Dave Nettell's Education Clippings

A collection of clippings from various periodicals that I find interesting and that I think are worth sharing.

Updated:  09/25/04 08:12 AM

Please Note:  Some links to articles remain valid for a limited period of time after their publication date (e.g. one week to a month).   This is due to the fact that they are moved to the newspaper's or magazine's "archives."  If you encounter an error message retrieving one of these articles from this site, you can usually go to their site and search for it in their archives.  Most often, this is a free service although there is occasionally a small charge.

Reading, Writing and Remembering
If your kids are forgetful, here are some reminders on how to help them
Sacramento Bee, 9/19/40

The beginning of the school year marks the start of forgetting season.

Just as you can count on kids to name recess as their favorite class, you can count on them to forget the following (among other things; no way we can list them all): homework, new coats (the more expensive, the quicker they lose themselves), notes from teachers (the more urgent, the longer they stay crumpled in the bottom of the backpack), shoes and hats, multiplication tables, bikes, and how to use a knife and fork.

Before the nagging, the grounding and the gnashing of teeth send you into despair, you might want to consider the bright side of youthful forgetfulness.
 

Tackling an Impossible Job
Education Week, 9/15/04

After years of hearing that a principal’s main job should be to raise the quality of instruction, districts and states are experimenting with ways to make that ideal a reality.

Kelly Griffith’s job description is most notable for what it doesn’t include. The principal at Easton Elementary School in Easton, Md., doesn’t handle maintenance. She doesn’t help arrange field trips. She doesn’t oversee her building’s cafeteria workers. Nor does she supervise the buses before and after school.

Instead, she spends her time in classrooms, observing educators and showing them new methods of instruction. She analyzes test scores. She plans professional-development activities for her teachers aimed at boosting student achievement.

Griffith can focus on teaching and learning because school leaders in her district made a conscious effort to let principals do so. Two years ago, the 4,500-student Talbot County system put "school managers" in its buildings to free principals of administrative duties and let them concentrate on raising student performance.
 

Teachers Mine Web for Election Nuggets
eSchool News, 9/16/04

The Nov. 2 election for President of the United States comes at a pivotal time in the nation's history--and it gives educators an ideal opportunity to teach students about the democratic process. In pulling together lesson plans about the election, teachers nationwide are drawing upon the many free and high-quality resources available on the internet this fall.

Alan Haskvitz, a teacher at Suzanne Middle School in Walnut, Calif., is having his students pretend they are candidates running in the election. They will plan their election campaigns using a list of web sites he has compiled.

His list of web sites--which includes links about election news, the Electoral College, and past elections--will be posted on his personal web site, Reach Every Child, in October.
 

New and improved ways to rot your kid's brain!
A new study shows that kids who watch lots of TV ads are more likely to suffer from depression, anxiety, stomachaches and other problems.
Salon.com, 9/8/04

It will come as no surprise to parents that kids who watch an excessive amount of TV will want Mom and Dad to buy them an excessive amount of stuff. But can heavy media consumption also cause kids to be depressed and anxious, and exhibit low self-esteem? Could it make your child's stomach ache or her head hurt?

Juliet B. Schor, a professor of sociology at Boston College and recognized expert on consumerism, economics and family studies, says yes.

21 Years Later, 'Multiple Intelligences' Still Debated
Educator Pushes Appealing to All Types of Learners
Washington Post, 9/7/04

Howard Gardner, Hobbs professor of education and cognition at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, received an offer recently from a lawyer in Quito, Ecuador. For just $600, the man said, he would protect Gardner from an outrageous attempt to trademark his name for a local school.

It appeared to be a scam but was not unexpected. Because of a book he wrote 21 years ago, Gardner is both lionized and exploited as one of the most famous educational theorists in the world. His notion of multiple intelligences -- including the idea that musical, athletic and other talents are separate from, but as important as, high SAT scores -- has inspired scores of books, journal articles, conferences and lesson plans for public schools.


Going Beyond Bake Sales
From hiring comedians and holding silent auctions, parents get creative -- and raise thousands of dollars for schools
Boston Globe, 9/5/04

In the softly lit yard of the James M. Curley Elementary School in Jamaica Plain, more than 350 people mingled at a silent auction, bidding on restaurant dinners, facials, and yoga classes. Mayor Thomas M. Menino, city councilors, and top Boston school officials hobnobbed with the guests as a reggae and blues musician hummed and a juggler entertained children.

