Six technologies soon to affect education

New report describes the emerging technologies that will shape K-12 education in the near future
By Meris Stansbury, e-school News

Collaborative environments, cloud computing, and "smart" objects are among the technologies that a group of experts believes will have a profound impact on K-12 education within the next five years or sooner.
The group, called the New Media Consortium (NMC), has come out with an annual report on emerging technologies in higher education for the last several years. This year, for the first time, NMC has issued a K-12 version of its "Horizon Report" as well.

The Horizon Report: 2009 K-12 Edition, released earlier this month, identifies and describes six emerging technologies that will have a huge impact on K-12 education within the next one to five years.

The report groups these technologies according to their time-to-adoption horizon--one year or less, two to three years, or four to five years. It also outlines key trends and challenges associated with the their adoption.

Made possible through a grant from Microsoft Corp., the report draws on published resources, current research and practices, and expertise from an advisory board of experts in education and technology. Members include representatives from the Consortium for School Networking (CoSN), technology vendors, EDUCAUSE, and U.S. school districts and universities.

"This is the first report we have developed with a focus on emerging technologies for elementary and secondary schools, and we hope that K-12 educators will use it as a resource for robust dialog and technology planning," said Larry Johnson, NMC's chief executive. "The technologies we identified have the power to transform teaching and learning both in the short and long term."

The six technologies detailed in the report are...

- One year or less: collaborative environments and online communication tools
- Two to three years: mobile devices and cloud computing
- Four to five years: smart objects and the personal web

Collaborative environments

The report defines this as anything from simple web-based tools for collaborative work to multiplayer gaming environments, and from social-networking platforms to virtual worlds.

Examples of the tools used to create these environments include Voicethread, which allows users to collect multiple voices and viewpoints in a single package, and Ning, which lets teachers set up workspaces that include web feeds to pull in relevant resources, chat spaces (synchronous or asynchronous), forums, profiles, shared documents, calendars, music, and many other tools--all with a few clicks.

The benefit of using these tools, the report states, is to foster teamwork and critical thinking skills. The challenge is for educators to be able to assess these types of skills in real time.

Online communication tools

According to the report, these tools make it easy for students to move past the classroom walls and connect with their peers around the world, as well as with experts in the fields they are studying. Access to these tools gives students an opportunity to experience learning in multiple ways, develop a public voice, and compare their own ideas with those of their peers.

Tools mentioned in the report include Twitter, Skype, and Edmodo, a private micro-blogging platform that gives teachers and students a sheltered place to manage classroom assignments and activities as well as engage in protected conversations.

Mobile devices

Over the past few years, the report notes, smart phones and other mobile devices have become able to record audio and video, store more information, and access the web--making mobiles function like laptops.

"The combination of available applications and a device that [students] can carry provides an opportunity to introduce students to tools for study and time management that will help them later in life," says the report. "The implications for K-12 education are dramatic: the potential for mobile gaming and simulation, research aids, field work, and tools for learning of all kinds is there, awaiting development."

Cloud computing

This is a term for networked computers that distribute processing power and applications among many machines. Applications such as Flickr, Google Docs, and YouTube use a cloud as their platform, just as programs on a desktop computer use that single computer as a platform.

According to the report, cloud-based applications can provide students and teachers with free or low-cost alternatives to expensive, proprietary productivity tools. eMail, word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, collaboration, media editing, and more can be done from a web browser, while the software and files reside in the cloud.

Smart objects

A smart object, as defined by the report, is "any physical object that includes a unique identifier that can track information about the object." The object can connect the physical world with the world of information. Smart objects can be used to manage physical things digitally, track them throughout their lifespan, and annotate them with descriptions, opinions, instructions, warranties, tutorials, photographs, and so on.

School libraries, for example, can use smart objects for tracking their collections and checking materials in and out. According to the report, some libraries are investigating further applications for smart objects: A project called ThinkeringSpaces, from the Illinois Institute of Technology's Institute of Design, "combines physical and virtual components to produce an environment where physical objects, like books, can be annotated with contextual information that is added manually or retrieved automatically."

Smart objects have recently become cheap for students and teachers to create, using Quick Response (QR) tags and smart-code stickers. Web services such as Shotcode and Kaywa let anyone encode QR tags and print them out. Products like Tikitag and Violet's Mir:ror allow users to attach scannable stickers to household objects.

