Nice article from a new teacher who is figuring out what works to motivate his kindergarten students - The Kindergarten Lesson from the Washington Post.

The author finds when he can build on internal motivation that is the best way, rather than rely on external motivation.

My personal experience as a substitute teacher, was I saw many teachers who were successful with external rewards. It does take a lot of work to manage these correctly, but they are a physical symbol of success that can be very helpful. Just as writing a child's name on the board with check marks for some ages can help. Other ages and schools, a stack of referrals is a good method :-) The best method depends on the culture of the class, which is always a challenge to figure out.

Labels: Schools

Cute article in the San Jose Mercury News - Teachers remember favorite — and offbeat — holiday gifts

This year my daughter made this home made candy (cookies?) for her teachers. She got some cute boxes to put them in. Per this article, handmade has a lot more meaning than a store bought gift. For some reason giving gifts to teachers seems to be pretty popular in my daughter's school district. My guess is cultural (lots of Chinese and Korean in the district) and showing respect to the teacher. In her middle school, I remember seeing some teachers with huge bags of presents they had received.

Labels: Chinese Christmas, Schools

My daughter has perfect attendance and recently attended the Southern California Honor Choir that required a practice on Friday. She had to be recommended by her teacher for this and went through a try out for it. Per her school district this is an absence per the Education Code. My question to them is per what specific part of the education code?

My thought is since:

1. She was recommended by her teacher
2. The practice was at a public school (Santa Monica High School)
3. There were certified teachers in charge who took attendance

This should count as a school activity. My wife is talking to the district person, but it's frustrating. I am not going into a lot of detail to avoid problems such as this blogger had.

History so far.
1. Referred to district.
2. District person said per education code and gave a general section and if you need to change that you need to go to the state board of education (ie brushoff).
3. I read the code and my wife then asks the district person which sub section and just reply to her E-Mail. For some reason the administration person is not very happy about putting this in writing :-)

Labels: Schools

Two students, two schools -- 20 miles and a world apart - LA Times. Excellent read.

There is a poem called a tale of two schools that was mentioned in the movie Walkout that chronicles the demonstrations of 1968. I would so like to read that poem, I have not found it online. Paula Christomo (Senior Director of community and government relations at Occidental College) wrote this after visiting Palos Verdes High School and comparing it to her school, Roosevelt High School of LAUSD in East LA with the difference in facilities. Palos Verdes High School is located in one of the richest areas of California.

What was mentioned in the LA Times article comparing Jefferson High School to La Canada High School seems like deja vu. What was talked about here was not the differences in facilities, but the attitude. When I went through my student teaching in LAUSD I saw the same thing, very nice students, but the lack of motivation was so frustrating! Missing the PSAT because there were friends visiting. Another student missed class time because she had to take care of her baby sister, so she flunked the class and had to retake it in intermission (school was year round). And the La Canada School seems so similar to my daughters High School.

Labels: Schools

Fascinating paper - Mathematics and Vocabulary Development in Chinese American and European American Children over the Primary School Years. So why do Chinese American's so often do so well in school in the US?

Some clues... Time usage on page 19 of the study. Less time on sports (.55 hours per week vs. 18 hours), more time on reading, music (30 minutes vs. 5 minutes per day), music lessons (60 minutes per week vs 8 weeks).

So how does my daughter compare to this? She's at 120 minutes per week of music lessons :-)

I was looking for a comparison of Chinese Kindergartens, such Follow Jade - Let's Visit Chinese Kindergarten in DVD and American Kindergartens. I guess I will need to write my own, may be as a lesson plan for the Follow Jade DVD?

Labels: Chinese Americans, Chinese Schools, Learning Chinese, Schools

Filipino teachers fill in the gaps at LAUSD - LA Times.

Good read. What is sad is so many of the schools in the inner cities have such poor graduation rates. The one I did my student teaching at was 40%.

Labels: School Safety, Schools

China's civil service exam cheaters go high-tech - Washington Post. I wonder how soon to this shows up for SAT test. "shared much conformity" was an issue.

US Cheating in High School:

• Use a keylogger on a teacher's computer to steal passwords - Saratoga High School
• 60% of High Schoool students said they have cheated on a test.
• Youtube has cheating tips

Labels: Schools

The Economist mentioned the $20 Million Dollar lawsuit as did a Washington Post Editorial, so I went looking for it. How I Joined Teach for America—and Got Sued for $20 Million They were explaining why a school in Florida called the police - Kindergarten Girl Handcuffed, Arrested At Fla. School

Scary. And add in mainstreaming when not appropriate and without enough resources...

Labels: School Safety, Schools

1 in 4 California high school students drop out, state says from the LA Times.

I am glad that my state, California is finally getting a better understanding of the drop out rate. It's sad the high percentage, and in Los Angeles, I assume city, 1 in 3. I did my student teaching in a Los Angeles High School that has a 60% drop out rate. I had nice students, but many just did not see school as that important. I find the high drop out rate incredibly sad and in my opinion a huge failure of our society. In our ever increasingly technical and skills driven economy, education is key for a high paying job. The lure of a job at Home Depot that gives short term more money is nice, but in 10 years it's not going to be what you want. There was one student who dropped out of school and was a cashier at Home Depot. My friend called her the young entrepreneur.

