Colleges realize that traditional efforts to retain freshmen—and all students until they graduate—need to improve. Below are new ideas on how this problem can be turned around:
Texting, Surfing, Studying?
CAROL’S SUMMARY:
Often to the angst of their parents, many children spend time texting, watching television, listening to music and surfing the Internet –all while studying for tests and doing their homework. Based on the article below, the big question is: Can young people who have grown up with new technologies multitask more effectively than older generations, specifically their parents? “Kids are spending an extraordinary amount of time with media,†says Dr. Victor C. Strasburger, a professor at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine. “We don’t really know what they pay attention to, what they don’t. We don’t know how it impacts their school performance, whether it impacts their school performance.â€
While studies have shown a decrease in productivity among adults who multi-task, some scientists surmise that the elasticity of the brain of children and teens might be more adept at these kind of mental gymnastics, but the verdict is still out. “The literature looking at media and its impact on attentional skills is just in its infancy,†said Renee Hobbs, a professor of mass media and communications at Temple University and a specialist in media literacy.
Dr. Dimitri Christakis, a professor of pediatrics at the University of Washington mentions a digital divide, previously between the rich and poor, but now between parents and their children. “Parents are digital immigrants,” says Dr. Christakis. “We’re fairly clueless about the digital world they inhabit.†According to Harris M. Cooper, a professor of psychology at Duke, “One of the things that homework is supposed to do for us is help us generalize where we feel we can learn.†Harris offers this advice to parents: “If they’re doing well [in school], permitting them to have some choice permits them to find their own style.â€
Regardless of media’s impact on studying, students need the requisite skills to process and absorb new information in order to thrive in school, career and life. LifeBound’s Study Skills book is an effective tool for helping students develop their own best strategies for learning. To view a sample chapter and lesson plan, visit www.lifebound.com and click on books. To request a review copy of this book, send an email to contact@lifebound.com or call toll free 1.877.737.8510.
ARTICLE:
New York Times
October 13, 2009
18 and Under
Texting, Surfing, Studying?
By PERRI KLASS, M.D.
Certain subjects make self-righteous parents of us all: our children thinking they are doing homework when in reality the text messages are flying, the Internet browsers are open, the video is streaming, the loud rock music is blaring on the turntable — oh, wait, sorry, that last one was our parents complaining about us.
Heaven knows, I understand the feeling. And not just as a pediatrician. I have my own children — a high school student, a college student and a medical student — and I know the drill.
But if you ask the experts, they are pretty unanimous that we don’t know much.
“The literature looking at media and its impact on attentional skills is just in its infancy,†said Renee Hobbs, a professor of mass media and communications at Temple University and a specialist in media literacy.
To view this entire article visit www.nytimes.com
Successful Schools Avoid False Choices
Today’s commentary published in Education Week by Karen Chenowith, senior writer for the Education Trust Foundation, contains broad and profound implications supported by brain-based learning and cognitive research. In her observations of successful schools who work with disadvantaged students, she writes: “they based their teaching not on a preset philosophy, or a set of program prescriptions, but on what would best help their students learn” (italics mine). People often say that everyone can learn. Yet the reality is that everyone does learn. As Prentice Hall author, Dr. Lynn Quitman Troyka, writes in the introduction of some of her books, “Thinking is not something you choose to do any more than a fish chooses to live in water. To be human is to think.”
Indeed, the brain’s ability to act and react in ever-changing ways is known, in the scientific community, as “neuroplasticity.†This special characteristic allows the brain’s estimated 100 billion nerve cells, also called neurons (aka “gray matterâ€), to constantly create new pathways for neural communication and to rearrange existing ones throughout life, thereby aiding the processes of learning, memory, and adaptation through experience. Without the ability to make such functional changes, our brains would not be able to memorize a new fact or master a new skill, form a new memory or adjust to a new environment. The brain’s plasticity is the reason it can heal itself after stroke or injury and overcome addictions. According to Dr. Norman Doidge, author of The Brain That Changes Itself: “The brain is not ‘hardwired’ from birth, but holds a remarkable lifelong power to change—a phenomenon called ‘plasticity.’ Positive or negative environments, exercise, nurture, learning, and other experiences continue to change the brain throughout life.”