The personal web

This is a term to describe a collection of technologies "that confer the ability to recognize, configure, and manage online content, rather than just viewing it," the report says. Personal-web technologies give users the ability to sort, display, and even build upon web content according to their personal needs and interests.

According to the report, simple tools to create customized, web-based environments to support social and academic activities are easily available today, but their use in schools is severely hampered by access and filtering policies.

Along with a more fully developed discussion of the relevance of each technology to education, the report also gives examples of how the technology is being--or could be--applied in education. And it notes that two themes arose repeatedly during discussions of these technologies: assessment and filtering.

"Assessment continues to present a challenge to educators at all levels, particularly in the context of new media and collaborative work; evaluating student work that includes blogs, podcasts, and videos, or establishing how much an individual student contributed to or learned from a collaborative project, is difficult," the report explains. "Further, translating assessments of this nature into the metrics measured by standardized tests is not at all straightforward."

Continued the report: "Likewise, the practice of filtering is intimately related to each of these topics. At many schools today, the technologies named here cannot be used because they are blocked by content filters. The advisory board recognized the need for new [filtering tools] that do a better job of keeping objectionable content out of the way, while allowing useful tools and content to be accessed."

Other challenges to the adoption of these technologies in schools include the fundamental structure of the K-12 establishment, which is slow to adapt to new trends.

The full report is available on the NMC web site. The CoSN web site also features an online forum dedicated to an ongoing discussion about the report.

"For education leaders, this report is extremely valuable and critical to making sure that school districts are integrating technological tools that will have maximum impact," said Karen Greenwood Henke, CoSN board liaison. "Having a grasp on up-and-coming technologies empowers technology leaders to plan for the future and keep their students, educators, and administrators on the cutting edge."

Read more!

Students plugged in to green initiatives

MICHAEL STUPARYK
Toronto Star
March 24, 2009

In the countdown to Earth Hour, the Star is asking organizations and companies what they're doing for the environment. Today: York Catholic District School Board.

Q. What are you doing for Earth hour?

The new solar-panel cross on the front of St. Jean de Brebeuf Catholic High School in Woodbridge not only stores energy from the sun – at least enough to run a microwave oven – but also will remind students and passersby this weekend to unplug for Earth Hour, says Norman Vezina, the York Catholic District School Board's senior manager of environmental services.



Like all GTA public boards, York Region's Catholic board is asking schools to celebrate Earth Hour a day early this Friday, by turning off all lights and non-essential equipment for at least an hour.

"A lot of our students are used to this already, especially at the 18 schools we call Eco-Champion schools, where each classroom has a flashing overhead LED warning light when electricity use goes beyond a certain threshold," Vezina said.

"It's working," he noted. "Their electricity use is down 10 per cent in one year."

The board plans to spread the system to all 96 schools.

All staff are invited to a special Earth Hour talk Thursday night by Walter Palmer, one of a handful of "green ambassadors" trained by former U.S. vice-president Al Gore to spread the word about global warming through his campaign the Climate Project.

Q. What have you done over the past year to reduce your carbon footprint?

Between switching 70,000 old lightbulbs for efficient new ones and replacing old boilers and building energy-saving occupancy sensors into new schools that automatically turn down heating, cooling and lights in empty rooms, the board has cut electricity use by 5 per cent in one year, boasts Vezina.

"And since 2000, we've cut our use by 35 per cent."

This month, St. Jean de Brebeuf won a board-wide contest to be the site of the new $20,000 solar cross, which is hooked into a live website that shows students how much energy the five photovoltaic panels are generating and feeding into the power grid.

Vezina said the school won by showing how it would link data from the website into daily classes on math, science and Canadian studies.

Q. What does Earth Hour mean to your image?

"Earth Hour is a prime event in our year-round process to increase awareness among students," said Vezina. "We want them to realize a school is not just a place where you learn, but the building itself is something you can learn from.

"I know from our 18 Eco-Champion schools, the students are so conscientious now," he said, "God forbid you should accidentally leave a light on – they'll let you know!"
Read more!