Forget selling chocolate bars and hawking gift wrap. As another school year kicks off, parents can expect increasingly sophisticated fund-raisers like this evening gathering at the Curley, which needed cash for music teachers and school supplies.
 

Internet Gives Teenage Bullies Weapons to Wound From Afar
New York Times, 8/26/04

The fight started at school, when some eighth-grade girls stole a pencil case filled with makeup that belonged to a new classmate, Amanda Marcuson, and she reported them.

But it did not end there. As soon as Amanda got home, the instant messages started popping up on her computer screen. She was a tattletale and a liar, they said. Shaken, she typed back, "You stole my stuff!" She was a "stuck-up bitch," came the instant response in the box on the screen, followed by a series of increasingly ugly epithets.

That evening, Amanda's mother tore her away from the computer to go to a basketball game with her family. But the barrage of electronic insults did not stop. Like a lot of other teenagers, Amanda has her Internet messages automatically forwarded to her cellphone, and by the end of the game she had received 50 - the limit of its capacity.
 

Cyberbullies' torments have much wider reach
Fort Worth (Texas) Star-Telegram, 8/26/04

To grown-ups, the word bully may evoke the memory of a sixth-grader who looked old enough to vote or a 13-year-old who advertised a classmate's phone number "for a good time" on the girls' bathroom wall.

But in the wireless age, who needs fists when you've got instant messaging?

And while the ink on the bathroom wall may fade, a personal Web site can last for years.


Teachers Preparing Kids Not Only for the First Grade but for Entire School Career
Salt Lake Tribune,  8/24/04

For the next 10 months, The Salt Lake Tribune will chronicle the challenges and triumphs of kindergarten and kindergartners, beginning with today's installment on the increasingly academic nature of a youngster's first year in public school.
We'll follow the class of veteran kindergarten teacher Becky Moffat, who is profiled in today's paper.  We'll get to know her students. We'll see them beam when they count to 100 for the first time and cringe when they forget what comes after "P" in the alphabet. We'll track their progress on the way to becoming young readers, writers and mathematicians.  And we'll examine why kindergarten, more than ever, might be the most important grade of all.

 Salt Lake City kindergarten teachers gathered in Highland High's auditorium for a back-to-school blast spotlighting everything they must do differently this year:

"Our students should write every day."
"Be explicit in what we want from kids."
"Focus on oral language, complete sentences with prepositions."
"The point of assessment is to know your kids well."

Yes, kindergarten has changed. A lot.  It's a long way from the play-filled "children's garden" German educator Friedrich Froebel envisioned when he led the first classes in the 1830s. What began as a transition year between home and school has evolved into a scholastic enterprise seen as the foundation of all future learning.  It's more academics, less play. More reading, less recess. More numbers, no naps.


School-Based Coaching
A revolution in professional development—or just the latest fad?
Harvard Education Letter, July/August 2004

"They call it coaching, but it is teaching. You do not just tell them it is so. You show them the reasons why it is so." —Vince Lombardi

After years of disappointing results from conventional professional development efforts and under ever-increasing accountability pressures, many districts are now hiring coaches to improve their schools. These coaches don’t use locker-room pep talks to motivate their teams, but they do strive to improve morale and achievement—and raise scores—by showing teachers how and why certain strategies will make a difference for their students.
 

Harshness of Red Marks Has Students Seeing Purple
Boston Globe, 8/23/04

When it comes to correcting papers and grading tests, purple is emerging as the new red.

"If you see a whole paper of red, it looks pretty frightening," said Sharon Carlson, a health and physical education teacher at John F. Kennedy Middle School in Northampton. "Purple stands out, but it doesn't look as scary as red."

That's the cue pen makers and office supply superstores say they have gotten from teachers as the $15 billion back-to-school retail season kicks off. They say focus groups and conversations with teachers have led them to conclude that a growing number of the nation's educators are switching to purple, a color they perceive as "friendlier" than red.


Recess Gets Regulated
Worried about safety, schools restrict traditional games
Sacramento Bee, 8/22/04

During recess at Woodridge Elementary School, a girl walked up to the foursquare court, wanting to join the game.
"You want to play," Briauna Ford, a sixth-grader, told her. "You got to read the rules."

Eight rules for Switched, a game Briauna and her friends made up, were scrawled on a piece of notebook paper: Rule No. 2: "You must say 'switch, switch' two times to begin the game." Rule No. 6: "Make right choices no yelling."
 

