate with students and those that don't—who are best able to spot problems early and to identify possible solutions. But capturing that local knowledge is a big management challenge. It requires employees who are unafraid to identify problems and who have been trained to problem-solve and to translate their knowledge and experience to useful organizational purposes.

Good teachers and principals know this. At Global Tech Prep in Harlem, which is part of New York City's innovation zone, one of the star teachers is David Baiz, age 27, who was rated unsatisfactory at his previous job at a troubled South Bronx school. A little mentoring by a veteran colleague who brought him to Global Tech helped Baiz reach his potential. Today, visitors flock to see his math classes. Baiz also has won Global Tech thousands of dollars in grants.

Under the rigid evaluation and incentive schemes now being instituted at tough-minded school districts, Baiz would probably never have survived, because the principal who rated him "unsatisfactory" had neither the insight nor the inclination to mentor him. At Global Tech, a collaborative culture fostered by the principal and the assistant-principal-in-training—Baiz's former colleague—made all the difference, not pay incentives.

What Students Need To Know To Thrive In College

2010-09-20T17:53:00.001-07:00

Personal qualities that support academic success

Students who have the following personal qualities are much more likely to thrive in college.

Self-awareness and self-acceptance
Proactivity as opposed to reactivity
Perseverance
Skill in setting short and long-range goals
Use of effective support systems
Strong emotional coping strategies

Understanding a student’s rights in college

Individuals with special learning needs are guaranteed special supports in elementary and high school by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. However, in college, no such guaranteed protections exist. Therefore, students need to work congenially with colleges to obtain reasonable accommodations that will facilitate their success.

It is best to have psychological and/or educational testing that was completed less than 3 years before applying to college because colleges usually demand recent testing to support a petition for accommodations.

Students will need to inform the college of their educational needs by registering with the office on campus that is in charge of reviewing and granting accommodations. This office goes by names such as Disabled Student Support Services or Office of Special Services.

Typical “reasonable accommodations” that colleges may decide to grant include:

Extra time to take tests
Providing a note taker
Taking tests in a separate room
Test read orally to the student and/or the student’s answers transcribed or typed
Use of tape recorder to record lectures
Tutoring services (some colleges have tutoring geared for students with special needs, however, most colleges have tutoring available to all students—check both sources)
Taking a reduced class load
Requesting “full-time” status for purposes of qualifying for health insurance when taking a reduced course load

Instructors and professors have the power to make decisions that can help students be more successful. The following are some modifications a student may be able to negotiate on a case-by-case basis:

Obtaining the instructor’s permission to modify an assignment or getting extra time to complete the assignment
Asking for advice about selecting classes or instructors
Asking the instructor to award an incomplete rather than an “F”—but be aware of the college policy in regard to “clearing” the “I”

Action steps a student should take to build a solid college support network:

Think through what kind of support you’d like to have from your parents and friends and express your needs before you go to college
Think about the kind of academic support you’ll need (for example, will you need tutoring) and make plans to set this up
Don’t suffer in silence—speak out, reach out when you need to
Get professional, trained help when you need it: tutors, doctors, etc.

Self-advocacy steps

Successful students understand themselves well. They know their strengths and they have developed ways to minimize the effects of their weaknesses. They also have a clear idea of their short-range and long-term goals, and are committed to meeting these goals.

These self-advocacy steps will help students obtain the supports they need, not only from others but from themselves as well!

Have a clear plan to graduate in a certain time frame and set your schedule to realistically accomplish this plan
Logically plan the kind of support you need to give to yourself!
Meet with your teachers regularly
Don’t wait until things get bad to see you need a different approach; if it isn’t working—try another approach
Pause, think and reflect before diving in—avoid the “Opps! and regret”
Remember: resistance and avoidance stunt maturity; meet challenges had on and don’t be afraid to make mistakes
Evaluate and think through setbacks—they are the teachers of success!
Success is a consistent mindset that says “I can do this, I will do this!”
Everything goes better when you get enough sleep and eat more healthy foods
Plan ahead on how to manage stress, loneliness, and change
Seek balance in all things—academics, relationships, pursuit of interests, career development, spiritual growth
Seek out stabilizing forces (people, classes, work experiences, living arrangements, etc.)
As soon as you identify a problem surfacing in a class, figure out how to remove it from your path
Make better time estimates; after you figure out how long you think it will take you to do what you need to do, multiply that by as least 150%
Keep your long-term, personal goals front and center in your mind, guiding you through the tough times!
Reward yourself for meeting your deadlines and achieving your goals!

Study Skills

Students who master study skills and use their strengths to learn succeed in college. Try these tips:

Set up a realistic study schedule and keep to it!!!! Don’t let spontaneity ruin your completion of college
Frequently review and critique your study approaches to find what is working and emphasize that
Don’t put off the “boring” or unpleasant tasks; doing so will leave you unprepared and can destroy your grade; find a way to see the value it brings to you as a person or as a professional
Take frequent, short breaks when your attention fades
Keep a calendar and an assignment book; record all due dates, test and quiz dates, etc. and schedule study/work sessions by backward planning
Work with classmates who are strong students and stay on track
While reading, stop frequently to retell the main idea and details in your own words
As you read, take notes, jot down questions and related ideas, and make mental pictures of the material to increase your comprehension and retention
Read the material before you go to the lecture; bring notes or an outline and fill in added material as you listen
Ask for clarification in class if you miss details; increase your concentration during difficult listening situati

Educational Propaganda

2010-09-20T17:53:00.000-07:00

Recently, students across the country took the Advanced Placement English Literature exam. This three hour test, which grants college credit to qualifying students, is the culmination of a year of intense study and preparation in a high level class. On this year’s exam, students were asked to write an essay in response to the following quote: "Exile is strangely compelling to think about but terrible to experience. It is the unhealable rift forced between a human being and a native place, between the self and its true home: its essential sadness can never be surmounted."

While exile as a theme is a good launching point for an essay, the College Board used the topic to launch an apparent political agenda by identifying the author of the quote as “Palestinian American literary theorist and cultural critic Edward Said.”

Quoting Edward Said, a man who has infamously been photographed throwing stones at Israeli soldiers, isn’t the issue. It isn’t even quoting a Palestinian, per se. What is problematic is the linking of a Palestinian with a quote about “exile.” It creates a sympathetic image of exiled Palestinians without any qualifications. It assumes one side in a longstanding conflict. After spending a year studying the nuances in language and writing, most of my students did not miss this inference.

Many of them had a fundamental problem with the question. As a teacher, I had a serious problem with it.

Political propaganda is something my students will certainly get used to, particularly as they head off to college campuses in the fall. But it has no place on a high-stakes exam that is supposed to be standardized. Not when they’ve worked hard all year studying literature and language.

They were blindsided and left with a choice: agree with the quote about Palestinian exile and write an essay, or disagree with the supposition that the Palestinians were torn from their “true home” and possibly throw their chances at a high score.

There isn’t anything “standardized” about that.

The College Board is particularly sensitive to language. This prompt could not have come out of nowhere. Politically motivated and particularly disturbing in its inclusion on the exam, it is a manipulation of facts and as such, it is a manipulation of education. In essence, this educational measure was a forced indoctrination of the College Board’s political beliefs.

I voiced my concern to the College Board and was told that they had not received any complaints. I called two more times and received the same reply. A Facebook group of close to 700 members has voiced its concerns. An article was written about this issue in a Jewish newspaper, The Forward, but still the College Board claims that they know nothing about the “problem.”

I shouldn’t be surprised. They are simply following the higher academia pied pipers down the path of bias and partiality. Literature and Composition: Reading, Writing, and Thinking, the Bedford St. Martin Press anthology just completed for the AP Literature course, contains two poems by Palestinians. Not one Israeli poet or author is quoted. Not even as an alternate view to Mahmoud Darwish’s “Identity Card”.

The College Board is notoriously politically correct. In fact, their dedication to being PC has gotten them in trouble over the years. But this time, they have chosen sides in a controversy that has offended a large portion of their testing audience. They have drawn lines, not in the sands of higher academia, but in the sandboxes of impressionable high school students.

Many in the academic world have pooh-poohed the controversy and called the protesting students overly sensitive or even racist. Interestingly, the same day as the exam, students in Brandies University were dismayed to learn that Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren was asked to give the commencement address. The student newspaper came out against the choice on the grounds that Oren is “a divisive and inappropriate choice” because “the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a hotly contested political issue, one that inspires students with serious positions on the topic to fervently defend and promote their views.”

