Parentalytics » Education

Brightest Stall, Low Achievers Gain

Parentalytics — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 01:29:16 +0000

A recent Wall Street Journal article focuses on the lack of support and resources for high achieving students. Stephany Banchero writes “A national focus on the lowest-achieving students has helped boost their academic performance, but it has left the country’s brightest young minds behind, prompting calls to rethink how schools teach top kids.” It seems that the 2002 No Child Left Behind law, which put intense focus on the lowest achievers is at the same time having an adverse effect on high achievers. Obviously, the two groups shouldn’t be pitted against each other and ‘investment’ in one should not come at the expense of the other.

A report by the National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC) calls for policy changes that don’t require additional spending, such as holding schools accountable for the scores of the top-fliers, training teachers to work with top-performing children, and making it easier for top-performing children to skip grades.

Here are some data points from the NAGC report:

Only 10% of U.S. students scored in the top-tier on the math and science portions of the 2009 Program for International Student Assessment, an international exam, behind many other developed countries, including South Korea, Finland and Canada.
Only 31 states require schools to identify gifted and talented children.
Twenty-six states mandate targeted services for top achievers and 23 set aside funding for such students.
Only eight states have policies that let smart kids skip grades, while the remaining leave it up to local school districts to decide.
Ten states prohibit students from entering Kindergarten early, and 24 leave such decisions to local districts.
23 states have no policies on academic acceleration strategies.
Eight states prohibit middle school students from enrolling in high school courses at the same time, and 24 states leave those decisions to districts.
A Wall Street Journal analysis of national elementary and high school reading, writing, math and social studies exams shows dramatic progress for the lowest achievers over the last two decades, especially after No Child Left Behind [that's great].
The scores of the brightest students have, for the most part, inched up marginally or stalled during the same time period.

Image source: hinnamsaisuy / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Interactive Play With Blocks Found to Facilitate Development of Spatial Vocabulary

Parentalytics — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 01:16:17 +0000

Source: Science News

I always thought there was something more to playing with blocks than simply the resulting creations of building, vehicles, figures, and every other kind of object stemming from the imagination of kids of all ages. Now, in a study published in Mind, Brain and Education, researchers at Temple’s Infant Lab found there are some very real benefits to playing with blocks. The researchers found that when playing with blocks under interactive conditions, children hear the kind of language that helps them think about space. Spatial skills are important for success in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) disciplines. ”This study gives parents news they can use. It shows that, rather than leaving kids alone with a preassembled activity, interactive play that draws out conversation is best at facilitating spatial development,” sail Nora Newcombe, co-director of Temple’s Infant Lab.

So there are benefits to young kids, but I wonder if there are also benefits to adults. I certainly take every opportunity to use my son’s Lego blocks – naturally under the guise of helping him. Apparently I’m on of many. According to the Wall Street Journal article For Some Grown-Ups, Playing With Legos Is a Serious Business, not only are there thousands of AFOLs (Adult Fan of Lego) worldwide, some of them make money building Lego sculptures. For me this activity is akin to what some may experience in yoga – focused, concentrated time where the mind does not wonder beyond the task at hand. It also happens to be fun family time and as I just learned facilitates the development of my child’s spatial vocabulary.

Read original article: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/11/111102161154.htm

Image source: renjith krishnan / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Performance Management for Teachers

Parentalytics — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 06:32:58 +0000

Bill and Melinda Gates write about the need to evaluate teacher performance in this Wall Street Journal article ‘Grading Teachers.’ According to a survey conducted by Scholastic and the Gates’ foundation, teachers are willing to be evaluated in a comprehensive way. Gates’ argue that nobody has been able to identify what makes for a great teacher. To change that, they have been working with over 3,000 teachers on a project called Measures of Effective Teaching (MET). The goal of the research is to figure out what makes teaching work and what measure may be predictive of student success. There is a saying that ‘you can’t manage what you can’t measure’, but that is exactly what’s going on. Current measures, such as an example from the article that says that 98% of school teachers are rated as “satisfactory”, are completely meaningless.

Teach for America is another organization that is researching means to quantify what makes a great teacher as was reported in the Jan/Feb 2010 issue of The Atlantic magazine.

Is Montessori Training Innovators?

Parentalytics — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 06:26:24 +0000

In his blog post Andrew McAfee (principal research scientist at the Center for Digital Business in the MIT Sloan School of Management) points out that Larry Page, Sergei Brin, Jeff Bezos, Jimmy Wales, Peter Drucker, Julia Child, David Blaine, and Sean “P. Diddy” Combs were all students in Montessori schools. He describes the principles behind the Montessori method of education and provides examples from his own experience in a Montessori school. Obviously, the type of education is not the only factor that determines if someone becomes an innovator – nature and all aspects of nurture matter. However, McAfee cites research that “indicates that Montessori methods work even for disadvantaged kids who Are randomly selected to attend.” More research is needed about this education method, but in the meantime more public schools have began to embrace it.