Survey: Young Students are Increasingly Violent, Disrespectful
Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 8/22/04

FORT WORTH, Texas - A first-grader in Arlington, Texas, tried to moon his teacher. Another threw chairs and destroyed the classroom.

A kindergartner in Fort Worth, Texas, tried to poison the classroom ferrets by feeding them crayons and glue. The child also bit other students.

As students begin returning to classes in coming weeks, teachers expect to see a continuation of a disturbing trend: It's the tiniest students who are hitting, spitting, kicking, biting and cursing like sailors.

"We fight before we learn to negotiate," said Michael Parker, who oversees psychological services for Fort Worth schools. "Kids who haven't learned that self-control or self-discipline are going to act out."

Counselors in Fort Worth and Arlington schools say today's kindergartners are experiencing more emotional and behavioral problems than their counterparts five years ago, according to a survey released in February. Several area educators contacted for this report expressed the same sentiment.
 

San Rafael School Unveils Labyrinth
Marin Independent Journal, 8/20/04

When St. Raphael School students walk onto campus Monday for the first day of school, they'll find an unusual figure painted on the blacktop of the school's lower courtyard.

The school recently constructed a 24-foot-wide labyrinth, a circular maze-like geometric pattern that provides a continuous path for people to walk from the outside to the center and back out. The pattern, designed by Catholic monks in the Middle Ages, is a smaller version of the labyrinth at Chartres Cathedral in Chartres, France.

A labyrinth can be used as a meditation tool, and people may find themselves less stressed with clearer minds after walking through it, said Carmen Peer, the artist who hand-measured and hand-painted the St. Raphael School labyrinth.
 

Schwarzenegger's Education Failures
The Nation, 8/19/04

Arnold Schwarzenegger came to Sacramento promising to end "politics as usual." But the partisan barbs continued as the governor called legislators "girlie men" and likened them to "children" in need of a "time-out." More substantively, shell games, secret deals and borrowing still held the day as the budget was, once again, late. And with his so-called "no-tax" pledge Schwarzenegger locked himself into a position of drastically cutting (and raising fees for) state-provided services. Nowhere is this more evident than in education, the state's largest expenditure.

Schwarzenegger is setting two dangerous precedents for education in California. He struck a deal with the California Teacher's Association (CTA) to suspend constitutionally guaranteed K--12 school funding. And he proposed suspending the promise, for the first time in forty years, that every eligible California high school graduate would have a place at the University of California or a California State University. This from the governor who pledged to "work to expand the dream of college."
 

No Politician Left Behind
Deborah Meier, The Nation, 5/27/04

Education is always about politics--in the best and worst senses. In the best sense what happens in our schools is an expression of our beliefs and values, what we want the next generation to be like. But education is also political in the partisan sense--as politicians of all stripes seek to rally their troops around schooling practices, to tie other political agendas into our agendas for schools. Social promotion, bilingual education, phonics, "new math"--all are issues that resonate with different audiences for reasons other than those that directly concern teachers, parents and kids. Phonics is seen as "right-wing authoritarianism," social promotion as "permissive liberalism" (and depicted as the scourge of New York City schools, despite the fact that almost half the city's children have been entering high school at least a year over-age for decades) and so forth. Reality often gets lost, and kids suffer in ways neither opponents nor proponents had in mind.

So along comes No Child Left Behind, and from right to left, everyone climbs aboard. It was, after all, an extension of a policy idea hatched under Bush Senior, pursued under Clinton and replicated in many states--the premise of which is that frequent testing will solve educational problems. And in fact the focus on "results," not "opportunities," echoes older liberal, not conservative, themes. Yet had anyone read the bill with care, it would have been hard not to fault it on almost every ground, except perhaps the high aspirations embedded in the title.

NCLB proposes to accomplish a statistical impossibility (that all children score in the top twenty-fifth percentile); it raises false expectations; it's built on an illusion that tests alone can--and should--measure worthwhile standards; that schools can do it all; that progress comes in steady increments; that penalties will motivate children and teachers; that lack of money is a mere excuse; that a single nationwide system is part of the American dream; and, finally, that schools can do it all. The law literally dictates the books we are allowed to use on a national basis, not to mention the pedagogy for teaching literacy and, coming soon, math. Before long, until eighth grade, little else will get taught at all.