I find it remarkable that University students cannot handle political controversy, but high school students are expected to “get over it.” Moreover, they are forced to actually agree with a statement they dispute, from a man who is so controversial that even his status as a Palestinian is questionable.

As an AP teacher, I have respectfully told my school that I am not comfortable teaching a course that has a clear political agenda. My students would be better served taking a literature course at their local university and graduating with actual college credit rather than relying on a politically biased exam to test their skills.

And while they will get their fair share of propaganda on campuses, at least the manipulationwill be blatant. There will be opportunity to debate.

A Tale of Two Movies About American Education--Which One Can You Trust?

2010-09-20T17:52:00.000-07:00

wo years ago producer Robert Compton put out 2 Million Minutes. a documentary about high school students in China, India and the US. The basic idea was that the foreign kids master their subjects, sacrifice to excel, and will out-produce us forever. Meanwhile, the American kids are lazy, never pushed to achieve real mastery, coddled by constant praise and inflated grades, more concerned with sports and dating.

Now along comes another American producer with a movie called A Race to Nowhere (you’ll see a discussion in the item below this one). I went to the website and looked at the trailer. Let me summarize the message from these people: American school kids are worked to death; this effort is mindless and soul-numbing; our culture is obsessed with tests, grades, performance, and standards, but this approach doesn’t work, as our kids end up ignorant and empty.

These visions are contradictory with each other. So we have to ask, what the heck is going on here?? Who is telling the truth??

Let’s note, first, that for the past 10 years the Education Establishment has been squealing steadily about No Child Left Behind. I’ve seen it in my local paper, month after month, year after year. Somebody is always complaining about teaching to the test, drill and kill, rote memorization, and the death of creativity in the schools. The wailing is so relentless, so repetitive, you just know it’s orchestrated. At least, that’s how I feel. (And “Race To Nowhere” seems to be part of that wailing. )

I just don’t trust any of it. Here’s why: ever since 1930 the Education Establishment was trying to purge academic content from the schools. The buzzwords by 1950 were “life-adjustment” and “real needs.” Translation: schools should be dumb and dumber. That’s the DNA in our Education Establishment. They don’t like facts, knowledge, basics, memorization, or mastery.

Here’s the whole nutty thing in one phrase: our educators--I mean the people at Teachers College, etc.--are very enthusiastic about social engineering but, in truth, ANTI-education. They are also deceitful. I suspect they try to manufacture evidence for their position by making schools more chaotic and oppressive than they need to be.

The first trick in the book, from the earliest grades forward, is NOT to teach foundational knowledge. Things that 100 years ago every sixth-grader knew are simply not taught. Ignorance is cumulative and galloping. By the time these kids get to high school, they have no background for learning science, history or anything else. How can you teach American history to children who don’t know the names of oceans, mountains, states and countries?

The second biggest trick in the book is to scorn and discredit memorization. Keep those heads empty. If there is anything in there, make sure it’s multicultural mush.

Finally, you’ve got whole classrooms full of teenagers who hardly know anything. Then you give them these complex, bottomless assignments such as compare Chinese and Roman culture in the year 100 A.D. What? These kids don’t know the name of the longest river in the United States and you want them to do what? Just think how frantic, overworked, stressed out, and hopeless these children will appear. Methinks it’s all theater. (Even if they write such a report, the knowledge learned will be fragmented and incoherent.)

Another favorite gimmick is to start the school day early, say at 7:30, which means that kids are getting out of bed around 6:00. They’re always going to be sleepy and cranky. Then some schools close at 1:30 creating a big problem for parents and under-utilizing the buildings. Again, no logic but plenty of melodrama.

The Education Establishment can say, oh, these poor kids, they work so hard!!! But we know that when these kids get to college, half of them need remedial education.

Final piece of the puzzle: I suspect that the much-hailed “Race To The Top“ is really a gimmick whereby the government throws money at the states until each one gives up any attempt at objective testing or standards. Authentic Assessment is code for not much assessment at all. 2 Million Minutes is the movie to trust.

Differences between Internet and Paper based TOEFL Test

2010-09-20T17:51:00.000-07:00

TOEFL test is undeniably the world's most popular English Language test. It is conducted at over 45000 administration site across 165 countries. The test so far has been taken by about 25 million students so far. The TOEFL is now conducted globally in two formats Internet Based Test (IBT) and Paper Based Test (PBT). It is very important to know the difference between the two tests in terms of pattern, structure and benefits according to individual applicant. StudyPlaces bring you a detailed comparison of the two tests to help you understand TOEFL better and shorten the distance between you and your dream college. Read on...

IBT is four hour long and PBT in 3 hour long. IBT requires integrated tasks and note taking while PBT does not require any of it. While listening, reading and writing are common to both the tests, IBT has speaking as the fourth section and PBT has Structure which is majorly based on grammar.

Due to their different structure, there is also a difference in the time duration of both the tests. While IBT is for four hours, the duration of paper based test is only 3 hours. Following is a section wise comparison for IBT and PBT tests:

READING

The Internet Based TOEFL exam can consist of 3 to 5 passages of around 700 words each. Each passage contains 12-14 questions often based on comparison, contrast and cause & effect. The Paper Based Test or PBT is always made up of 5 passages from academic texts which are around 250-350 words long. The ideal time for reading section IBT is 60-100 minutes and the score scale of section is from 0-30. While the ideal time for paper based text is around 55 minutes and the score scale is between 31 and 67.

LISTENING

The listening section in TOEFL IBT is made up of 4-6 lectures (some with classroom discussion) and each lecture is 3-5 minutes long with 6 questions. For PBT, there are 3-4 mini talks, each one around 60-90 seconds and with 3-5 questions. In the next phase of IBT there are 2-3 conversations of about 3 minutes and 5 questions each. While in PBT, there are 2-3 extended conversations of 60-90 seconds and 3-5 questions again. PBT has another set of questions. These are about 30-40 dialogues followed by 1 question each dialogue. The duration of these dialogues is not more than 15 seconds each. The time for IBT should be between 60 to 90 minutes and it has a score scale of 0-30. While the time for PBT should be around 30-40 minutes with a score scale of 31-68.

SPEAKING

As we mentioned before, there is no speaking section in Paper Based TOEFL. In IBT, there are Six tasks is speaking section. 2 of these are independent where candidate has to express an opinion on a familiar topic. The other 4 are integrated tasks where candidate is expected to speak on basis of what is read and heard. The candidate gets about 30 seconds to prepare and 1 minute to respond for each task. The total time allotted is 20 minutes. The score of speaking section in IBT is on a scale of 0-4 which is converted to a 0-30 score scale.

WRITING

In writing section of PBT, there is only one independent task (Test of Written English) to be 'written' in 30 minutes. In IBT, there are two tasks, one integrated (write on basis of what is read and heard) and one independent ( support and opinion on a topic). The time allotted is 20 and 30 minutes respectively. The score scale of 0-5 is converted into ratings of 0-30 score scale.

STRUCTURE (Grammar)

While grammar is evaluated in speaking and writing sections, there is no separate grammar section in Internet Based Test. In the Paper Based Test, there are a total of 40 questions to be done in 25 minutes and the score scale is between 31 and 68.

TO CONCLUDE...

The total score of IBT exam is from 0-120 and the total score of PBT exam is from 310-677. The IBT version scores on the fact that in it, a candidate gets performance feedback for each skill in the test taker report, which is missing in PBT.

Acquainted these facts about IBT and PBT, we hope now you are in a better and more informed state to prepare and appear for TOEFL.

Five Things to Know About the Transition from Homeschool to University

2010-09-20T17:50:00.001-07:00

Graduating from homeschool to university is an exciting time – and also a little intimidating. Here's the good news: plenty of homeschooled students have made the transition, and we know many times over that these students are more than up to the challenges of college.

Below are five things you should know about the transition from homeschool to university. Keeping these tips in mind can ease your mind and help you appreciate everything you've accomplished and all that's ahead of you.

1. Get Oriented
Chose a university with a variety of orientation events and training seminars for incoming students. From social events for freshmen to afternoon presentations on how to use the campus library system, such offerings are of value to all students, but of special value to homeschooled students, who may have less experience dealing with an institution.