Which brings us back to today’s article. The reason a flexible approach to teaching works– as this article implies–is because students aren’t a one size fits all, nor is their intelligence fixed at birth. Everyone’s brain is unique and malleable for endless learning possibilities. As the principal at Imperial High School, Lisa Tabarez, in the Imperial Valley of California, quoted in this article said: “Every single student who comes before us has the ability to learn. As educators, we must accept our daily responsibility of taking students, at whatever level and place in their lives they may be, and helping them to learn—to learn how to become productive, contributing members of our society through the opportunity of education.â€
- How can we ignite and nurture student minds and emotions to transform learning?
- How can the revolutionary findings in the field of neuroplasticity direct us to new possibilities for ‘rewiring’ the brain to help overcome learning disorders and to enhance memory, learning, and achievement in all learners?
- What are the implications of cognitive research for student success and transition programs, which seek to address opportunities and vulnerabilities during adolescence?
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
ARTICLE:
Education Week
Published in Print: October 14, 2009
Commentary
Successful Schools Avoid False Choices
By Karin Chenoweth
I know I am not the first to notice that education as a field tends to get whipsawed between what seem like incompatible alternatives: We can teach phonics or surround children with literature; we can teach skills or content; we can prepare students for the workforce or for college; we can provide schools that are equitable or schools that are excellent. The examples are endless.
For the past five years, I have been examining schools that have, for the most part, sidestepped these battles. They are schools I have visited as part of my work for the Education Trust, a Washington-based nonprofit organization. The job involves identifying and writing about schools with significant populations of low-income children and children of color that are also high-achieving or rapidly improving. In many of these, just about all of the students meet or exceed state standards, and achievement gaps are narrow, or sometimes nonexistent.
To view this entire article visit www.edweek.org
CHS lifts ban on social networking sites
CAROL’S SUMMARY:
As the article below illustrates, educators are discovering that social networking sites, such as Facebook and MySpace, have applications that extend beyond an individual’s circle of family and friends to the classroom. Although not cited in the article, following are observations from a landmark study by researchers at the University of Minnesota, released on July 8, 2008:
94 percent use the Internet, 82 percent go online at home and 77 percent had a profile on a social networking site. When asked what they learn from using social networking sites, the students listed technology skills as the top lesson, followed by creativity, being open to new or diverse views and communication skills. Data was collected over six months from students, ages 16 to 18, in thirteen urban high schools across the Midwest. Beyond the surveyed students, a follow-up, randomly selected subset was asked questions about their Internet activity as they navigated MySpace.
“What we found was that students using social networking sites are actually practicing the kinds of 21st century skills we want them to develop to be successful today,” said Christine Greenhow, a learning technologies researcher in the university’s College of Education and Human Development and principal investigator of the study. “Students are developing a positive attitude towards using technology systems, editing and customizing content and thinking about online design and layout. They’re also sharing creative original work like poetry and film and practicing safe and responsible use of information and technology. The Web sites offer tremendous educational potential.”
“Now that we know what skills students are learning and what experiences they’re being exposed to, we can help foster and extend those skills,” said Greenhow. “As educators, we always want to know where our students are coming from and what they’re interested in so we can build on that in our teaching. By understanding how students may be positively using these networking technologies in their daily lives and where they as yet unrecognized educational opportunities are, we can help make schools even more relevant, connected and meaningful to kids.” Based on these findings, here are questions to consider:
How can we incorporate the educational benefits of social networking into student success and transition programs, which may offer a more flexible teaching format than core curriculum classes?
How can we create a 21st century global education to include project-based learning, which connects social networking to curriculum standards?
How can we teach students to become online leaders and digital citizens by using technology in appropriate, respectful ways?
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ARTICLE via ASCD feed–BIMSMARCK, ND
Century Star
by Jordan Stalk
What started out as a way to keep in touch with family and friends has how grown to be much more. Social networking has been absorbed into the lives and daily needs of the average person.