When Gadgets Get in the Way
New York Times, 8/19/04

Now that computers are a staple in schools around the country, perhaps the machines should come with a warning label for teachers: "Beware: Students may no longer hear a word you say."

Today 80 percent of public schools have high-speed Internet access in at least one classroom, according to Market Data Retrieval, an education research company. Among colleges, 69 percent have classroom Internet access and 70 percent have wireless networks. Students start tapping away behind laptop lids with no way for professors to know if they are taking notes or checking Hotmail.

"I've never been in a lecture where I haven't seen someone checking their e-mail when they were supposed to be doing stuff," said Bill Walsh, a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Instant messages, news tickers and games like solitaire beckon too.


In the Classroom, Web Blogs Are the New Bulletin Boards
New York Times, 8/19/04

Last spring, when Marisa L. Dudiak's second-grade class in Frederick County, Md., returned from a field trip to a Native American farm, all the students wanted to do was talk about what they saw. But instead of leading a discussion about the trip, Mrs. Dudiak had the students sign on to their classroom Web log.

There they wrote about learning to use a bow and arrow, sitting inside a tepee and petting a buffalo. The short entries were typical of second-grade writing, with misspelled words and simple sentences. Still, for Mrs. Dudiak, the exercise proved more fruitful than a group discussion or a handwritten entry in a personal journal.


Elementary Schools Post Lower Scores
After several years of gains, state test results in math and English either declined or showed no improvement at a majority of campuses.
Los Angeles Times, 8/17/04

After several years of marked gains, the majority of public elementary schools in California posted lower scores or showed no improvement this year on standardized English and math tests, according to data released Monday.

State officials tried to make the best of the disappointing results, pointing out that scores remained significantly higher than they did at the beginning of the current testing program four years ago.

But fewer than half of the state's elementary schools showed any increases this year, compared with the nearly 90% that improved last year, according to a Los Angeles Times analysis that combined English and math scores.
 

Progress stalls on school test scores
Sacramento Bee, 8/17/04

Following several years of consistent gains in standardized test scores, the academic progress of California's public school students came to an unceremonious halt during the 2003-04 school year, according to results released Monday by the state Department of Education.

Instead of the often-sizable jumps in previous years, the latest results overall show little to no growth in English, math, science and social science tests meant to measure each student's mastery of specific, grade-by-grade academic goals set by the state.

California test scores stuck at same level
'Not where we want to be,' says schools chief
S.F. Chronicle. 8/17/04

After several years of optimism over rising test scores, state educators expressed disappointment Monday that new results on the state's rigorous California Standards Test showed little if any improvement.

Across the state, 1.5 million students remain mired in the lowest ranks of academic performance.

"This is not where we want to be," said California schools Superintendent Jack O'Connell. "I hope that these scores are a wake-up call for all in education."


Student Test Scores Due Today
San Jose Mercury News, 8/16/04

In what's become an annual ritual, the first wave of California student test scores will be released today by the California Department of Education.

This year, results of both the high school exit exam and the Standardized Testing and Reporting program will come out simultaneously. Today's releases -- which are totals for schools, districts, counties and the state, but not for individual students -- were scheduled to be posted late this morning on the department's Web site at www.cde.ca.gov/index.asp.


State Teachers Face Cuts to Reimbursed Classroom Supplies
Associated Press, 8/16/04

LOS ANGELES - California teachers may have to scale back their out-of-pocket spending on classroom supplies after losing state and federal tax breaks that helped lower their costs.

The state Teacher Retention Tax Credit repaid educators up to $1,500 in taxes to cover some expenses but was suspended last month under the state budget plan. At the same time, a federal tax deduction for up to $250 for teachers' extra expenses expired this year.


Election Issue of Education Is Promoted
New York Times, 8/12/04

WASHINGTON, Aug. 11 - A coalition of organizations, led by the nation's largest teachers union, introduced a campaign on Wednesday to mobilize opposition to the No Child Left Behind law, to demand more money for public schools and to raise the profile of education as an election issue.

Members of the coalition include the National Education Association, the teachers union, which has endorsed Senator John Kerry, the Democratic nominee, for president, and MoveOn.org, the 2.3 million-member Internet-based political movement that also backs Mr. Kerry. But it also includes groups like Acorn, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, and the Forum on Education and Democracy, which are more oriented toward policy.