Sex ed 2.0: vibrators and condom runs

ZOSIA BIELSKI
Globe and Mail
March 26, 2009

Linda Strobl was mortified when her 14-year-old son came home last fall "quite upset" about his high-school health assignment: Go to the local pharmacy, buy condoms and then beat the other boys at fitting one on a wooden penis in his class.

Ms. Strobl, a public health nurse, admitted she was embarrassed that the pharmacist in her tiny town of Ayr, Ont., would note her son's purchase. She said the lesson also went against the basic hopes she has for her son - that he will practise abstinence until marriage.

"When he's ready to buy [condoms], he's the type of kid that will do it because he has that inner strength that when it's time, he'll manage it. To force him into it at a time when he doesn't feel comfortable and it's not part of what he's chosen to do, that doesn't work."
On Monday, Ms. Strobl persuaded Waterloo Region District School Board staff to consider protocols that would require teachers to give parents of Grade 9 and 10 students outlines of their children's sex ed. classes.

The case is raising questions about parental rights in education. At a time when rates of sexually transmitted diseases such as chlamydia and gonorrhea rise annually among teens, many sexual health educators say only visceral lessons will speak to youth, but they face another challenge as parents seek special accommodation for their children.

"Human sexuality still is a pretty emotional topic for people. For students and parents, it's based on their own experience and upbringing," said Karen Quigley-Hobbs of the Region of Waterloo public health department.

"Any time you mention sexual education, you're almost throwing gas on a fire."

Similar issues arose in the same school board in 2003, when several parents objected to a questionnaire administered as part of Girl Time, a sexuality program for Grade 7 and 8 girls that focuses on building self-esteem. The 150-question survey was meant to help gauge the sexual attitudes of teenage girls, but some parents balked at its explicit tone, which they said the school's permission slip purposely did not disclose.

Darlene Mashinter's daughter filled out the survey. Among others, the mother objected to a question that asked girls if their boyfriends "pull their penises out before they come."

"Their answer to that was that they had to use terminology that the children [understood]. But believe me, they realize what 'ejaculate' is too. It was in very poor taste," Ms. Mashinter said.

Linguistic quibbles are one of many hurdles facing sexual educators who come up against diffident parents.

Parental squeamishness is another. In 2004, a parents' group in Nova Scotia grew incensed at the prospect that their members would be pre-emptively forced to discuss the birds and the bees with their children after the province offered youth 12 years old and over a brightly coloured, spiral-bound notebook titled Sex? A Healthy Sexuality Resource.

The 126-page guide offers young readers "good openers" to broach the topic with their parents after school. Several chapters discuss safe sex, including where to get cheap condoms and how to construct a dental dam, but the guide also devotes many pages to warding youngsters off sex.

"Are you prepared to sit down with your child and discuss all of the topics contained in the resource (i.e. all forms of sexual intercourse, the low age of legal consent, what a vibrator is and the 'morning after' pill)?" a parent asked on the Parent Advocates for Accountability Group's website.

In Waterloo, educators are trying to resolve the growing polarization of reluctant parents and progressive sex educators.

"We respect, because we are a public institution, that not everybody's going to agree with what's in the best interest for the individual child," said Mary Lou Mackie, executive superintendent of education at the school board.

"What we try to do is find a way to honour individual people and their particular beliefs, but at the same time promote what we think is in the best interests of the public at large."

Ms. Mackie said the board is embarking on an "Equity Inclusion Strategy," essentially "religion, faith-based and personal-based" accommodation. (Ms. Strobl's concerns, as put forward in a motion by her trustee, are to be addressed when the province releases these new guidelines in June.)

But others argue that myriad opt-out strategies pose problems of their own.

"It's one thing to talk about parental rights, but you also have to talk about the basic rights of youth," said Alex McKay, research co-ordinator at the Sex Information and Education Council of Canada.

Mr. McKay said parents need to wake up to the fact that their children will likely have sex before they're 20, and that educators have to teach them where to get condoms and how to put them on years before that. Mr. McKay said that in Ms. Strobl's case, the high-school teacher did just that.

"When you're talking about issues that have as profound a potential impact on people's lives, such as HIV infection and unintended pregnancy, young people have a basic right to potentially life-saving information." Read more!