2. Find Your College Family
Before college, homeschooled students enjoy a level of parental support and affirmation that traditional students don't often experience. So when homeschoolers leave the house and head to the university, building a new support network is critical.

The sooner homeschooled students make friends at college, the sooner they'll feel at ease in their new home. New students should look for a local church with a strong university fellowship, or join a campus Christian group. Or maybe they can find a good crew of friends in the dorm who enjoy eating dinner together every night. A strong feeling of fellowship makes all the difference.

But remember this: according to a study by Mary Beth Bolle, Roger D. Wessel, and Thalia M. Mulvihill published in the Journal of College Student Development, the more often homeschoolers call their families during the first year, the faster they will make new friends. So neither parents nor students should worry that severing the bond is the only way that a new college student can meet new people. Rather, the feelings of love and support give way to an appealing confidence in a young college student.

3. Trust Your Skills
Homeschooling teaches students how to budget their time and learn at their own pace. Also, homeschooled students tend to study in more personal, individualized ways than their private and public school peers.

So when homeschooled students arrive at the university, they should trust the skills they developed while learning at home. Because in college, success depends on time management, self-pacing, and study skills. Far from being less prepared for life away from mom and dad's supervision, homeschoolers know how to work on their own.
The skills learned in homeschooling are the very skills needed as a college student.

4. Get to Know Your Professors
One of the greatest challenges for the homeschooled graduate entering college is adjusting from the expectations of the parent or primary teacher to the expectations of professors.

During the first week of class, new students should visit all of their instructors during office hours. Ask professors about their expectations, what they look for on tests and in papers, how much they imagine students should study each week. Before the first assignment is due, ask to see a sample of a successful paper or project to see firsthand what they think is exemplary work.

5. Remember, It's the Same but Different
The homeschooled student doesn't make a transition all that different from the public or private school student. Both adjust to life away from home. Both discover how to responsibly manage their new freedom. Both learn to navigate the services and procedures of campus. And both must discern how to meet new expectations. When you arrive at your new school, look around at your classmates. Take peace in knowing they're experiencing the same feelings of excitement and intimidation you are.

Assessment is Continuous (Part 1 of 3)

2010-09-20T17:50:00.000-07:00

If you’re a teacher, parent, student (or former student), then you know the importance of assessment. Teachers strive to evaluate their students as fairly as possible, but it can be difficult to know what “fair” assessment is. Kim Hughes and Dominic Gullo wrote a fascinating and effectual article about assessment in the May 2010 issue of Young Children. The authors examined the importance of assessment, describing it as continuous,comprehensive, and integrative. This article is the first part in a series of three discussing the importance of assessment in preschools, kindergartens, and day care centers, as well as how The Adventurous Child’s outdoor play equipment will allow you to assess children’s developmental milestones.

Kim Hughes and Dominic from Young Children magazine wrote about assessment:

Assessment is a continuous process. Ideally, assessment describes the progress of a child’s learning not just after a single test but over time. There is no beginning, middle, or end to learning, so it follows that assessment of children’s learning should not be limited to measurement only at the end of an instructional unit (Hughes & Gullo, 2010, p. 57-8).

At The Adventurous Child, we understand that assessment isn’t only happening at the end of the semester or year. Teachers are constantly assessing their students’ progress. Assessment can also take many forms: it can be the teacher and his state-mandated report card, or it could be the day care center instructor monitoring her children’s social, emotional, cognitive, and physical milestones.

Equipment in an outdoor classroom can be built with state early standards in mind, which is useful for assessing children. For example, abalance beam will help develop balance and coordination through outdoor play. Moreover, the ability to step from narrow beam to narrow beam requires a greater skill level than just walking on a standard preschool balance beam. Watch your children’s understanding in gravity and enjoyment of motor and sensory experiences increase as they move from one beam to the next! Stepping pods are another great way to monitor children’s physical developmental milestones. While crossing the Playground Stepping Pods, a child’s brain, eyes and feet all have to work in accordance with one another to move from lower pods to higher pods and back, and to step from a small object to another small object. Aside from assessing development, this is fun, too!

Times Tables – Causes of Difficulties (6 – 8)

2010-09-20T17:49:00.000-07:00

The next three causes of difficulties in mastering the multiplication tables are considered in this article: the times tables from 11 to 20, poor memory of pupils, and the use of calculators.

Cause #6. Some educators suppose that pupils must learn the times tables up to 20 by 20. But several results (16 by 17, 19 by 18, etc.) are too difficult for kids to remember for a long time.

A few months ago I had written that I could not even imagine some explanation to justify this immoderate demand. Recently I have found one reason - the 12 times and 16 times tables are needed to help with inches and ounces. If so, I can not be a referee, because I have never dealt with inches and ounces at school.
If a math curriculum provides for wide use of inches and ounces, then, maybe, the demand for knowing by heart the 12 times and 16 times tables is justified. But what about the13 times tables or the 19 times tables, etc.? Even if a pupil has learnt them by heart, he/she will forget them soon because of the lack of use, and the time spent on the learning will turn out to be wasted in vain.

Cause #7. Many pupils have poor memory in view of the fact that the methods of teaching mathematics which are used at school do not encourage the development of their memorizing abilities.

Teachers and parents notice often that many children have weak memory now. They can not memorize simple math facts totally; they do not remember the rules which have been learnt a month or even a week ago; they can not recall the methods of solving tasks used recently, and so on. I suppose, the cause is connected with our methods of teaching math, and not only math, but other school subjects too. Now there is decreased emphasis on memorizing at school. We do not develop pupils' memory duly; we do not use proper exercises to drill their memorizing abilities. At the same time, most researchers agree that memorizing abilities play a significant role when kids think with numbers.
Learning multiplication affects different parts of the brain. Drilling the times tables uses one area, while learning multiplying methods uses others. According to Brian Butterworth, Professor of Cognitive Neuropsychology at University College London, anything that is memorized is consigned to the back (memory) part of the brain, freeing the front of the brain (the learning area) for more learning. So the practice of learning the times tables by rote (which is named unfashionable very often) turns out to be not as ineffective as it is considered. It looks like kids are "born with a start-up kit for numbers," Butterworth said, and have to practice, just as musicians do. “Processing is done at the rear as you become more experienced,” he explains. In other words, if pupils have memorized the times tables by heart (the back part of the brain), they become more experienced, and the front parts of the brains become more receptive for advanced learning.
I think that multi-digit operations, for instance, are important not only as a drill in calculations. During implementation of such operations pupil's memory is continuously working. The pupil recalls and uses simple math facts (the results of the times tables, for example), memorizes the intermediate results, performs simple mental computations, and, hereupon, his/her memory gets a good training.

Cause #8. Pupils are allowed to use calculators too early, and, instead of development of their independent computational abilities, their brains get a cripple wheel-chair for moving in the world of numbers.

The debates on the use of calculators at school have been lasting thirty years or even more. The main claim of the proponents is that calculators allow students to spend less time on calculations and more time on understanding and solving problems. They believe that the use of calculators helps students develop better number sense. Moreover, some of modern curriculums can tell you that basic arithmetical skills are not necessary now, because pupils can use calculators.
The opponents say that calculators produce students who can't perform basic tasks without calculator. One of their mantras is "Calculators were invented by vampires to suck your brains out."
I am not an opponent or a proponent of calculators. My opinion is closer to standpoint of those educators who consider calculators as useful devices only, but not as a mean of teaching math. Calculators can not be used to excuse pupils from learning the fundamentals. If pupils do not master mental arithmetic, they will also be poor users of calculators. To use a calculator effectively, a kid should learn to monitor and control the obtained results. This requires good developed skills in mental calculations.
I agree, there are many problems which are too difficult to be solved without the use of calculators, but we can postpone these problems until our pupils master mental computational skills totally, and only then the use of calculators may be begun. In the hands of an inexperienced kid a calculator ceases to be a useful device – it becomes a useless toy. Regrettably, we can often observe pupils who implement the same calculations with the use of calculator several times and, herewith, each time they receive different results. It seems that only one part of their brains is acting at that moment - the part which has charge of moving hands, and, if they need to add 15 and 10, their fingers stretch to the keys again, press them mechanically, and, without slightest delay, write in the copy-books a ridiculous result: 150 (or, maybe, 5 or 1.5).

