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Monday, October 28, 2019

Peter Greene: Is Big Brother Watching Your Child? Probably.

Is Big Brother Watching Your Child? Probably.

Is Big Brother Watching Your Child? Probably.
One of the current trends in education is the increasing surveillance of students.
The idea is not new. For several years now companies have sold versions of student monitoring as an educational tool. There were pitches for software that would read facial expressions and eye movement to determine if students were learning. Companies are lining up sales pitches for software that will measure the social and emotional well-being of students. Testing company NWEA is prepared to measure student engagement based on the speed with which they answer multiple choice questions. A Dutch company believes they can accomplish amazing things with audio surveillance of students.
These ed tech wonder-programs overpromise and underdeliver, but while they’ve been struggling to establish their education bona fides, surveillance companies have found another sales pitch for extending their reach into schools.
Florida has been on the cutting edge of this development. After the Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School murders, the legislature passed the Marjorie Stoneman Douglas School Public Safety Act. The part of the act that got attention at the time was the raising of the CONTINUE READING: Is Big Brother Watching Your Child? Probably.


Parent Coalition for Student Privacy - https://www.studentprivacymatters.org/

Chance the Rapper advocates for Chicago teachers as host of 'Saturday Night Live' - CNN

Chance the Rapper advocates for Chicago teachers as host of 'Saturday Night Live' - CNN

Chance the Rapper advocates for Chicago teachers as host of 'Saturday Night Live'

Chance the Rapper donned a red Chicago Teachers Union sweatshirt while hosting "Saturday Night Live" in a show of support to the teachers who have been on strike.
Chance the Rapper showed support for the Chicago teachers on strike by wearing a Chicago Teacher's Union Sweatshirt when he hosted "Saturday Night Live."
Chicago teachers have been on strike since October 17 demanding more support staff, higher raises and limits to class size. Chicago Public Schools is the third biggest school district in the country.
"To the teachers in Chicago, I know you guys are on strike right now. I fully support you," Chance said Saturday, adding the joke "I just wish that when I was in school my teachers had gone on a strike."
    Chance, who is from Chicago, also rapped about the city's nickname "The Second City" and how he's a fan of all things in second place.
    Michelle Gunderson, a public school teacher and trustee for the teacher's union, tweeted during SNL that the bargaining team was working but took a break to watch the rapper.
    "Your teachers thank you," Gunderson tweeted.
      Several SNL cast members were seen at the end of the show wearing Chicago Teachers Union T-shirts.
      This isn't the first time Chance has shown support for Chicago educators. In 2017, he donated $1 million to the city's public schools to support arts and enrichment programming.


      Chance the Rapper advocates for Chicago teachers as host of 'Saturday Night Live' - CNN


      Teachers Who Promote Creativity See Educational Results

      Teachers Who Promote Creativity See Educational Results

      Teachers Who Promote Creativity See Educational Results

      WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Creativity in the classroom goes hand in hand with exceptional student learning, according to a new Gallup study examining U.S. education. Specifically, K-12 teachers who frequently make assignments that require students to think creatively are much more likely than other teachers to observe higher-order cognitive skills in their students. These skills include:
      • engaging in problem-solving
      • demonstrating critical thinking
      • making connections between different subjects
      • having deep learning of subject matter
      • retaining what they have learned
      Classroom creativity also corresponds to more engaged, confident learners. Specifically, teachers who practice creativity in learning are much more likely than their counterparts who do not practice this to say their students often take responsibility for their own learning; feel confident about their ability to master difficult material; are willing to take risks; and display a strong desire to learn more about the subjects taught in school.
      These findings are based on a nationally representative online survey of 1,036 K-12 teachers conducted March 27-April 5, 2019, using the Gallup Panel. Additionally, for this study, Gallup conducted online surveys of 2,673 parents of students in grades K-12, as well as 853 students in grades six to 12.
      Teachers' use of creativity in learning was determined by the frequency with which they report allowing students to do each of the following: 1) choose what to learn in class; 2) try different ways of doing things, even if they might not work; 3) come up with their own ways to solve a problem; 4) discuss topics with no right or wrong answer; 5) create a project to express what they've learned; 6) work on a multidisciplinary project; 7) work on a project with real-world applications; and 8) publish or share projects with people outside the classroom.

      Creativity Plus Transformative Use of Technology May Reap Even Greater Benefits

      Gallup's new Creativity in Learning report finds that teachers who combine creativity with assignments that make transformative use of technology see even better student outcomes.
      Examples of transformative use of technology include using tablets or computers to create multimedia projects, conduct research, analyze information and create complex projects that cross disciplines.
      As the following chart shows, 85% of teachers who focus on creativity in learning and use technology in transformative ways say they often see their students engaging in problem solving. This drops to 75% among teachers who foster classroom creativity but use technology in more substitutional ways (replacing paper and pencil with tablets or computers to do the same tasks) and to 50% among teachers who maximize neither creativity nor transformative technology in the classroom.
      Similar gaps by teaching method are seen in teachers' ratings of their students for CONTINUE READING: Teachers Who Promote Creativity See Educational Results