Social Networks Are the R&D Teams of the Future

This morning's session "Professional Learning Networks Using Web 2.0 Tools," presented by Meg Ormiston, shared a bunch of networking tools (find the liveblogged rundown on the session's wikispace) and some big ideas:

* "Social networking for educators is about breaking down isolation. Imagine if every 2nd grade teacher was on Twitter and their network was primarily other 2nd grade teachers. It would accomplish so much more than all our binders of curriculum."


* Use Twitter and Skype in tandem to arrange for experts to speak to your staff or students (i.e., reach out to your Twitter network, "I need an expert on X to speak to my class/staff," and then schedule their availability for a Skype presentation).

* Use LibraryThing.com (or SafariU) to create professional libraries that you can share with staff.

* Video is the future of professional development. Want to know how to use some of these new Web 2.0 tools? YouTube. For example, Meg wanted to know how to use Google SketchUp, and found one printed book and 3000+ YouTube videos on how to use SketchUp.

* "Also, for struggling learners—is the goal for kids to struggle with the book, or learn about gravity? We need to open up YouTube for teacher use.

This is the world we live in—especially our students and new teachers—we need to educate on how to use social networking responsibility, and use it."

Ormistan covered a variety of Professional Learning Networks (PLNs) and emphasized that harnessing the wisdom of crowds is the future of improving educational practices.

How are you using Web 2.0 to network with your colleagues? Have you seen benefits, resistance, or challenges to using Web 2.0 among educators? Read more!

Yes, these children can

Margaret Wente
Globe & Mail
March 21, 2009

We Canadians like to congratulate ourselves that our society is less unequal than it is in the United States. Our schools are better, our income distribution is fairer, and our poverty is less entrenched.

We should stop feeling smug. We already have a two-tier society, and it starts in childhood. In the upper tier are kids with educated, middle-class parents who'll probably get postsecondary degrees and good jobs. In the lower tier are kids from visible minority groups with poorly educated, lower-income parents who very likely won't. The achievement gap opens early, and is usually permanent.

How to change the outcomes for second-tier kids is one of the more important challenges we face. People have plenty of ideas but very little evidence of what might work. The schools are not the social levellers we hoped they'd be. Most low-income children in average public schools wind up poorly educated. Only a handful go on to higher education.

But, in the United States, a decade of educational experiments has produced some highly persuasive results. Education can make a difference - a big one. The leading example is the KIPP schools, which serve 17,000 children in 19 states. (KIPP stands for the Knowledge Is Power Program, and its slogan is "work hard, be nice.") Nearly 80 per cent of KIPP alumni - who are overwhelmingly black and Hispanic - go to college.

KIPP classrooms tend to alarm advocates of progressive education. They are very orderly. No one is gazing out the window. No one is slumping in his seat. All eyes are focused on the teacher. The kids have learned the drill called Slant: Sit up, listen, ask questions, nod, and track the speaker with their eyes. They like it. They say it helps them to learn. KIPP schools have a policy of zero tolerance for misbehaviour. And they all have long waiting lists.

Jessica Hart is a typical KIPP kid. When she arrived as a fifth grader at San Francisco's Bay Academy, her English scores were in the 16th percentile. By the end of the year, she was in the 75th percentile. How, a reporter asked last year, did that happen? "Because I'm smart," she said.

Turnarounds such as Jessica's are common. When kids start at KIPP - usually in middle school - most are already a grade or two behind. But the teachers tell them constantly that they are smart - and they are. Every student knows the year when he or she will go to college. In New York last year, 94 per cent of KIPP eighth graders scored at or above grade level in math. In northwestern Baltimore, every eighth-grade KIPP student who'd enrolled in Grade 5 passed the state's math test - compared with 19 per cent in the control group. Almost every KIPP school decisively outperforms its district.

But it takes a lot more than high expectations to get results such as these. Students clock a huge amount of classroom time. The school day runs from 7:30 to 5, with homework every night, classes every other Saturday, and three weeks of school every summer. One of the school's slogans is: "There are no shortcuts." Another is: "No excuses. You are responsible for getting smart." The teachers have cellphones so the students can call them after hours if they run into trouble with their homework. The teachers are young, idealistic, incredibly hard-working, and very good.