Cool Science Experiments - The Way to get your kids excited about Science

2010-09-20T17:48:00.000-07:00

I love seeing kids excited about Science. Reading about Science, exploring the world outside, seeing a science video are ways in which children enjoy and become motivated about Science. And, through the years, that is what we have successfully done. However, recently it has been confirmed in my own mind, that a real and extremely valid way for kids to love Science and be keen to know more, is to provide them with time to play around with really cool Science experiments.

As a homeschooling family we have questioned, "What have been the things that we look back on with fond and treasured memories in Science?" It is either the hands-on nature walks and finding animals, or the fun in setting up and doing an experiment with great results. Many of the experiments my children have enjoyed have been totally unrelated to any science text we may have been following at the time. Most of the successful 'science' messes have sprung up from their own interest and trying to solve a question which they have posed themselves. (Like fixing a cheap toy and making it far better than it ever was.)

So, how do we encourage our children to play around with Science?

Ask them Questions

Firstly, ask your children questions without giving away the answer. If you are working through a text which has science experiments, present the question to them and don't read or let them read what sorts of results they should be getting from performing the experiment. Ask them questions during the experiment and after it - what do you think would happen if we changed x,y or z?
Ask them questions about life - about their physical environment or why things happen? Ask them the curious questions before they ask you. And then let them think and ponder about it. It does not mean that you should never give answers, but at the same time, don't rush in - give them time first. When answering, relate the answer to their current experience. And remember, it is okay to admit you don't know the answer - that can become an ideal time to discuss how to research and find answers we are looking for.

Let them Experiment

Let them play with all sorts of things around the home and experiment. Using a book or Science course will give you ideas about exciting science experiments. There are also a ton of books at the library that will interest your children. Recently, I discovered an online Science Curriculum which is full of really cool science experiments. You can see science experiments listed here.

The experiment instructions are also on video, which we all really love watching. Using all sorts of common household materials, and some that you need to buy, these experiments have amazed and excited my children. In fact, it has been the recent catalyst for a whole heap of hovercraft experiments which in turn has motivated my other children to fiddle with a toy gun changing it from a gun using air pressure to one using spring mechanics.

Be prepared, Grow a collection of Science Tools and Encourage Mess

If you want your children to experiment, you will need to accept and even encourage mess. Set up some boxes where you keep
all sorts of odds and ends which will come in handy for science experiments.

You will need materials like rubber bands, straws, pipe cleaners, paper clips, balloons, popsicle sticks.

You will also need tools and materials to bind items together like sticky tape, masking tape, hot glue gun, super glue, rope or string, stapeler and staples, hole punch, scissors.

Then you will also need to collect some clean junk - bottle tops, soda bottles, clean cans, bottle lids, icecream containers and cardboard boxes of all sizes.

Perhaps you can create a Science Corner - filled with experiment books and all the materials, and a table to work on.

Allow for mistakes

Every Science experiment does not need to work perfectly and make sure your children know that. When an experiment does not
work the way they had hoped, ask them, "What did you learn from that?" "What might you do differently next time?" "Why do you think that happened?"

Be Curious alongside of them, but don't take over

When your children are in the middle of a project or have completed it, they love to have a fan club. As they become more independent, they may not need you to set up an experiment or help them do it, but they really want to share their enthusiasm with an interested party - like their family and parents! So, let them inspire you - cheer them on as they set up an experiment - ask them questions so they can verbalize what is happening and why - problem solve with them - search out answers together, BUT don't take over.

As parents we have the tendency to ruin the child-led learning experience and make it a full-blown lesson. We want to run with their idea because we can see how it will make a wonderful 'unit study' and so we plan, get books, blah, blah, blah, and run off with all of our great ideas, but meanwhile our children have turned the corner, lost interest and moved on. It doesn't matter! Even if their interest in that topic may have been short lived, another experiment at a later date will most likely, help to reinforce the science concept.

So, do what you need to do to excite your children about Science?

Be curious, ask questions, encourage messes, grow a collection of Science Tools and find materials to help you. You can find some easy and totally 'cool' science experiments. as well as links to science experiments on video, plus two free Science Experiment Ebooks (A Science Experiment Guide usually valued at $25, and a Science Activity Manual and Video Guide valued at $30) , here - easy science experiments.

Foreign Language Classes as a Paradigm For Successful Instruction

2010-09-20T17:47:00.001-07:00

To put this article in perspective, I should mention that I write a lot of harsh articles about the counter-productive practices used in public education.

A few weeks ago I wondered: well, is there any good news? Let’s approach this thing from the other direction and ask: are there still classrooms that are sensibly conducted; are there still subjects that are taught in an intelligent way?

I thought about French (or other foreign languages). And I was immediately sure that this was the least contaminated area in American education. Here’s why:

I bet that most French classes are still taught today very much as French classes were taught 100 years ago. This is great news. It means there is a laboratory where we can see how it should be done.

And what are the main components of this successful formula? There are two. First, teachers and students are deeply respectful of the content being taught; everybody loves French and wants to master French. Second, language classes are completely transparent; everybody in and outside the class can view and evaluate the progress made by all the students.

Think of the contrast with a typical public school classroom, where content is disdained, and the proceedings are so murky that almost nobody knows what success looks like or whether anybody is achieving it.

I wrote up these reflections in an article titled “French Class As A Paradigm For The Perfect Way To Teach Everything.” (On AmericanChronicle.com.)

Trying to keep the article short, I left out some interesting points. Run through your own list of the most popular fads in American education. You would probably think of Constructivism, Self-Esteem, Multiculturalism, Cooperative Learning, Portfolios, No Memorization, and many more. Now imagine a good French teacher evaluating these gimmicks (as I think of them) for use in her French class:

Constructivism? This means the kids are going to invent French? Sure they are.

Cooperative Learning? Learning French is like eating lunch at a bistro: you have to do it for yourself. When you interact, you should interact with the whole class or the teacher. Kids shouldn’t be chatting with each other, whether in French or English.

Multiculturalism? That’s why they take French to begin with. They’ll learn the glory of French civilization. Are you saying we have to stir in some stuff from Africa, Asia and South America. Bizarre!

Self-Esteem? Where does this go? Kids will hear records, movies, television news. Can they pronounce it like that? Then they’re good. If they can’t, should the teacher say they’re good. Everyone knows it’s a lie.

Portfolios? Oh yes, students will learn French by cutting out pictures of the Eiffel Tower. Maybe this is a way to learn about France in elementary school. But it is clearly not the way to learn to speak French in middle or high school.

No Memorization? And you want to learn French? Does this actually work in history and science?? Well, it doesn't work in French. The whole point is to memorize French...

My point here is that thinking about French clarifies how useless all these things are. My thesis is that these gimmicks are harmful in history, biology and all other subjects. You don’t always feel it because the Education Establishment has woven them into the fabric and made you think it’s normal to have contempt for content, and murkiness and ignorance in every direction.

How to Simplify your Homeschool Curriculum

2010-09-20T17:47:00.000-07:00

When you begin to homeschool, you are keen to go to curriculum fairs and search out the perfect homeschool curriculum for your family. When you have been homeschooling for a few years, you may discover that your first choices did not work out that well, and you are on the hunt again. Five or so years later, you may be bored and keen to re-think
the homeschool curriculum and cater for your highschool students. Ten years later, you throw out so much of what you have bought and never used and keenly look to simplify your homeschool curriculum.

I am not sure if you subscribe to numerous homeschooling e-newsletters or ezines (perhaps you subscribe to mine!). I subscribe to a few to find out what homeschool curriculum is around and the see what other homeschoolers may be using. At times, I like to read reviews. However, as my email box is continually bombarded with new homeschool products and resources, I wonder if all the new products have helped our desire or vision for homeschooling. Are we more focussed on the task of homeschooling now with the
plethora of curriculum that is put before us or did those early veteran homeschoolers with limited resources capture the essence of homeschooling in a better way? Have we lost the vision?

Am I against homeschool curriculum? Absolutely not! I am very thankful to numerous publishers who have put time and thought into a product and are selling it to the homeschool market. Thankyou! It has made my task so much easier! However, I am concerned that some publishers are just viewing homeschooling as another market and we are steered into thinking that each child needs to have a textbook for each subject each year! Four children, eight subjects each year means literally 128 textbooks for every year of homeschooling. Most of these will be pricey and consumable.

