A new report by LFA and Grunwald Associates, with support from AT&T, examines how parents perceive the value of mobile devices, how they see their children using mobiles, and what they think of the possibilities for mobile learning.
Standards that Matter
Blog Entries
Phi Delta Kappa, International has just released the results of the 40th Annual Phi Delta Kappa/Gallup Poll of the Public's Attitudes Toward the Public Schools. It makes for fascinating reading.
The Big Headlines
The press will no doubt focus on the following findings: ...
Harvard professor and cultural critic Henry Louis Gates, Jr. captured some 25 million viewers with his riveting PBS documentary series, African American Lives (WNET). Using genealogical research and DNA science, Gates traces the family history of 19 famous African Americans. What results is a rich and moving account of the African American experience.
Gates recently spoke with Public School Insights about the documentary and a remarkable idea it inspired in him: To use genealogy and DNA research to revolutionize the way we teach history and science to African American Students. Now, Gates is working with other educators to create an "ancestry-based curriculum" in K-12 schools. Many African American students know little about their ancestors. Given the chance to examine their own DNA and family histories, Gates argues, they are likely to become more engaged in their history and science classes. As they rescue their forebears from the anonymity imposed by slavery, students begin to understand their own place in the American story.
If the stories in African American Lives are any guide, they're in for an experience.
The Significance of African American Lives
PUBLIC SCHOOL INSIGHTS: Tell me about "African-American Lives" and its significance, in your view.
GATES: Wow, that's a big question. [Laughing] I got the idea in the middle of the night to do a series for public television that would combine genealogy and ancestry tracing through genetics. I've been fascinated with my own family tree since I was 10 years old - that's the year that my grandfather died. ...
Child advocates have worried in recent years that recess has been disappearing from public school calendars as schools focus more heavily on academics--primarily math and reading. Is this concern warranted? According to the National School Boards Association's Center for Public Education, the answer is yes and no.
In its recent analysis of research on the fate of recess, the Center reaches the following conclusion: "To borrow from Mark Twain, reports of recess's death seem to have been grossly exaggerated.... Even so, the pressure on schools to find more instructional time is real, and it seems to be leading many districts to shave minutes from the recess time they provide. In addition, children who attend high-poverty, high-minority, or urban schools are far more likely than their peers in other locations to get no recess at all-a definite 'recess gap' that commands our attention." ...
In the Washington Post today, Jay Matthews offers a thought-provoking challenge to uncritical purveyors of critical thinking programs. "As your most-hated high school teacher often told you," Matthews writes, "you have to buckle down and learn the content of a subject--facts, concepts and trends--before the maxims of critical thinking taught in these feverishly-marketed courses will do you much good."
To some extent, Matthews is states the obvious. If you don't have anything to think about, critical thinking will likely elude you. Critical faculties atrophy when starved of content knowledge. (Unfortunately, too many low-income students must in fact survive on an academic starvation diet when basic reading and mathematics crowd out important content areas.) ...
In a Washington Post editorial today, Robert Samuelson reacts to author Bill Bishop's caution in his new book, The Big Sort: namely, that Americans are increasingly segregating themselves by social and political values into so-called "lifestyle ghettos." Samuelson soft-pedals Bishop's claim that this trend is exacerbating political polarization and endangering our long-held commitment e pluribus unum, but other commentators lend Bishop's concern greater weight. ...
Last week's Sunday New York Times published an interesting article on the benefits and perils of online reading. Taking on a topic often framed as a debate between dour supporters of books and wild-eyed proponents of technology, the Times leaves the impression that the book advocates and internet enthusiasts are both mostly right.
Truly proficient on-line readers are creative, critical, and self-directed brokers of information from many different sources, so schools that do not include forms of on-line reading in their curricula miss an important opportunity to prepare students for the 21st century. To quote the Times, "Reading five Web sites, an op-ed article and a blog post or two, experts say, can be more enriching than reading one book." True, but the value of such reading depends on the websites--and the book. It also depends on the reader's ability to ask the right questions, separate wheat from chaff, analyze information and construct arguments. Young, 21st-century readers still need some old-fashioned guidance. ...
In case you hadn't noticed at first glance, the soberly-dressed person at right is Richard Simmons. (The hair is admittedly a giveaway.) He donned the suit and the earnest expression yesterday to testify before the House Education and Labor Committee about the need to increase time for physical education in public schools.
According to the Washington Post, the affair was less formal than the photograph suggests: The irrepressible Simmons reportedly kissed onlookers, photographers and even Congressmen as he entered the hearing room, and he lent the hearing the atmosphere of "a support group" where lawmakers traded stories of weight loss. ...
Last Sunday the Dallas Morning news published a disquieting article about students' results on the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS). Here are a few excerpts:
Students are passing the ninth-, 10th- and 11th-grade language arts TAKS at higher rates than ever. Some even post near-perfect passing rates.
But on the short-response portion, fewer than half of North Texas students pass.
...
Testing experts say exams should include sections that expose such academic cracks.
But rarely do Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills tests ask students to do more than fill in a bubble.
...
The past month has witnessed many skirmishes over the reliability of rising state test scores as measures of some high-profile education reforms' success. At issue are: ...
A few weeks ago, we were excited to learn that Crook County Middle School's Michael Geisen, a forester-turned-science teacher, was named by the Council of Chief State School Officers as the 2008 National Teacher of the Year. Selected for an innovative teaching approach that focuses on the individual needs of students, school/community connections, and collaboration with his colleagues, Geisen is now spending a year traveling nationally and internationally as a spokesperson for education.
He recently spoke with Public School Insights about a variety of topics including what he hopes to achieve as teacher of the year, his belief in the need to redefine "basic skills" and "intelligence," the support teachers receive (or should receive), and how he personalizes teaching to foster a life-long love of learning while increasing standardized test scores.
Listen to 5 minutes of highlights from our interview (or read through the transcript below): ...
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