Latest News and Comment from Education

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

How I’m Helping My Students Try To Avoid The “Summer Slide” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…


How I’m Helping My Students Try To Avoid The “Summer Slide” | Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…:

How I’m Helping My Students Try To Avoid The “Summer Slide”

I’ve previously posted The Best Resources On The “Summer Slide” and how I’m going to make that information into a lesson for my students.
I’m also doing more than that — at least with students in my Beginning/Intermediate ESL class.
Our inner city school of nearly 2,000 students used to regularly have 1,300 students attending summer school each year. The vast majority of those students were not there to make-up for failed classes. They were there for advancement and enrichment and, to be honest, because they didn’t have anything else to do. Obviously, many of our students don’t have the summer options that middle-and-upper-income families have.
Because of budget cuts, this year and for the past few years we’ve had closer to between 60 and 100 students in


This Week’s “Round-Up” Of Good Posts On Education Policy Issues

Here’s a compilation of recent good posts on education policy:
Education and the income gap: Darling-Hammond appeared in The Washington Post. I’m adding it to The Best Places To Learn What Impact A Teacher & Outside Factors Have On Student Achievement.
TFA Teachers: How Long Do They Teach? Why Do They Leave? is from Education Week. I’m adding it to The Best Posts & Articles Raising Concerns About Teach For America.
Computer Scoring Open Ended History Questions is by Tom Hoffman.
Robot Eyes As Good As Humans When Grading Essays is a strange title for an NPR interview with NY Times


My Thoughts On Today’s NY Times Article About The “Digital Divide”

Today’s New York Times has a fairly lengthy article headlined Wasting Time Is New Divide in Digital Era.
It’s thesis is that young people are spending too much time on screens, including television and computers. In addition, with the increased availability and affordability of computers and online access, low-income children are spending more time online for entertainment instead of education than middle and higher income kids.
I wonder if they may be making mountain out of a molehill. The numbers they used that painted alarming statistics about the increase of screentime from 1999 to the present did not seem very reliable. If someone was watching TV and surfing the Web at the same time for the same one hour, they would count that as two hours. I


“Research-based practices forge strong family and community partnerships”

Research-based practices forge strong family and community partnerships is a new report from the organization Leaning Forward.
It’s in their newsletter, Tools For Learning Schools.
I wouldn’t say there’s anything particularly new in it to people with family engagement, but it does provide some good summaries, particularly on Joyce Epstein’s work.


This Week’s Parent Teacher Chat On Twitter

Guest Post by Joe Mazza
Upcoming #PTchat: Parents & Teachers Discuss Ways to Combat Summer Learning Loss

Wed., 5/30 9PM EDT
  
As another school year comes to a close, we begin another summer. This week’s Parent-Teacher Chat (#PTchat) on Twitter takes a look at all the way we can keep the learning going through the summer.
Last year, The Rand Corporation released “Making Summer Count,” a comprehensive look at summer learning loss in children, grades 1-8.  The report states that children, on average, lose one month of knowledge and skills