To view the entire article visit
http://bit.ly/7ZPz8
Study Finds High Rate of Imprisonment Among Drop Outs
CAROL’S SUMMARY:
A new study from Northeastern University cites that students who quit high school are 3.5 times more likely to become incarcerated in their lifetimes than high school graduates. The research also estimates a national cost of $292,000 per drop out, based on lost tax revenues and government assisted amenities and programs.The director of the report, Andrew Sum, told New York Times reporter, Sam Dillon:
“We’re trying to show what it means to be a dropout in the 21st century United States,†said Sum. “It’s one of the country’s costliest problems. The unemployment, the incarceration rates — it’s scary.â€
Among African-American males who drop out of high school–which is estimated at 40 percent–the situation is worse. Of those, 72 percent are jobless, and the likelihood of being incarcerated jumps to 60 percent, according to statistics from Ronald B. Mincy, professor of social work at Columbia University and editor of “Black Males Left Behind” (Urban Institute Press, 2006).
One obvious question is why do students drop out? While it’s often assumed that students do so because they can’t keep up with the academic load, recent studies paint a different picture. For example, in a joint project by the Civic Enterprises and Peter D. Hart Research Associates for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation,”The Silent Epidemic: Perspectives of High School Dropouts,” the study found:
Nearly half of the former students – 47 percent – quit not because of the academic challenge, but because they found classes uninteresting. “These young people reported being bored and disengaged from high school,” the report said. “Almost as many (42 percent) spent time with people who were not interested in school. These were among the top reasons selected by those with high GPAs and by those who said they were motivated to work hard.”
An even larger number of students – 69 percent – said they were not motivated or inspired to work hard. In fact, two-thirds said they would have worked harder had it been required of them.
These findings underscore why schools must challenge students and prepare them for the different transitions they face. Freshmen year, in particular, is a precarious time in student’s academic future because students typically drop out the summer between their freshmen and sophomore years. If we don’t engage them at this entry point, we may lose them for the rest of their lives at great cost to the student and to society.
1) As educators, how can we provide a more supportive academic environment at school and at home that would improve students’ chances of remaining in school? What needs to be different—with students, parents, teachers, counselors and administrators—for that to happen?
2) How can we continuously challenge teachers so that they are always learning, growing and contributing to their own passion-level? If a teacher isn’t motivated, students aren’t likely to be either.
3) How can we help students discover their gifts and talents so that they can envision the crucial role that education plays in their future? When students know what they are good at, research shows they will persevere.
4) What can we do to increase awareness of the value of student success and transition programs in fostering engagement and relevance in the classroom? How can we start these classes in fifth grade so that we avoid these costly patterns from the get-go?
ARTICLE
New York Times
by Sam Dillon
On any given day, about one in every 10 young male high school dropouts is in jail or juvenile detention, compared with one in 35 young male high school graduates, according to a new study of the effects of dropping out of school in an America where demand for low-skill workers is plunging.
To view the entire article visit
http://bit.ly/MIGHi
Attorney General, in Chicago, Pledges Youth Violence Effort
CAROL’S SUMMARY
Chicago has been in the national and international news lately not only for losing the bid as host city for the 2016 summer Olympics, but for the tragic beating death of high school honor student, Derrion Albert, who was caught between two rival gangs on his way home from school on the city’s southside. Derrion’s murder is sparking a national conversation about youth violence. Many people compare the incident, which has been viewed by millions over YouTube, to Emmett Till’s brutal killing at the hands of white supremacists in 1955, when his open-casket funeral on television sparked the American Civil Rights Movement. Derrion was the third adolescent killed this school year. Since the beginning of 2007, close to 70 students have been murdered mostly on their way to or from school.
As the New York Times article below points out, youth violence isn’t only a Chicago problem; “it’s an American problem,” said Attorney General Eric H. Holder in his meeting yesterday with U.S. Secretary Arne Duncan, the former superintendent of Chicago Public Schools. As an admission counselor (who asked to not be identified) from another local high school on Chicago’s westside neighborhood said, “We’ve always heard of kids fighting kids, but they lived to tell about it. That’s not true anymore.”