      Many parents are confused about how public education now works in New Orleans, report says | Education | nola.com

      Many parents are confused about how public education now works in New Orleans, report says | Education | nola.com

      Many parents are confused about how public education now works in New Orleans, report says

      The last decade has produced tectonic shifts to education in New Orleans, the first major city in the U.S. without any traditional public schools run by a central office. But even though decentralization of the local school system has been years in the making, many parents still don't understand how it all works.
      That's according to "What Do Parents Think?," a report from the Cowen Institute, an education research and innovation center based at Tulane University.
      The report also found that nearly half of public school parents surveyed think the local school system has neither improved nor gotten worse since charter schools came on the scene.
      With the charter movement comes school choice, which means more options for families. But it also means a complex lottery application system, long commutes across town for many students, decentralized services like bus transportation, and frequent leadership turnover as charters are revoked for reasons ranging from poor fiscal management to failing grades from the state.
      "I completely understand why parents would be confused," said Vincent Rossmeier, the Cowen Institute's director of policy. 
      The institute has conducted similar surveys each year since 2007 to gauge the public's opinion on school governance and performance. While the questions have remained similar, this year's poll was exclusively given to parents and guardians of New Orleans public school students, excluding residents who have no ties to public education, Rossmeier said.
      The survey results, released this month, show that parents care deeply about public education. Of the 500 parents surveyed, education outranked crime, infrastructure, the economy and CONTINUE READING: Many parents are confused about how public education now works in New Orleans, report says | Education | nola.com


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      Education Policy and Black Teachers: Perspectives on Race, Policy, and Teacher Diversity

      This article examines interview responses from prominent education researchers who were asked to consider the role of major educational policies in the underrepresentation of Black teachers in public schools. Participants considered policies related to accountability and market reforms including testing, school choice and charter schools, and alternative teacher education. Although participants a
      Being better-looking raised children's learning outcomes

      Complete report This study uses data from the 11 waves of the U.S. Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development 1991-2005, following children from ages 6 months through 15 years. Observers rated videos of them, obtaining measures of looks at each age. Given their family income, parents’ education, race/ethnicity and gender, being better-looking raised subsequent changes in measurements of obje
      Sibling Spillovers in Educational Achievement

      This study finds positive spillover effects from an older to a younger child in less affluent families and negative spillover effects from a younger to an older child in more affluent families. These results are consistent with direct spillovers dominating in economically disadvantaged families and with parental reinforcement in more affluent families.
      Addressing Capacity Shortfalls at California’s Universities

      Complete report Reforms undertaken by California in the past decade to improve academic performance and prepare students to attend four-year universities are paying off: More students are graduating from high school than ever before, and more of them have completed college preparatory classes. In addition, growing numbers of community college students are earning the credits needed to transfer an
      Influences of executive function, language comprehension, and fluency on reading comprehension

      The purpose of this study was to examine the extent to which children’s executive function predicted their reading comprehension performance. Participants were approximately 18,000 kindergartners in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 2010–2011. The results suggest that individual differences in reading comprehension were influenced by variations in executive function. C
      Charter school penetration and growth played a role in increasing socioeconomic segregation within districts

      This study examines the effect of the expansion of charter schools on socioeconomic segregation in American public education. Using a district-level panel data set from 1998 to 2015, the authors describe and model changes in within-district segregation of low-income students, proxied by free-lunch eligibility (FLE). The authors show that the segregation of FLE students from non-FLE students incre
      Creativity in Learning

      is a new report based on Gallup's study of how creativity in learning fosters problem-solving and critical-thinking skills, especially when supported by transformative technology use. Report findings include: Teacher, parent and student perspectives on what U.S. schools need for students to succeed The impact and outcomes of creativity in learning The supports and barriers to making creativity a
      The US and the High Price of Child Care: An Examination of a Broken System

      More than 12 million children younger than age five are in some form of child care in the United States. provides a review of how child care is an issue for all of us and shares our policy recommendations for supporting families and child care providers. Also featured are: An overview of the child care ecosystem and how each member is affected by unaffordable child care How Child Care Resource a
      Early Childhood Essentials framework

      The presents the essential skills and competencies children should acquire before they enter kindergarten and the related skills and competencies early childhood educators (early educators) must cultivate in order to provide high-quality early learning experiences that will set all children on the path to success in school and in life. It provides a baseline of knowledge to help decisions-makers
      Teacher Leadership Opportunities

      A new analysis by the National Council on Teacher Quality demonstrates that more states are recognizing the importance of leadership roles for teachers, signaling that state policy is reflecting teachers’ voices. Thirty-five states now have formal teacher leadership policies, with a net of eight additional states adopting formal teacher leadership policies in the past two years. This statewide re


      Education plans, book review, Trump's Head start proposal

      A presidential candidate drops a new education plan. A new book details the practices of one of the nation’s highest performing — and polarizing — charter school networks. And then all of edu-Twitter is afire with hot takes, long 
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