"What are you doing for Language Arts?"
"DS has a Year 3 book for Spelling, Year 4 for grammar, Year 3 book for Literature Studies, Year 3 text for writing and Year 4 Book for Reading Comprehension. Yes, I am so glad that we can cater for his individual abilities!"

Is this the only way? Are you ready to simplify your homeschool curriculum and not fall into the marketing traps? How can that be done?

If you have spent any time on my website, you would know that I always refer to your educational and family goals. That is the first thing that you need to do now if you want to simplify your homeschool curriculum.

Decide on the big picture goals

Why are you homeschooling? For what purpose and to what end are you preparing and educating your children?
Let these answers drive the curriculum you choose to implement in your homeschool.

Decide why you want to teach a certain subject

Here you should pose questions to yourself which will help you formulate why you want to teach a certain subject.

This step can be quite simple. The most obvious answer as to why we want to teach reading, is, so that our children will read widely and understand what they read. True? How do we do that? Firstly, we set up an atmosphere that encourages reading. We read widely to them; We give them the tools so that they can read for themselves (phonics instruction when ready); We offer a range of quality reading resources - both fiction and non-fiction living books. We include reading in all subject areas and do not treat it as a separate subject, but instead, a skill to be developed in each subject.

The most obvious answer as to why we want to teach writing, is, so that our children can write appropriately for different audiences and in different situations. This includes writing notes, letters, essays, descriptive writing, fiction, non-fiction, responses, critical essays, essays of persuasion and more. (More writing skills can be found listed here: http://www.design-your-homeschool.com/teaching-writing-skills.html.

So, how would we do that? Does it mean we need a consumable textbook for each grade level? Probably not! If we want to teach our children to write, they need to write! - all types of forms of writing, across the curriculum. Begin by teaching them correct letter formation, writing words, copying sentences, narrations, copying their own oral narrations, essay writing. I would encourage you to get a book which explains different writing forms. I like the Write Source books and have chosen a few age-appropriate teaching texts. These are non-consumable and are written directly to the child.

If you would like to work on writing skills, you could choose an excerpt of literature, discuss the grammar, spelling, sentence structure, word usage and use it as a basis for copywork, and modeling.

Spelling can flow directly from their own writing and an individual spelling list can be created from their incorrect spelling. Spelling in context is far more effective. However, if you would like a Spelling Program, choose one which spans across the ages and years.

If your goal for history teaching is that they memorize dates, you would look for a program that just focusses on memorization of facts, but if your goal is that they gain an understanding of the time period and understand it in the context of a Biblical Worldview, you would look for a curriculum that helps you to do that.

The answer you give for each subject area, will help you choose appropriate homeschool curriculum which has the same purpose in mind.

Combine subjects and Skill Teaching

To simplify the curriculum, you need to look for ways to combine subjects. If you teach history in an integrated approach, you can teach history, geography, literature, art history, science history, music history and worldview (depending on the curriculum you choose to help you teach). As you integrate these subjects, you use and develop age-appropriate reading and writing skills. Writing can be done in the context of any subject area!

During a study on Ancient Egypt, you can read aloud an historical fiction novel such as "Mara, daughter of the Nile", create a salt map of Egypt; Read about the culture; Put the time period into the Biblical timeline; Copy the way the Ancient Egyptians decorated their tombs; Dress like an Egyptian, Hold a feast; Write a story/narration/summary/book report/essay from what was learned.

Combine ages

To simplify your homeschooling life, combine ages where you can. History can be taught successfully to the whole family at once, but the writing and reading assignments which are set will be different for the different ages. I expect more from my fifteen year old, than from my ten year old.

Some families like to begin their day with their 'together' work - such as Bible, Memorization, History/Science Readings, Art, and whatever they combine, and then continue the day in independent studies. Other families like to begin independently, and then finish working on projects together.

Make memorable learning experiences and products

Textbooks may have a place as educational tools, but the consumable workbooks that some children work in year after year, will not be treasured years after. However, a book which they have created, a scrapbook, a personal diary, an art collection, a poster, a photo journal, a project, notebook or portfolio will have an important place in the lives of your children for years. These will be kept as wonderful memories and as the pages which they have spent energy, heart and soul creating, are turned, the experiences and memories of that year of homeschooling will come back too! My children love looking back at what they have created, but have not had any attachment at all to a consumable workbook, which subsequently has been tossed in the bin.

All of Life is Education

To simplify your homeschooling, do not confine education to books. All of life is education even chore training, kitchen duties, house cleaning. Do not be anxious if you can not get to the books as much as you would like. Talk to your children, converse with them about all of life, as you sit down, as you get up and as you walk along the road. Remember there are phases of learning and different ages have different things you need to focus on. When a child is ready, they can work quite independently, structure their own days and learn things quickly. How much more effective would it be if we taught our children a difficult concept when they were truly ready, rather than to our timetable or the timetable of our text?

Remember that excursions, holidays, visiting the sick, providing a meal are opportunities for training and education.

Also, one needs to be reminded that you can not do it all. Be realistic in your own expectations.

Do not compare

Above all, do not compare yourself with others.

Use the homeschooling resources which conform with the goals you have for your children. If it is working for you and your
family, there is no need to change.

As you step out to simplify your homeschool curriculum, keep your own goals in mind and be driven by them, not by the
hype and advertising of numerous publishers.

Tips To Develop Your Child's Mental Skills

2010-09-20T17:46:00.000-07:00

When a children is exposed to new ideas or knowledge, their brain will absorb these like a sponge.

This is crucial to the child's development both mentally and emotionally. Having an environment favorable to learning access to everything that can help a child learn new things are crucial in his mental development.

Today, we are lucky that we have things that are available that can help us achieve this. Here are a few: 1. Books- It is undeniable that children of any age enjoy reading books especially those which have colorful pictures and pop-up pages. Even children who are barely a year old are very eager to listen to bedtime stories. You should encourage your kids to read often. Take them along with you when you go to the bookstore. And when it's time, start teaching him how to read. It is through reading that a child can have the opportunity to see the world from many different angles. Reading can give the child the chance to learn new things, explore the world without traveling and most of all, he can be able to explore different cultures. This is not only a fun but this is a very inexpensive hobby.

2. It's common to pregnant women to be advised by their friends or relatives to listen to classical music. This is because it has been reported that exposing children to classical music before birth will have a greater appreciation for this when they grow up. You can introduce different genres of music as your child grows and for those who can afford, enrolling your kids to piano, violin or guitar classes will help.

3. Children, just like some of us, don't enjoy numbers that much. You can include math in your kid's daily activities like making them count their toys or their fingers or anything that can be counted. The challenge is to make math fun to learn. If it is fun, the child will have a greater chance of remembering each lesson he learns.

4. CAD for Kids- Every child has an artist in him. Children have different methods in expressing art. They may scribble, draw, sculpt, write or paint. Parents should encourage the child so that his creativity will be enriched. You can do this by giving them the opportunity to express themselves. CAD is software used by design professionals such as architects and engineers. CAD for kids, however, was designed to help children see the artist in him and help him learn to express this artistry through drawing on a digital medium. Who knows? Your child could be the next big thing in architecture for the future generations. When you help your child develop his mental ability, you are not only helping him be excellent in academics.

It has been proven that kids who explore different learning avenues grow up to be a more secure person than those who are always left with nannies and spending the entire day watching TV.

INDIAN SCHOOLS ALL SET TO IMPLEMENT RFID AND GPS BASED TRACKING SYSTEM

2010-09-20T17:45:00.001-07:00

Indian schools are all set to implement a high-tech solution that will enable the school and parents to monitor students' entry into and exit from school buses.

Called RFID and GPS based tracking system; the state-of-the-art monitoring system will already been adopted by many renowned schools and the process of adoption is still going on.

"We have been working on this system for quite sometime so children can be monitored to ensure their security and safety," said the manager, Agnicient Technologies Pvt. Ltd.

A Noida (India) -based IT solutions provider, Agnicient Technologies Pvt. Ltd. will implement this automated Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) and GPS-based student tracking system in the school's buses. Agnicient Technologies Pvt. Ltd. uses a combination of RFID, GPS (Global Positioning System) and GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) technologies.

RFID is a type of automatic identification system whose purpose is to enable data to be transmitted by a portable device, called tag, which is read by an RFID reader and processed according to the needs of a particular application.

All the buses of schools will be equipped with RFID readers and each student will be given an RFID card (pictured) which incorporates GPS and GPRS technologies, with all the student's particulars printed on it.