Addressing such serious issues like youth violence requires support from many facets of society, including our school system. When former New York Times science journalist and co-founder of the Yale University Child Studies Center (now at the University of Illinois at Chicago) Daniel Goleman first coined the term emotional intelligence, he cited strong emotions as holding the potential for promoting great good in society as well as terrible atrocities, because some people use violence to release feelings of anger or frustration. LifeBound’s People Smarts for Teenagers program works with adolescents on developing self-awareness, as well as managing strong emotions. The principal at Skyway Elementary School in Colorado Springs, Patrick Webster, who used the People Smarts resources last spring told his counselor: “We have had ZERO disciplinary referrals from 6th grade this year, which is phenomenal.” In a typical time frame they would have received half a dozen by now.
As educators we need to cultivate a vision and establish a comprehensive game plan like they have in Colorado Springs for helping school communities curb violence and assess measurable goals. In addition to our resources for students and faculty, LifeBound provides programs for parents on coaching skills and other strategies so that they learn how to model the kinds of attitudes and behaviors they want their children to emulate. Children absorb how parents deal with a job layoff and other traumatic and stressful life events, and supporting parents in their roles is another effective way to stem the escalation of violence among school-aged children and teens.
For a review copy of People Smarts and more information about our programs for parents, please contact us by calling toll free 1.877.737.8510 or emailing contact@lifebound.com, and we’ll be glad to help you. Together we can answer the call to make a profound difference in our school communities.
ARTICLE:
Attorney General, in Chicago, Pledges Youth Violence Effort
By SUSAN SAULNY
Published: October 7, 2009
CHICAGO — Trying to spark what he called “a sustained national conversation†about youth violence, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. met with public school students and elected officials here Wednesday, pledging a heightened crime-fighting commitment from the federal government toward vulnerable children.
Mr. Holder, joined by Education Secretary Arne Duncan, the former head of the local public schools, said the Obama administration was dedicated to being a full partner in the fight against youth violence, in part, because “too many of today’s victims become tomorrow’s criminals.â€
To view this entire article visit www.nytimes.com
Online Schools Test Students’ Social Skills
CAROL’S SUMMARY:
As online high schools increase in popularity nationwide, educators and psychologists are seeking to address a potential pitfall for students of digital learning: social isolation. The upside of these programs is that students can work at their own pace and delve more deeply into subject matter than a traditional classroom might allow. The downside is that some students feel lonely and see they’re missing out on proms, homecoming football games, and other social venues customary to high school life. According to the article below, approximately 100,000 of the 12 million high-school-age students in the U.S. attend 438 online schools full-time, up from 30,000 five years ago, based on research by the International Association for K-12 Learning Online, a Washington nonprofit representing online schools. The article reports:
“Online schools appeal to gifted students who want to work at their own pace, students who dropped out of traditional high schools or who are taught at home by their families, students who travel with globe-trotting parents and teens with competitive outside pursuits like ballet, tennis or gymnastics. Many more students take some classes online, while attending traditional schools.”
Of the home-schooled population, approximately 1.1 million students (2.2 percent of the school-age population) were being educated at home in 2003, compared to an estimated 850,000 students in 1999, says the Department of Education. The National Home Education Research Institute concludes that the homeschooling population is increasing each year. The institute estimates that the number of chilÂdren being homeschooled grows 7 percent to 12 percent per year.
1) How can programs like LifeBound’s People Smarts for Teenagers be introduced to home school populations, as well as more fully integrated into conventional school curriculum so that all students develop the requisite social and emotional skills to thrive in our global world?
2) What can local high schools do to help connect online learners with their student populations?
3) How can online programs foster human connection so that students don’t become lonely or miss out on the socialization important to teen and young adult development?
ARTICLE
Wall Street Journal
By Paul Glader
PALO ALTO, Calif. — Tatyana Ray has more than 1,200 Facebook friends, sends 600 texts a month and participated in four student clubs during the year and a half she attended high school online, through a program affiliated with Stanford University.