The campaign, called the National Mobilization for Great Public Schools, came under attack from Congressional Republicans, but the coalition insisted that its effort was nonpartisan and that it would not endorse any candidate or party.

It's time to party for public education!
Source: NEA Website

NEA and other organizations in a new coalition have kicked off an unprecedented effort to host "house parties" and other get-togethers to raise the profile of education issues nationwide.

More than 2,000 NEA members have already signed up to host "house parties" and other gatherings on Wednesday, September 22, 2004.

Anyone who cares about the future of public education can sign up to host or participate in one of these parties by visiting the Web site of the official coalition known as the National Mobilization for Great Public Schools.

For Bronx Students, the Art of Boat Building
New York Times, 8/11/04

SLEEPY HOLLOW, N.Y. - Terrell Smith, 15, was smoothing a rough-hewn oar with a homemade wooden plane. Dressed in britches and high socks - but missing his usual earring - Terrell had plunged into life as a boat builder in the mid-18th century.

"When I tell my friends what I'm doing, they're shocked," said Terrell, of the Bronx. "At first when I told them I'm building boats, they thought it was like little toys and they're like, 'Will you give me one?' So I have to explain they're big ones, like you see in the movies."

Terrell is one of 16 students and 7 apprentices spending the summer building a traditional wooden boat at Philipsburg Manor, a historic site in Westchester County. Not only do they dress in period costume, but they also use handmade wooden tools.
 

A Beautiful Way to Help Children
Boston Globe, 8/10/04

A routine school assignment landed little Kaylee Wallace in Children's Hospital yesterday -- which was just what she wanted.

Kaylee's first-grade teacher at Wellfleet Elementary School, on Cape Cod, had asked the class to write about how they would make the world more beautiful. Kaylee, 7, wrote that she would buy toys for sick children. Then, she told her parents, who had adopted her from China six years ago, that she actually wanted to do it.

"She said, 'We're going to sell lemonade,' " recalled Kaylee's father, John Wallace.

That's how Kaylee raked in more than $850 to buy toys that filled several large boxes, which she and her parents delivered to a playroom in Children's Hospital yesterday. The toys will be distributed to the hospital's several playrooms.

The writing assignment that inspired Kaylee was given after her class read Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney, a story told by a young girl about her great-aunt, who scatters flower seeds around the world because her grandfather had told her when she was little that she needed to do something to make the world more beautiful.
 

Plan to Pare California Education System -- Power Would Shift from 58 Counties to 11 Super Centers
SF Chronicle, 8/9/04

Within the vast new blueprint telling Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger how to run state government more efficiently is an idea for axing a system used since the Gold Rush days of 1852 -- and which today serves thousands of California's least-visible students.

The California Performance Review team that drafted the efficiency plan is recommending a constitutional amendment to abolish all 58 county Boards of Education, the 53 elected county superintendents and the five who are appointed. School districts, with their school boards and superintendents, would remain intact.

Back to School Begins Season of Test-Taking
Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 8/8/04

Jerry Pimental doesn't mess around, even on the first day of school.

Testing will be one of the first topics he addresses with his fifth-graders Monday when they settle into his classroom at Lilburn Elementary School.

"I don't scare them," Pimental told me after his Thursday morning workout at Gold's Gym of Lilburn. "But I don't beat around the bush, either. I tell them that we have a writing test that they have to pass, a CRCT test that they have to pass, and the math and reading portion of the CRCT test that they have to pass. I tell them, 'You have to listen to me, work hard and we'll be set.' "

Let's say I start school Monday as a Gwinnett first-grader. Assume I earn my high school diploma here. By the time I graduate, I will have taken 38 standardized tests such as the Criterion-Referenced Competency Test, the Gateway and graduation exams.

Assuming each test takes about a week of school time, plus a week dedicated to prepping for it, that's 76 weeks dedicated to testing. If a school year is about 40 weeks, I will have spent the equivalent of two out of 12 school years being quizzed.
 

A Question of Age, Ability
State panel's proposal to delay kindergarten for youngest pupils should fund preschool for those who would have to wait, critics say.
Los Angeles Times, 8/7/04

Lorraine Fong can pick them out in a heartbeat:  They can't sit still for long, follow directions, or work with other students. Some struggle to learn colors or numbers. And many of her school's youngest kindergarteners even have trouble executing the simplest drawings, said Fong, principal of Bennett Kew Elementary School in Inglewood.