Using the technology, the parents will get a text message every time the student gets into the bus and alights while going to the school from home and when returning. Alert messages will also be sent to the school authorities.

"This technology will give peace of mind not only to the parents but also to us," said School principal, adding parents had been consulted with regard to the scheme and they had given positive feedback.

"Parents were favorable with the system because ultimately it means security and safety for the students," he said, adding he could see that other schools could adopt it in the future.

Agnicient Technologies Pvt. Ltd. manager said the application software displays not only a real-time view of the location of the bus but also the student inside the bus at any point in time.

"The system can be configured and could be converted into a smart card in the future to have other functions," Manager explained, adding RFID readers could be installed in other locations in the school as needed to further ensure the safety of students.

He also said the text messages would be very specific. For instance, if a child is still inside the bus five minutes after the vehicle's engine is turned off, a text message will be sent to the school authorities.

It means that this system from Agnicient Technologies Pvt. Ltd. Will answer the question more prominently that “Its already 10 PM do you know where your child is???????????

But now every parent and school administration knows.

knowledge of the subject matter or the ability to relate with the students?

2010-09-20T17:45:00.000-07:00

"The mediocre teacher tells.The good teacher explains.The excellent teacher demonstrates.The great teacher inspires".A great quotation by William Arthur Ward which served as my guiding principle as a teacher.I remember when I was in kindergarten,everytime my friends would ask who will be our teacher in grade one, all they have to do is ask me. I knew all our teachers then. They were all nice and kind.That is why in my heart as a child the greatest profession is to be a teacher.

Every teacher should be equipped with the knolwledge of the subject matter and sharing that knolwledge is one of the primary goal of education. However,I disagree that it is more important than the teacher's abilitry to relate with the students. A teacher is not only a walking grammar book nor a human calculator but also a friend,a counsellor and a confidante roled into one.A teacher can be a good friend only if he can relate with the students. A teacher can be an effective counsellor if he can realte with the students. A teacher can be an excellent confidante if he can relate with the students.Therefore,the ability to relate with the students is very important.

A teacher has the ability to influence and effect students' life and the effect is infinite.In order to mold the students into whole rounded individuals,teachers should have the ability to relate with them and should understand that every individual is unique.Hence,the ability to relate with the students would help the teacher understands the students' individuality therefore he would know what effective approach he may use in the classroom.

To sum it up,every teacher acquired the knowledge they specialized through the courses they took but none of those courses taught them how to be a great teacher that inspires. Iam confident that although Iam still very young in the teaching arena and had not yet accomplished milestones as what others already achieved but Iam very confident that Iam a good teacher and I would be an inspiration to my students.I owe this to my teachers that inspired me to be one .Iam the teacher that Iam now not because of the academic knowledge they taught me but because they touched my heart. They did it because of their ability to relate with me.

Conspiracy? Why Would Anyone Think There Might Be A Conspiracy??

2010-09-20T17:44:00.000-07:00

I would argue that the biggest mystery in American history is how did the public schools get so messed up? Wouldn’t we like to answer that question?

The moment you start looking deeply into this mystery, you’re going to come up against a gang of ideologues led by John Dewey, the Father of American Education. He and his buddies were socialists. They believed in transforming the country, one way or another.

So look where we are. We are now staring into the teeth of a conspiracy.

A lot of people are upset by this word, but I don’t see any way to avoid it. Starting by 1910, every time Dewey and another professor at Teachers College had a meeting, they were plotting to insinuate their ideas into every public school in America. No Congress voted; no president approved. Dewey, who was probably a Fabian socialist, believed in working quietly from the inside; and that’s what he did.

I’m fascinated by the conspiracy question because I don’t think we can fix the public schools unless we first confront what actually happened to them. Here’s my short take: a lot of socialist educators said the heck with knowledge, facts and all that academic stuff; the big job is to turn children into future socialists. End of story.

However, if you do start talking about conspiracy, one common response is, no, no, we don’t need any crazy theories like that. The problems in the schools are clearly due to lazy parents, difficult kids, the Internet, drugs, sex, television, rock ‘n roll, etc., etc. Why go poking around in the past? Dewey’s been dead forever.

My sense is that many people are content to stay on the surface and to blame the victims. They don’t want to rock the status quo or blame any of their nominal allies. They don’t want to look at root causes.

Well, in this case, the political beliefs of our Education Establishment a century ago are the root causes. These people were basically what we would today call European socialists. Traditional, academic education was not their main priority. Once they committed to a secret agenda that the public did not ask for or approve of, then you are witnessing a conspiracy. What else can it be called?

Emotional Abuse In the Name of Academic Success in Indian Schools

2010-09-20T17:43:00.000-07:00

Child abuse is a very serious matter in western schools and any teacher, parent and school involved in child abuse have to face the law. In spite of serious steps we still see some cases of child abuse here and there, but majority of children are safe from abuse. This is not the case when it comes to developing and under developed countries.

Many countries didn’t address child abuse because of their culture and lack of awareness about the issue. Some countries officially announced child abuse as illegal, but they are not serious in enforcing the law. India is one of those countries that made child abuse illegal, especially in schools but doesn’t enforce the law strictly. This is causing an enormous physical and emotional damage to the younger children.

In recent years there is no more canning of students in schools, especially in private schools. Parents are not at all tolerating their children being canned or spanked by teachers. This is a very good sign of change, but abuse is still predominant at homes. However, there is a different form of abuse that is happening in every private school in the name of academic requirements and student success. I call it as “emotional abuse” What is so sad is educated parents are also supporting the idea without even noticing that the excessive workload on students is causing an enormous ‘emotional damage’ to the younger minds.

Private schools are very attractive to parents because they offer quality education to students, and they provide special coaching to students to prepare them for professional courses like Engineering, Medicine, and IIT (Indian Institute of Technology), highly reputed engineering and technology institute. While it is a good concept to prepare students to do well in school exams and also in entrance tests, it is sad that children are excessively burdened with school work and preparation.

For example, none of the private schools allow their students leave the school before 6 hours. They are at school almost 9 hours, instead of recommended 5 ½ hours. In addition to this many students attend before and after school tuitions, and still have to finish their 2-3 hour homework after all these sessions, irrespective their grade levels.

When I look at school children in India my heart bleeds. Parents want the best education for their children, which is fair enough, but they are not noticing that with an excessive workload children are at abuse. This abuse of children must be stopped for the welfare of their physical and psychological well being. Since schools want to offer what parents demand, parents must take initiative in stopping this kind of abuse. On the other hand, teachers and educational experts must also make an effort to educate parents about this type of bad practice in schools. This I call a step toward a positive change, and perhaps an indicator of developing nation.

Intrinsic Motivation and its effects on Student Academic Achievement

2010-09-20T17:42:00.000-07:00

Motivation 101

Schools across the nation are experiencing ever-increasing pressure to raise student test scores. In order to meet the growing demands of student achievement, educators at all levels have created and implemented strategic plans that focus on adult controlled variables such as professional development and the purchasing of computer-based learning programs. However, perhaps the most significant factor in determining student achievement is simply student motivation. Motivation is one of the most widely-studied areas in the field of psychology and its implications in the field of education are apparent. Psychologists have established two major concepts in regards to motivation: extrinsic and intrinsic.

Extrinsic motivation is described as an outside force influencing an individual’s behavior. These types of motivators can be effective in helping students meet short-term goals, but have a tendency to make students depended on rewards. Examples of such motivators include stickers, trophies, extended break, and even money. Students who perform for the sole purpose of being rewarded by an outside variable, often times lose focus on why overall academic success is important. For extrinsically motivated students, their goal is to be rewarded for their efforts, rather than the results of their efforts, the learning itself, act as the reward.

The other major motivational concept is intrinsic motivation. Psychologists explain intrinsic motivation as when an individual completes an activity for the basic enjoyment of the activity, or understands the underlying value of the activity. Students who are intrinsically motivated to complete tasks see the value in the activity itself and are not reliant on an outside reward for their efforts. There are many theories concerning the concept of intrinsic motivation, but one that has recently gained momentum is the Self-Determination Theory (SDT).