Although top public and private high schools abound in her affluent area of Palo Alto, the 17-year-old originally applied to the online school because she and her parents thought it looked both interesting and challenging. She enjoyed the academics but eventually found she was lonely. She missed the human connection of proms, football games and in-person, rather than online, gossip. The digital clubs for fashion, books and cooking involved Web cams and blogs and felt more like work than fun.
To view the entire article visit
http://bit.ly/Ybt7J
Skills Set Drafted For Students Nationwide
CAROL’S SUMMARY:
The Common Core State Standards Initiative is a joint effort by the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices (NGA Center) and the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) in partnership with Achieve, ACT and the College Board. Governors and state commissioners of education from across the country have created a state-led process to develop a common core of state standards in English-language arts and mathematics for grades K-12.
According to their web site at www.corestandards.org, these standards will be research and evidence-based, internationally benchmarked, aligned with college and work expectations and include rigorous content and skills. The NGA Center and CCSSO are coordinating the process to develop these standards and have created an expert validation committee to provide an independent review of the common core state standards, as well as the grade-by-grade standards.
In math, the goal is to have students “solve systems of equations; find and interpret rates of change; and adapt probability models to solve real-world problems.†In English and language arts, the goal is to have students be able to “analyze how word choices shape the meaning and tone of a text; develop a style and tone of writing appropriate to a task and audience; and respond constructively to advance a discussion and build on the input of others.â€
There is still much work and research to be done if a national consensus on education is to be adopted, but one thing is certain: Students from the United States need to be prepared to compete in the global marketplace among students from Asia and Europe. With education reform inevitable, here are some important questions to consider:
· Could standards be developed by type of student? College-bound, career-school bound?
· Could we identify skills that will make students successful no matter what path they choose and emphasize cross-curricular learning?
· How can we better work with the initiatives such as the 21century skills, which foster critical thinking, technological literacy, cross-curricular core-competencies and global knowledge needed to compete with counterparts world-wide?
Whatever standards are developed, the voice of Higher Education and employers will need to be heard. Learning needs to be linked to success in the working world. To fuel our economy of the future, students will need knowledge, skills and the initiative to tackle the toughest problems with confidence, competence and faith that the solutions—while difficult and elusive—can and will come with a quality mindset and follow-through.
ARTICLE:
Skills Set Drafted For Students Nationwide
By Nick Anderson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Experts convened by the nation’s governors and state schools chiefs on Monday proposed a set of math and English skills students should master before high school graduation, the first step toward what advocates hope will become common standards driving instruction in classrooms from coast to coast.
The proposal aims to lift expectations for students beyond current standards, which vary widely from state to state, and establish for the first time an effective national consensus on core academic goals to help the United States keep pace with global competitors. Such agreement has proven elusive in the past because of a long tradition of local control over standards, testing and curriculum.
To view this entire article visit www.washingtonpost.com
Schools Official in New Jersey Orders Plan to Combat Hazing
CAROL’S SUMMARY:
Bullying can take many forms (verbal, psychological and physical), and administrators for a district in New Jersey will participate in sensitivity training and devise a plan within the next two months to combat hazing at Millburn High School. These actions were ordered by the president of the Board of Education after a board meeting revealed that another school year started off with hazing of freshman girls by seniors that included being pushed into lockers, having whistles blown in their faces and the release of a “slut list.â€
In the past, some seniors have been expelled, but Principal William Miron said that no student will be disciplined without proof. Board member Debra Fox remembers being hazed as a freshman and suggested punishing the entire female population of the senior class in order to get the names, saying “because no one is going to take the rap for someone else.†One parent was applauded when she said parents must also take responsibility when their children acted like bullies.
Tragically, every day thousands of students wake up afraid to go to school. As educators, we have an inherent responsibility to make our schools safe, bully-free cultures because every child and teenager has the civil right to learn unhindered. Because parents, teachers, and other adults don’t always see it, they may not understand how extreme bullying can get. According to the web site, www.kidshealth.org, two of the main reasons people are bullied are because of appearance and social status. Bullies pick on the people they think don’t fit in, maybe because of how they look, how they act (for example, kids who are shy and withdrawn), their race or religion, or because the bullies think their target may be gay or lesbian.