KIPP's 66 schools are charter schools, which means that they're in the public system but have more operating freedom. They appoint their own principals, hire their own (non-unionized) teachers, and give them merit pay. They receive the same funding as public schools, but they cost more to run. To make up the difference, they rely on philanthropists (such as the Gates foundation and the founders of the Gap).

Some detractors - those who believe KIPP is too authoritarian - call it the "kids in prison program." Others have questioned whether the schools simply cream off the better students from the other schools. But several independent evaluations have found that this isn't the case. The students really are representative, and KIPP schooling really does make a dramatic difference.

KIPP was founded in 1994 by Mike Feinberg and Dave Levin, two idealistic young veterans from Teach for America. They began with middle schools, and are now expanding to college-prep high schools. Other successful low-income schools share much of the KIPP formula. They offer the small and nurturing environment of a private school (but without the amenities). They rigorously track every student's progress, and believe in intense discipline. The aim is not only to teach reading and math but to instill non-cognitive abilities such as self-control, adaptability, patience and kindness. (These are traits that most middle-class kids pick up outside the classroom. They have a huge impact on any child's future success.)

Despite the impressive track record, it's obvious that this education model is tough to scale up. It costs more money. And it doesn't work for everyone. As many as 40 per cent of KIPP students transfer out for one reason or another (although some of the benefits remain after they leave). The demands on teachers are very heavy, and a lot of them move on, too. Nor can these schools succeed if they have to play by the rules of a public-school bureaucracy (although I've seen a few exceptional public schools that do).

What these schools tell us is there is a way to do it. But it's hard. Giving disadvantaged children the same education that middle-class students get won't work. It has to be considerably better. And it has to use methods that are radically different from those employed in most public schools. In fact, methods that may suit middle-class kids just fine can be ruinous for lower-class kids.

There are important lessons here. And if we don't want a two-tier society, we'd better study up. Read more!

TEAMWORK ON ICE

Middle-school students in danger of falling into drugs and gangs learn discipline, respect at the rink

Debra Black
Toronto Star
March 21, 2009

Twelve-year-old Jahlon Gardner, known as Beenie, sits in Darlene Jones' classroom at Brookview Middle School. His classmates are discussing a book about bullying and racism. Beenie isn't paying attention.

His eyes stray from the teacher's. He looks across the room impatiently. The bell rings. Class ends. This child, dressed in the school uniform of a white T-shirt, blue school sweatshirt and blue pants, cockily gets up from the desk. He elbows his classmates out of the way.

Beenie is one of the students on principal Karl Subban's radar. If Subban doesn't get to Beenie and others at this Jane-Finch-area school soon, they may be lost to gangs, crime and drugs.

Simply: The future of these children is on the line.

So when school started last September, Subban encouraged Beenie and 40 other students, both boys and girls, to be part of an experiment: the school's first-ever hockey team. Think the 1960s movie To Sir with Love – only on ice; or more recently, Season Four of the gritty TV series The Wire, when teachers tried to rescue middle school students in West Baltimore from a drug-dealing life on the street.

The Brookview Heros hockey team is part of The Hockey Heros (Hockey Education Reaching Out Society) program – which runs in other Canadian cities including Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary. It teaches at-risk youth how to skate, shoot and pass. Ice time and hockey equipment are free, paid for with donations from corporations and the National Hockey League Players Association.

For these kids, hockey wasn't even in their lexicon when they first stepped on the ice. For them it was a "white man's sport." Basketball was their passion. It mirrored what they saw around them. Black men on television played basketball; in their neighbourhood they played b-ball or maybe soccer. These kids knew nothing about hockey. And most of their parents couldn't afford the steep fees and hefty equipment costs of the game.

But that changed with principal Subban, a Jamaican Canadian who has a passion for the sport and played the game as a teenager. His children also love the sport, including his son P.K., a member of Canada's gold-medal-winning Canadian national junior team.

"We're teaching them anything is possible," says 50-year-old Subban. It is a lesson repeated in other sports and music programs at the school, not just in hockey. But Subban is such an ardent hockey fan that his enthusiasm rubs off.

Six boys in Jones' class are members of the newly formed hockey team. The other nine students have chosen not to participate. The boys are shy, reluctant to say much about their participation on the team.