Many of the issues mentioned in Walkout, the poor graduation rate are still issues, 40 years later. I would love to get a copy of a tale of two cities, that compared Lincoln High School in East LA, with Palos Verdes High School (super rich) by Paula Crisostomo (now director of government and community relations at Occidental College in Los Angeles).

Labels: Schools

Some conflicting articles, both from the Wall Street Journal. One about how some Chinese students are doing so much better than US students because they get more homework. The other about What Makes Finnish Kids So Smart?

The Finnish students rank first in Science and second in Science, but they don't start school till 7 and don't have the standards that are the foundation of most improvement efforts in the US. Taiwan was first in Math as my dear Taiwanese wife likes to point out (guess who does the math tutoring at home - and it's now me). My understanding of the article is Finnish focuses on high quality teachers that are given general goals and figure out how to meet them. More Entrepreneurial, where the US Education uses in most schools a general factory set up that is standardized. Reading is a focus from an early age where parents of newborns are actually given books by the government.

The take aways from the two articles. It's an interest of mine with my daughter on how to get Good Grades, Study Skills, and get into the right College. The Finnish and Chinese approach are opposite it would seem. What was not mentioned in either article was in China, the teachers are given more time to prepare than in US classes. For learning Math, I do believe at lower levels using rote is a good method as done with the Singapore Math Texts. This gets into the entire question of why are some School better than others?

Labels: Best Schools, math, Schools, Science

At my daughter's school there was a rumor about a gun today being in the locker room. My daughter got four or five phone calls from her friends last night. I called the school before school started, and they said it was a rumor that had been investigated by them and the Sheriff Department, and that they had their normal security (I asked if they had extra).

I still noticed that a lot of students did not go to school today because of the rumor which made dropping her off easy. A friend did not have their child go to school today and was unhappy the school did not use their automatic system to alert parents and check all the lockers last night. They did cancel an assembly today and for PE had all the students walk as a group to the gym.

I am not sure the Principal had many good alternatives. My opinion is the Principal and whom ever else made the decision did not know the power of the rumor network, and is paying for that by having many students miss school today (which reduces funding, because the school gets paid, say $34 per day per student. So if 1000 students miss school, about 1/3rd of the school which looking at the parking lot makes sense, that is $34,000 the school is out).

Labels: School Safety, Schools

A big issue is home work and are top performing schools stressing out their students. One MA school's Principal is even giving stress reduction using yoga classes for seniors. The Principal also stopped publishing the honor roll in the local paper. The school had four students who committed suicide, which prompted a look at what is necessary.

The article also mentions Doing School: How We Are Creating a Generation of Stressed-Out, Materialistic, and Miseducated Students (Paperback) which read the comment/review section. Two very different view points of one, schools are dumbing down and the real problem is making students more efficient in their studying so they can achieve more, and the other is need to lower the stress level in schools and make it so students understand that Harvard is not for everyone and not everyone needs to take 5 AP classes at a time.

Labels: Schools

Article in Costco's Magazine mentioned this. At some schools the drop out rate is 60%. LA Times a while ago had a great series of articles that looked at one High School in LAUSD on this. Recent LA Times editorial on this. And in our increasing skills required society, what becomes of them? Challenging topic that I worry about. Their is the top tier of society who has figured out how to work the system, so their children get the best education possible, and then the lower tier that does not understand the system.

Labels: Education, Schools

Tis the season for Back To School Nights and your chance to spend a few minutes with your child's teacher. Some suggestions to help you make the most of your Child's Schools Back to School Night

Preparation:
1. Find out if your child can go with you

2. If your child is not, get a map so you know where you are going for middle school and High School especially, and have your child draw the best route.

3. Have them right down the periods, subject and name of the teacher

4. Bring something to take notes with and write with.

5. Remember you usually only get 10 or so minutes per class, so your time will be limited.

6. Find out for K-5 where the student has one teacher the entire day, what are the room numbers for the next year (example: if your child is in 4th grade, find out the room numbers for the 5th grade).

Actions:

1. Greet the teacher and shake their hand saying you are so and so's parent, with your name.

2. Ask the teacher how your student is doing, but you probably won't get a good answer from middle school and high school (your child is one of 180 or so students they have, and unless they are either extremely good or bad, most teachers won't remember).

3. Look around the room, especially if there are projects.

4. Get advice from K-4 teachers on whom they recommend for next year for teachers.

5. Visit the teachers who are one year ahead for K-5 to look at projects (and find out what the competition is doing). At my daughter's school, the projects some of the 5th grader supposedly (with how much parental help) did was amazing. One was a working saw mill.

6. If your child is not doing well or you have concerns, schedule a parent teacher conference at another time than back to school night so the teacher can be prepared.

Labels: Education, Parents, Schools