Roots of Learning » Trends in Schools

The Merits of Single Sex Education

admin — Tue, 22 Jun 2010 02:30:17 +0000

I just read an article from the Washington Post describing how a middle school in Northern Virginia will be piloting a voluntary program wherein students will attend single sex classes in the core academic areas. I laud this effort. Many students, both boys and girls, will – in my opinion – likely flourish in this new setting. I hope that this growing trend in K-12 education keeps growing. Unlike some critics of the idea, I do not believe that single-sex instruction leads to a confirmation of stereotypes. Rather, teachers are less able to ‘gloss’ over divergent learning styles. If a teacher knows that she is facing a class of all girls, or all boys, each day, then she will tailor her teaching to their styles. This brings up my only concern with this program. I hope that those in charge who have made the decision to go forward with the single-sex instruction have not neglected to invest in appropriate training for the teachers to prepare them for the different methods that they will need to employ. I hope to hear more examples of this, and will update my blog as I find them. For those reading this, if you know of a program such as this, please let me know!

Heather

Performance Assessments Would Address Basic Knowledge and Skills as well as “21st C. Skills”

admin — Wed, 26 May 2010 19:52:34 +0000

I don’t know when they began calling critical thinking skills “21st Century Skills” – I used them and taught them plenty during the 20th century, but no matter. It seems to be the educational buzzword of the day. And if the trend results in teachers and parents focusing more on communication, collaboration, critical thinking, problem solving, innovation and use of technology, then I’m all for it. One thing that articles and reports focusing on 21st century skills – as well as those focusing on No Child Left Behind and state assessments – tend to neglect is the concept of performance assessment. Performance assessments can help school divisions, private schools, and homeschooling parents determine not only their students’ mastery of basic knowledge and skills, but also their capacity with those skills deemed “21st century skills.” However, we rarely hear of performance assessment being used in a widespread manner.

It is not a new invention, either. In the mid to late 1990′s, some states used performance assessment measures to assess every student for all types of skills and capacities. These assessments can, however, be costly. Perhaps that is the issue during this time of ever tightening budgets. A performance assessment cannot be run through a scantron for scoring. It requires manpower. So while we may not see widespread performance assessment in the near future, we can all encourage the educators that we work with to use them in their own classrooms for formal and informal assessment of students. Before the end of the 21st century, they’ll thank you.

US History Lessons in the Age of New Media

admin — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 23:45:57 +0000

Engaging the student, utilizing knowledge of various senses, taking advantage of free online tools, my son’s fourth grade social studies teacher did all these things when she showed the kids the following in class today:

Word Processing and Formatting for Youngsters?

admin — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 20:00:56 +0000

I was talking with a parent of a fifth grader who is attending our local “gifted zone center” program. Her daughter was assigned a paper that needed to be two pages, double spaced. Her daughter does not type well, so this assignment was taking a while. At one juncture, the parent noticed that her daughter was not double-spacing the paper. “Oh yes, I am,” responded the student. “I am putting two spaces between each word.” Clearly, this student had not learned about basic formatting in a word processing program.

So this got me thinking – there are plenty of great typing programs out there for students, such as the BBC’s Dance Mat Typing, but are there resources (books, software programs, etc.?) that help teach word processing conventions and formatting ‘rules?’ If you know of any, I’d love to hear from you! If I come across any, I may do some field-testing and review them for you here.

- Heather

Lesson Plan from ReadWriteThink: Email Writing Conventions vs. Traditional Letter Writing

admin — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 03:28:54 +0000

“In this lesson, students explore the differences between e-mail and letter writing by contrasting and identifying different forms, and experimenting with their own e-mail and letter compositions.” Check it out at ReadWriteThink*.

* ReadWriteThink is a website from the International Reading Association and the National Council of Teachers of English. It’s purpose is to provide educators and students with access to the highest quality practices and resources in reading and language arts education.

Enjoy!