Hazing is a form of bullying and often the result of underdeveloped emotional intelligence, or people smarts, such as empathy and compassion. LifeBound’s book, People Smarts for Teenagers: Becoming Emotionally Intelligent, helps students develop these skills by boosting self-awareness and empathy. Every chapter includes a real-life story about another teenager who overcame their own obstacles to emotional well-being. This past spring, a progressive district in Colorado Springs used this book with all of their sixth graders and observed a spike in test scores, which they attribute to this program. Learning is linked to emotions and when we teach children and teens emotional and social skills we give them another advantage in the learning process. For more information about this and other student success and transition resources, visit www.lifebound.com
ARTICLE:
The New York Times
September 22, 2009
Schools Official in New Jersey Orders Plan to Combat Hazing
By TINA KELLEY
MILLBURN, N.J. — The president of the Millburn Board of Education said on Monday night that district administrators would have to undergo sensitivity training and ordered them to come up with a plan within the next two months to address the longstanding tradition of hazing at Millburn High School.
The action came at a board meeting that drew about 50 parents and lasted more than three hours.
“This is not acceptable behavior; it will not be tolerated,†the board president, Noreen Brunini, said of the most recent hazing, which included the distribution of an annual “slut list†of incoming freshman girls. “This is the end of this.â€
To view this entire article visit www.nytimes.com
Panel Urges Attention to Adolescent Literacy
CAROL’S SUMMARY:
In the article below, Carnegie Corporation of New York’s Council on Advancing Adolescent Literacy experts gathered to discuss their final report in which they spent five years examining the need for better reading and writing skills among students in grades 4 through 12. The experts stressed the importance of action at each state level, suggesting reading and writing standards be set high and state tests be set to the levels of the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Statewide data systems for all literacy, as well as, including adolescent-literacy training in state teacher-certification programs were considered of high importance.
Catherine Snow, a Harvard University education professor who chaired the Carnegie panel, said an important tenement of the report is to have the nation’s entire education system recognize that the traditional literacy approach (focusing on building skills at a young age) doesn’t help students with “complex vocabulary, composition, and concepts they encounter in high school.†Another panelist, Michael Kamil, a Stanford University education professor, said that the sole responsibility for teaching adolescent literacy cannot rest on the shoulders of English teachers. Literacy needs to be taught across the disciplines in each subject of middle and high school, because at these higher levels, literacy comprehension, and therefore instruction, is grounded within the content.
Students learn best when they can draw comparisons and connections between information they already know and the new knowledge presented to them. That is why in Critical and Creative Thinking for Teenagers, the basics of problem solving are presented to high schoolers within profiles about innovators in medicine, science, math, finance, art, music and English to relate their previous knowledge of the core subject to the new critical and creative thinking skills taught within the book. There is no reason why adolescent literacy cannot also be strengthened if it were taught within the core subjects.
How can literacy instruction be integrated into the curriculum of other subjects?
What can districts do to ban together and mastermind effective statewide standards and data systems to measure and track outcomes?
What role does emotional intelligence play in students’ ability to build a strong literacy foundation for cross-curriculum learning?
ARTICLE:
EducationWeek
Published Online: September 15, 2009
Panel Urges Attention to Adolescent Literacy
By Catherine Gewertz
Washington
Leading figures in education policy, academia, and philanthropy called today for a “re-engineering†of the nation’s approach to adolescent literacy, saying nothing short of a “literacy revolution†is needed to keep students in school and ensure that they are able to learn the complex material that college and careers will demand of them.
The experts gathered to discuss and draw attention to the release of the final report of the Carnegie Corporation of New York’s Council on Advancing Adolescent Literacy, which has spent five years examining the need for better reading and writing skills among students in grades 4 through 12. Vartan Gregorian, the president of the foundation, urged audience members to “be good ancestors†to future generations by pushing for sound adolescent-literacy policy and practice, given the pivotal role such skills play in young people’s lives, and the low level of skill students have shown on national tests.
To view this entire article visit www.edweek.org