Implications of Intrinsic Motivation within the Classroom

The Self-Determination Theory was established by Ed Deci, professor of psychology at Rochester University. According to Deci, this theory represents a broad framework for the study of human motivation and personality (Deci, 1995). SDT identifies three specific areas which directly influence intrinsic motivation levels. These areas include: autonomy, competence and relatedness. Deci argues that these are essential needs of all learners and as the degree to which these needs are fulfilled, the degree of intrinsic motivation will also rise. Intrinsic motivation has the ability to foster lifelong learning skills (Messali, 2010). Deci agrees with the importance of intrinsic motivation and has consequently, created an instrument to evaluate student levels of intrinsic motivation: the Academic Self-Regulation Questionnaire (SRQ-A).

Being a school administrator myself, student motivational levels, and more importantly student achievement levels are a priority. The study of intrinsic motivation and its effects on academic achievement, naturally posed the question: Is there a positive correlation between student’s level of intrinsic motivation and their academic performance?

Study

In the spring of 2010 a study was completed that dealt with academic achievement and intrinsic motivation. Sixty 7^th and 8^th grade students from a rural middle school in Kentucky completed the SRQ-A evaluation tool. Students were randomly selected from two distinct groups: students with a 2.5 grade point average or below, and students with a 3.5 grade point average (GPA) or above. The purpose of the study was to determine if a positive correlation exists between the intrinsic motivational levels as determined by the SRQ-A tool and student academic achievement as evidenced by GPA.

Results

The average GPA of the 60 students was 2.72 and the average SRQ-A score was 13.9. The numbers changed dramatically when examining the two distinct subgroups. The top 30 students had an average GPA of 3.67 and a SRQ-A score of 17.8. The bottom 30 students had an average GPA of 1.76 and a SRQ-A score of 10.1. A correlation test was applied to the two variables to measure the relationship between intrinsic motivation and academic achievement. The results indicated a positive correlation of .891, meaning that there was an 89 percent chance that the variables of GPA and SRQ-A data were related. The data suggests a close relationship exists between academic achievement and intrinsic motivation.

In a field which values data-driven decisions, this study assuredly indicates that schools would benefit from focusing more time and energy on increasing student intrinsic motivation. In some respects, intrinsic motivation can be thought of as a precursor to increasing academic performance. Schools should make every effort to implement teaching strategies and create an atmosphere which fosters intrinsic motivation. As test score requirements rise with each passing year, educators must seek every advantage possible to raise student performance levels and according to this study, intrinsic motivation plays a significant role in our future success.

Teachers Educated Outside Canada

2010-09-20T17:41:00.001-07:00

I was a cum laude graduate in the Philippines and had finished my masters with honors. Since I had an impressive academic standing I was immediately hired as an English teacher in a public school which I consider as a blessing because in the Philippines it is almost impossible for newly graduates to be absorbed in a public school.

The experience was very challenging but after two years I gave up my profession. It was one of the toughest decision I made but when your salary is not even enough for your children to have the life you wanted. As a mother you have to do what you are supposed to do. I was working on my doctorate degree when I decided to quit and work as a caregiver in Canada. When I left I have so much hope in my heart that after two years I can be a teacher again but this time in a country of opportunity, Canada.

Canada has a two year program for live in caregivers that after a caregiver finished the two year contract , he or she will be eligible to apply for permanent residency. So I said to myself for two years I will be working as a live in nanny then I will apply for my permanent residency then I can be a teacher again because as a permanent resident I can work whatever work I want as long as Iam qualified. What a well thought plan I said.

Now that Iam almost done with my two year contact hence in the near future I would be applying for my permanent residency ,the excitement and hope for me were like ice cream that had been melted under the sun when I realized how hard it is to be accredited by the teachers college and that was not the only obstacle I have to face. The unemployment rate for teachers was overwhelming. I had read lots of articles about unemployed teachers especially in Ontario. Now, if teachers that were educated in Canada were having a hard time finding a job, where do teachers educated outside Canada belong? Do we have a chance in this country then? Are teachers like us have a future in Canada?I do not know what the future holds but all I can say is nothing can ever discourage me. I had already been in a long way just to simply give up. Giving up is not an option.

That is something that immigrants like me have, the determination and the courage to believe. I know for sure that it will be a rocky and tough road just to be certified in Canada not to mention how tough it would be to compete with other teachers for employment but all I can say is “once a teacher will always be a teacher“. Hence, I can already picture myself practicing my profession again. Iam born to be a teacher. Iam passionate about it. Iam well equipped and if it will take me changing nights into days I will do it for the glory of my profession.

Just thinking that I would be teaching again, touching student’s life give me strength to keep believing. Wondering whether teachers like me have a future or a chance in Canada does not really matter what matters is believing in myself and I believe I can. Everyone

has a chance. You and I can make it but on how we make it up there is an assignment we both need to do. Meanwhile as I send this article and start preparing dinner for the two kids I’m taking care of, I would like to leave this words to those teachers who are in the same situation, Believe and work hard is the key to success.

School assembly - Is it just a routine or a generative force?

2010-09-20T17:41:00.000-07:00

outines across schools - When we think of routines followed in schools, what comes to our mind first? I asked this question to a couple of my friends of various age groups. I have listed a few of their responses below

v Attendance taken by teachers

v Lunch prayers

v School assembly

v Switching classes

v Group learning activities

v Notebook correction

v Examinations

v Report card distribution

v Parent teacher meeting

v Homework submission

v Diary checking

I have also followed such routines as a student and as a teacher then. Now I go to schools as a consultant or sometimes as a trainer and witness such routines. As a student I was bored or sometimes scared of such routines. As a teacher I was questioning myself on these routines, also saw my students following such routines without any understanding.

For example, the assembly time…

Students stand in line hearing to prayer, news, a few verses from religious books/poems, instructions given to the students, talk by the school Principal or the teachers. Some students just close their eyes and stand, some try to play some pranks on others, some moving uneasily under hot Sun, some just looking at their wrist watches to find out the time left out for the assembly to come to an end. Many teachers stand there controlling students without paying attention to what’s happening in the assembly. When asked about assembly time to children, many of them were unable to say what was shared in the assembly and their responses were, “we stand in line and listen to what is told”. Nor the teachers were able to give a clear rationale as to why assembly is conducted.

I am not sure if schools are aware of the purpose of such routines. The dictionary meaning for the word ‘assembly’ is ‘a public facility to meet for open discussion’ or ‘a group of persons who are gathered together for a common purpose’.

If so, what is the common purpose for which the students gather everyday? Have Schools discovered such common purposes? What do they do to achieve them? Have they communicated it to the other stakeholders of Schools – teachers, parents and community? Do schools have some indicators to find out the value adds for children during assembly time?

Are school assemblies simply a routine to be followed or a generative force for schools to educate, empower and envision a pupil community who walk into the assembly hall with a well-defined purpose?

Kids Need Geography. So Why Won’t Public Schools Teach It?

2010-09-20T17:40:00.000-07:00

Geography, Queen of the Sciences. Yes, that’s what scholars used to call geography. Savor that title.

Queen of the Sciences. Is that not the highest praise you could bestow?

It sounds so strange, like something from Star Trek or Avatar. Geography important? This must be far away and in another galaxy.

There could hardly be a more dramatic contrast between what elite universities and brilliant minds thought about geography a thousand years ago, and what we think about it now.

Today we read about surveys where a third of the high school students in Arizona don’t know the name of the ocean on our East Coast. We see surveys where a big percentage of children can’t find major countries on a map, or even their own country.

None of this is the fault of the children, I’m certain. It’s the fault of our anti-intellectual Education Establishment, which for 100 years has waged war against foundational knowledge and basic facts.

What is more foundational and basic than geography? It is the starting point for the study of just about everything else: history, geology, archaeology, anthropology, environmental science, world trade, military history, early mathematics, etc.

Bottom line, teach geography, then more geography. It’s so easy to do. Every school room, and every child’s room, should have a map of the United States and as well a map of the world. At appropriate moments, adults can casually point and say, this is where you live, this is where the story takes place, this is where the flood occurred, this is where your uncle served in the military.

But why has the Education Establishment turned so completely against geography? Therein lies the history of 20th century American education. When you understand why the ideologues in charge belittled geography, you know why they battled against educational excellence in general.

In a shift toward lower standards, geography symbolized everything our so-called educators hated. Facts and precision, for two examples. Geography had to die.

Parenting tips for special needs kids with math disabilities

2010-09-20T17:39:00.001-07:00

How often has your child said, “I don’t like math!” “I just don’t get math!” I can’t learn math!”