- Heather

Year-Round Schooling and Curriculum Centered Around “Big Ideas”

admin — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:22:19 +0000

There are two things I like about the recent Washington Post Editorial I read about year-round schooling. Firstly, I like the concept itself, for some pretty simple reasons:

Kids learn more and forget less.
Parents who work can cope a little better.
There is no reason (not educationally, not practically) in today’s world for the school calendar that most of us currently keep.

Secondly, the school that the author refers to in the article uses its intercessions to focus curriculum around “big ideas.” If you are asking “what is the big idea?” then you’re not alone. Basically, curriculum focused this way allows an interdisciplinary inquiry into larger issues that affect all areas of ‘traditional’ curriculum.

One example of a “big idea” might be something like “What is the relationship between governments and innovation?” Such a broad question can encompass history, science, literature, art, mathematics, civics, and much more. It also leaves the student, after delving into various aspects of the “big idea,” with a firm impression of (in this case) those relationships throughout history.

This type of inquiry allows students to make evaluations and to become thinkers for our future – by “our” here I mean civilization.

- Heather

Uh-Oh…

admin — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 01:35:44 +0000

Do you think your state’s standards and standardized testing is bad now? Just you wait…. “Forty-six states and the District of Columbia today will announce an effort to craft a single vision for what children should learn each year from kindergarten through high school graduation, an unprecedented step toward a uniform definition of success in American schools. ” – The Washington Post

While this, on the surface, sounds reasonable, I believe that it will only lead to the following in America’s public schools:

a further watering down of the curriculum as ‘baseline’ standards get treated as the ‘be-all and end-all’
a further beaurocratization of public schools (as if it wasn’t bad enough)
an expansion of testing that does not take into account the real needs of real students in 21st century America.

I sure do hope I’m wrong on this one.

- Heather

It Takes a Village (and some Collaboration)

admin — Fri, 29 May 2009 01:55:42 +0000

I love this. It has all the elements of a great learning experience:

“Advanced science students at Zionsville High School extracted and analyzed dolphin DNA this month in an ongoing collaboration with the Indianapolis Zoo, the University of Indianapolis and other research facilities.” IndyStar.com

Purpose – check. Relevance – check. Inquiry – check. Intrinsically motivating – check. I only hope that I can foster these types of experiences for my own kids and as a partner with the museums I consult with about education.

Revolution, or Spinning our Wheels?

admin — Wed, 06 May 2009 00:50:32 +0000

I was reading a blog post by Jerry Mintz of the Alternative Education Resource Organization. He had traveled recently to Washington and had the opportunity to ask Education Secretary Arne Duncan whether No Child Left Behind would be scrapped. The answer: ”I don’t know. But the name No Child Left Behind is toxic. We will at least change the name!”

Needless to say, this is anything but reassuring. I used to be a program specialist at the U.S. Department of Education (early 90′s) and I will be the first to make what is, in Washington, a political suicide declaration: the U.S. Department of Education (not just NCLB) should be scrapped. With all the money saved by not maintaining several huge office buildings full of paper pushers who do nothing to augment education in this country, we could work wonders with alternative schooling options, charter schools, experiential education facilities, immersion schools, alternative and special education options for those who need or choose them, and much much more.

Oh, and when I was at ED, it was called “Beyond the Year 2000″ and then it was called “Goals 2000″ – it had another name or two before NCLB, but as Barack Obama has himself state, you can put ‘lipstick’ on a pig…. and let me tell you – there is some pork at the USDOE!

- Heather

Experiential Learning Resources from UC Davis

admin — Sat, 02 May 2009 20:52:21 +0000

“Tell me and I forget, show me and I may remember, involve me and I understand.” – Chinese Proverb

Constructivist learning, experiential learning, whatever you want to call good teaching where the student is intimately involved as meaning-maker is desirable for the development of true understanding. UC Davis has some wonderful resources for teachers, home schoolers, or anyone involved in children’s learning.

Check out these three training modules from UC Davis.