"The ones who aren't ready usually draw stick figures that have legs, arms and hands coming out of their heads," she said.

So Fong, along with many other educators and early childhood experts, tentatively welcomed a recommendation by a special state commission that the birthday cutoff for kindergarten enrollment be moved from Dec. 2 to Sept. 1. But their support was almost universally made conditional on the state's providing quality, affordable preschool for youngsters who would be kept out of kindergarten for an additional year. Parents seemed more leery.
 

Too much TV is taking our kids down the tube
Minneapolis Star-Tribune, 8/5/04

Television can be a wonderful learning tool. Thirty-odd years ago, "Sesame Street, "The Electric Company" and "Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood" helped my sons learn to read, count, socialize and cope with feelings. Nature programs on public television taught them an enormous respect for the world at large and the creatures within it.

Not until the boys were old enough to understand how commercials tried to promote consumption were they allowed to watch sports programs on commercial TV. The basic motto of the household was, "When it's light out, you're out" -- that is, playing outdoors.

Unfortunately, our experience with television is rarely duplicated these days. Sitting passively in front of the tube for hours is taking its toll on the bodies and minds of U.S. children. Studies have documented unhealthy effects on weight, attention span, reading skills and socialization among children who spend hours a day watching TV or playing video games.

Seven Myths About Diverse Schools
Washington Post, 8/3/2004

Diverse is an elastic word, but no matter how you stretch it, my high school was not diverse.

Hillsdale High in pleasantly suburban San Mateo, Calif., had about 1,600 students in 1963, the year I graduated. A basement flood recently wiped out my yearbooks, so I cannot make an exact count, but I don't think there were more than two or three African Americans and a dozen Asian Americans in the entire school. I suspect there were a few Hispanics, but I don't remember any.

Hillsdale is very different now, as are the schools my children have attended, which I think is good, but we still have a major problem with this odd concept of diversity. Diverse can mean a nice blend of all ethnicities, but can also mean lots of low-income black and Hispanic children, and to many people who have not thought about this very deeply, that is a bad thing.

They are wrong, and their failure to understand what is actually happening in many heavily minority schools is aggravating both our racial problems and our education problems. To bring light to this issue, I am adding a new selection to my Better Late Than Never Book Club, which spotlights splendid works that I have overlooked because of my habitual sloth and stupidity.

The book is a modest 163 pages. You can read it in a couple of hours. The title is Debunking the Middle-Class Myth: Why Diverse Schools Are Good for All Kids, published in 2003 by The Scarecrow Education Press.
 

Students' film takes the anxiety out of going to sixth grade
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 8/01/04

The scene starts with the direction of Chris Gegen, the Steven Spielberg of Richard Hull Middle School. The camera is rolling; the actors are on their marks.

But they need their motivation.

They get it from Gegen.

Although he usually works behind the scenes as a technology support technician at Hull, Gegen has found himself in a more high-profile role as director and coordinator of "A Day in the Life," an acclaimed short film featuring the most demanding actors of all — Hull Middle School tweenies! But Gegen is up for the challenge.

He is their Hollywood insider, the one with an A-list résumé of film and TV credits starring the likes of Tom Hanks, before his Oscar win, and Mr. T, before "The A-Team" got the ax.
 

Can you be a techie if you can't type?
The Christian Science Monitor, 8/3/04

Once a week at John Eaton Public School No. 160, each class comes to the computer lab for a session with teacher Susan Eastman. Kids pull an orange plastic cover over the keyboard so that they can't look at the letters and they power on the "Type to Learn" software.

Ms. Eastman's computer classes at this Washington, D.C., elementary school used to focus on using technology to enhance academic skills. But three years ago, after watching some kids spend as long as 10 minutes searching for the letters to enter a single Google query, she decided to start formally teaching touch-typing.

Now her students in grades three through six are working their way through the self-guided lessons.

In some schools, typing classes disappeared at least a couple of decades ago. A skill that once seemed vital - particularly to prepare young women for secretarial jobs - no longer appeared relevant in an age that urged more kids to consider going on to at least some form of higher education.

And yet, argue some teachers, the ability to touch-type - or to "keyboard," the term more often used today - has perhaps never been more essential.

"You can't word process unless you can keyboard," Ms. Eastman says. "You can't use the Internet, you can't instant message. For some kids with learning disabilities, for those who have messy handwriting, or for whom holding a pencil is awkward, it opens so many tools."