Compared to reading, parents are more tolerant of problems in math. But math is very important in children’s lives and future careers. Many of the fastest growing occupations require math through algebra and even calculus.

Math is the most cumulative subject in school. Therefore, if your special needs child falls behind, he is particularly prone to developing “gaps” in knowledge that will haunt him in future years.

Elementary teachers do a poor job of teaching math

Math is the most poorly taught subject in school, particularly in elementary school. Research has proven that elementary teachers are uncomfortable with math—not only with teaching math, but with using mathematical principles in their own lives. In fact, many elementary teachers suffer from math anxiety themselves. Therefore, most elementary teachers are not good influences on the mathematical learning and attitudes of their students.

The combination of a teacher’s poor understanding of mathematical concepts, inadequate knowledge of teaching methods in mathematics, and limited knowledge about modifying teaching approaches to reach learners with atypical learning profiles can create dismal results for special needs children.

Tip #1

Stress to your children the importance of mathematics in their lives and careers.

Jobs in science and technology require a strong knowledge of math, and play a vital role in the advancements that give us our standard of living. Students who understand mathematics have dramatically more career opportunities than students whose math abilities are weak.

The level of math sophistication is much greater for today’s students

Because the nature of math education has morphed dramatically since most parents went to school, often parents find themselves beginning to struggle with math concepts when their child reaches middle school.

If a special needs child has struggles with math, parents need to face the harsh truth that they may not stand in the ideal position to help their child themselves, particularly when math becomes conceptually difficult. Due to the history in the US of poor math teaching, parents may have limited knowledge of mathematics and may not appreciate the central role math plays in the lives of today’s citizens.

Tip #2

If you are finding that you do not completely understand the work your child is bringing home, you should bow out of the “direct teaching” role. Direct teaching involves explaining concepts and procedures to your child, much as a teacher or tutor would. If you don’t fully understand the math you are teaching your child, you and your child run the risk of ingraining inaccurate beliefs and inefficient habits that can take months to undo.

Math anxiety is rampant in the U.S.

Did you know that at least 66% of adults have strong negative feelings about math! This is largely due to poor teaching adults received in school. These negative feelings are easy to communicate to your child. When children feel negative about a school subject, they unconsciously engage in self-sabotaging behaviors such as tuning out in class, not doing their homework, not asking questions when they don’t understand, and not practicing the concepts and skills enough to make them automatic.

This starts a vicious cycle of failure…as the student “back away” from learning math, he or she begins to fall behind in learning, and this creates even more dislike and avoidance. Eventually, what’s called learned helplessness sets in.

This enemy robs a child of their power. This beast whispers in a child’s ear phrases such as “you’re stupid” “you’ll never learn this stuff” “who are you kidding, you don’t need this” and the ever-present “this is boring”

These self-destructive messages tear at a child’s resolve, limit what he or she can learn, and reduce future educational and career options.

Tip #3

If you have negative feelings about math, make a conscious effort to change these feelings, and encourage your children to feel positively about math. Praise your child’s efforts, especially when the going is tough.

Math has to “make sense” in order for your child to want to learn it

Students respond to a program that puts understanding and enjoyment into math. They benefit from meaningful learning experiences that overcome frustration with “math that just doesn’t make sense.” They learn concepts and computation more quickly from real life situations.

Tip #4

Show children how math is used in their lives.

At stores, have them develop mental arithmetic skills by adding up the cost of a few items, by estimating sales tax, or by figuring out the cost of one can of soda from the price of a six-pack.

Put some fun into math by playing games while riding in the car or standing in line. For “Guess My Secret Identity,” give your child clues such as, “When divided by three, I’m equal to your age,” or “If you add 22 to me, I’m the length of a football field.” Be playful and creative and have your child make up riddles for you to solve.

“Summing in all up”

Special needs kids want to succeed in life and their parents want to do everything possible to help them succeed. If you are among the majority of parents who have negative attitudes toward math, feel your math skills are inadequate, and express your feelings opening to your child, I urge you to make every effort to eliminate these tendencies from your parenting repertoire!

Even if you have, up until now, suffered from the power-robbing demon of math self-doubt, your children can learn math skills and can appreciate the wonderful role math plays in their lives. But they can’t do it without your support and encouragement!

Back to school routines for special needs parents

2010-09-20T17:39:00.000-07:00

hildren with ADD, ADHD, autism, learning disabilities and other special needs often have difficulty with the social or academic aspects of school and they can be reluctant to return to the demands of the educational environment. Parents who build in support with routines established and maintained during the summer help their child feel safe and secure as they venture back to the world of school and friendships.

Begin the transition process early

At least a month in advance, show your child on the calendar when school will start. Include a little drawing of something that symbolizes fun to your child, such as a kickball or an artist’s palette—something that he connects with school.

Back plan from that date, writing into the calendar times to go shopping for clothes, school supplies, and a cool new book bag.

Also plan ahead for end of summer fun experiences such as a day at the beach or a barbeque with friends. Be sure your child knows these great events are coming up and looks forward to them.

In fact, start this year by establishing a special celebratory event as an end-of-the-summer-custom that will ease your child’s transition back to school in the years to come!

Remind your child of some favorite fall activities such as football games, apple picking and Halloween, and connect the return to school with these favorite activities.

While you’re looking at the calendar, be sure to show your child times for relaxing and being with family and friends, such as weekends and holidays.

Children need routines to be at their best

We often relax bedtimes and other routines during the summer, but August is the perfect month to begin the gradual transition back to the structure of academic life.

Start now to put more structure into the schedule—don’t wait until the week before school resumes, or your child will have much greater difficulty getting into the flow.

Make bedtime a bit earlier each week, until your child is going to bed at the “school bedtime” by the third week of August—children’s bodies need to make the new bedtime a habit in order to adapt and be ready for learning.

Be sure to have structured academic time each day. This can be a couple of hours in the morning or in the afternoon, but it’s important to give your child the structure of learning. Making academic gains is often more difficult for our kids—they can’t afford to fall behind. For tips on fun ways to practice academic skills (at any time of year!) download free audio files from my website.

Be sure to discuss the structure that will be in place for homework time when school starts. Before school starts is a good time to talk with your child about the homework rules of the house. It’s best to develop these rules in collaboration with your child so you both feel they are fair. Discuss homework time as part of your child’s job as a student.

It is vital to find a few moments everyday to give each of your children undivided special attention. Treat yourself and your child to exclusive, one-on-one time together each day. Develop joint interests and pursue them passionately.

Children with special needs can be fearful and uncomfortable with transitions, making it important for parents to give special consideration and care to the back to school season! With careful attention to routines and advance planning, our kids can handle transitions with calm security.

Children With ADHD Need to Learn How It Looks and Feels to Pay Attention

2010-09-20T17:38:00.000-07:00

How do people know you are paying attention? What do you look like when paying attention? How do you feel when you pay attention? All too often, students with ADD and ADHD can’t answer these questions.

In order to really get control of their ability to devote the right amount of attention to a task at the right time, students must understand how their body looks and feels when they pay attention.
The following role playing activity can encourage students’ insights by drawing their attention to the body language that illustrates strong listening.

Have your child play the role of the speaker, reading two or three paragraphs from a book or article. The parent will take the role of the listener. As you listen to what your child is reading, talk about the behaviors that show you are listening (see below for a list), and use a digital recorder to record your observations.

Play the recorder for your child and model each behavior again as it is mentioned on the recording. Draw your child’s attention to each aspect of your behavior that illustrates you are paying attention.
Now it’s time to change roles. You are the speaker and your child is the listener. Play the recorder and ask your child to demonstrate the behaviors he hears on the recording. Practice until your child shows he understands and can model the correct behaviors.

Make a list of attentive behaviors and post in your child’s room to refer to during homework and put a copy in the front of every notebook or binder.

How does attentive behavior look to others?

The following signs of good attention are easy to demonstrate and observe:

Eyes focused on the speaker and/or the visual material (such as textbook, board, etc.)
Sitting upright, feet on floor, hands on desk or in lap
Head level or tilted slightly to one side
Response or reaction is “on topic” and appropriate to the context (e.g., taking notes during note taking sessions)
Physical activity (hands or body) assists understanding (many students with ADHD use note-taking or doodling to increase attentiveness rather than keeping their hands and body completely still)