Yet many students are not given formal instruction in keyboarding skills.


'No Child' no help at many schools -- Lofty goals, low standards produce frustration
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
August 1, 2004

For Anthony Hall, the No Child Left Behind Act might as well be called One Child Left Behind.

His child.

Hall sought a transfer for his daughter Angelica last year, when Crim High School in Atlanta failed to meet state testing goals. He wanted Angelica to go to highly regarded North Atlanta High School. The district, as required by the federal law, offered a transfer to Southside or Therrell high school, where test scores were low.

Hall reluctantly sent Angelica to Southside, where she made the honor roll. But she rarely had homework and, in her father's view, was not challenged. This year, Hall planned to try again for a transfer to North Atlanta. But Southside squeaked by on the state's testing goals and does not have to offer transfers.

"I've given up," said Hall, who said he may move closer to a better school.

No Child Left Behind swept into the nation's schools two years ago, promising changes that would give every student, in every community, a quality education. Despite those lofty ambitions, the law so far offers little or no help to most parents.
 

Report Sets Off Alarms
Sacramento Bee, 8/1/04

The overhaul recommendations don't lack for vision: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger should have greater authority over California's public schools and colleges, and the work-force needs of business and industry should play a larger role in shaping what students learn.

But educators whose programs and agencies would be dismantled or rearranged under a task force's proposals say the critical student services they provide appear to have been disregarded in recommending such a power shift.
 

Camp Helps Children Conquer Social Disabilities
Washington Post, 7/29/04

Playing in a sandbox, making friends or starting a conversation, social interactions that most people take for granted, are not easy for Gabriel, who has been diagnosed with a social learning disability. But along with seven other youngsters, he has learned skills such as saying hello, standing still while others are speaking and ending conversations politely as part of Take 2, a summer program for youngsters with similar problems that concludes its first year this week.

Kindergarten Scares Parents More than Child
Boston Globe, 7/25/04

Little Kaya Bos woke up an hour ahead of her usual schedule.

By 7 a.m., the 5-year-old had already picked out her ensemble: a blue shirt and a pair of freshly purchased boot-cut jeans with fancy blue embroidery running up and down the sides. After making sure her ponytail was perfect, Kaya was ready to enter a whole new ''big girl" world -- her first day of kindergarten.

Her mother's stomach, not the 5-year-old's, was twisted into knots.

Last September, Kaya became the first of the three Bos children to start school.

Adults can learn from children: They think before speaking, scientists find
Seattle Times, 7/25/04

In an infant's knowing eyes, scientists believe they have resolved one of the oldest debates in science and philosophy: Which comes first, an idea or the language to express it?

"How do we think about the world before we are corrupted by culture and the world?" Yale University psychologist Paul Bloom said. "One way to learn is to look at babies."

Researchers at Vanderbilt and Harvard universities demonstrated through experiments made public last week in Nature magazine that children do appear to think before they learn to speak. Moreover, infants seem to share fundamental ideas about the world around them that languages later alter.
 

Pushing to the Front
Boston Globe, 7/25/04

Janet and Glen Ilacqua carefully dissect homework to see why their kids fell short of an A, pay for leadership and music camps, and crisscross the eastern half of the country on multi-stop college campus tours.  The Easton couple says they never stop hunting for ways to improve their three children's chances of succeeding in school.  ''You realize when they're at a young age that good grades aren't enough; you have to help them do more," said Glen Ilacqua, an accountant. ''If you look at the top 25 kids in a class, almost all of them are going to have parents who were very involved in their achievement."

X marks the spot -- At a Sacramento school, students are discovering the art of cross-stitch
Sacramento Bee, 7/24/04

At 3 o'clock on a Thursday afternoon, the floodgates were opened at Samuel Jackman Middle School in south Sacramento. Kids spilled through the doors and onto the sidewalk, hustled along by security guards and teachers.

Deep inside the school campus, Carole Hanna's classroom was also supercharged with noise and motion. Fourteen students - 12 girls and two boys - had gathered for a weekly after-school program. There was a big difference between the activity inside this room and the commotion outside. This group of 12-to 14-year-olds was excited about its weekly cross-stitch and needlepoint lesson.

Yes, we're talking about the needlework many people associate with grandmas and state fair competitions. It's an odd juxtaposition, this contrast of ponytails, glittery shirts and gum popping with old-fashioned, cross-stitched teddy bears.

 

 

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