At one point Beenie and one of the girls in the class get into a tussle. He claims she has tried to cut his hair with a pair of scissors. Mark Babiy, one of the vice-principals, talks to Beenie in the corner. It is one of many chats Beenie has had with both Babiy and Subban throughout the school year. Beenie is defiant. He is the one being wronged, he insists. His take-no-prisoners manner is in sharp contrast to his boyish looks – his doelike eyes, sweet smile and four-foot-something frame.

But on the ice Beenie loses the hard-ass attitude.

He leaps onto the ice enthusiastically as he and the others are put through drills by Norm Flynn, the program's Vancouver-based founder. Flynn pays particular attention to Beenie, who he made one of the captains of the team.

"Skate, skate," shouts Flynn, 47, a former hockey player with the Lethbridge Broncos and Portland Winter Hawks. When the program first started many of these kids couldn't even skate. When they hit the ice last October some fell flat on their face, skimming along the surface like a puck. But slowly, with the help of Flynn and volunteers from Big Brothers Big Sisters of Toronto, they found their skating legs.

Flynn smiles as he watches them, proud. "We've really focused on the hockey basics," he explains. "A lot of kids at this age want to be independent. They end up doing things on their own rather than helping others." But that's slowly changing. "As the kids got to know each other on the ice they became a lot more supportive of each other rather than combative."

The message that anything is possible is also hammered home during a visit to the school by former NHL player Tony McKegney, who played with the Buffalo Sabres, the Quebec Nordiques and the St. Louis Blues. In a speech at a packed assembly he recounts how he – a black man – successfully played professional hockey. The usually raucous students listen attentively as McKegney tells them with pride that while with the Blues he became the first black player in NHL history to score 40 goals in a season.

He also talks candidly about racism on and off the ice. "Every day was a struggle," he says. "I was the only black person at my elementary school and high school (in Sarnia). Athletics was a way of being accepted." On the ice, he was called every name in the book. But he ignored it. "I was such an oddity. It was brutal. It was awful."

His words hit home. Beenie sits on the floor, beaming in his Brookview Heros hockey shirt. He listens intently to McKegney and afterwards asks for his autograph.

Subban wants all the kids at Brookview – whether on the team or not – to feel a sense of pride. Too often, fear and a sense of failure run through this community.

Brookview, at Jane St. and Driftwood Ave., is mere blocks from C.W. Jefferys Collegiate Institute, where 15-year-old Jordan Manners was shot in 2007. Many of the students, who are in Grades 6 to 8, come from troubled homes, without adequate supervision and financial resources. Some have no place to go after school. They panhandle at the Downsview subway station. It is a high-risk community, but also one of great potential.

Subban doesn't sugar-coat the world these kids live in. Children come to school hungry. Some come with unexplained wads of money, porn on their cells. They are often absent without reason. Many are disengaged from their school work and uninterested.

"I wanted to introduce them to a program that I thought might motivate them to do better in school," Subban explains.

"Hockey teaches them life skills. It teaches them how to work as a team. It teaches them there will be some struggles, but `Don't give up, you'll be faced with hardships and obstacles but persevere...' There are certain values they must work by: respect, discipline, listening and fun."

At the first intersquad game – where the kids play each other and get to show off their newly acquired skills – the enthusiasm for the sport and school generates a buzz. Brookview's Hockey Heros are finally getting a chance to strut their stuff. The stands at York University's arena – where the team practises – quickly fill up. Electricity builds as the students take to the ice. The crowd cheers. They chant: "Brookview, Brookview."

Principal Subban works the stands, encouraging the students to do the wave. Beenie scores the first goal a few minutes into the first period. He raises his stick in celebration. He is, for that brief moment, a hockey hero.

"Tears were in my eyes," says Brookview teacher Juliet Daniel. "Some of these kids, they used to get in trouble a lot, always in trouble, always on the wrong end of the stick. But hockey gave them something to do, something to learn, something to accomplish, something to strive for."

That was the case for 13-year-old Ottwaine Buchanan. He was having trouble at school. He was, to quote Subban, "an angry kid." But that is changing, says his mother Pamele Spence, a 37-year-old single mother of three. "I know he always says he's going to hockey and he's excited to go. Previously there was a lot of disciplinary stuff. But not this year."

Before the program, Ottwaine had never watched or played hockey. Now he understands the rules, can cite statistics and has a favourite player – the Calgary Flames' Jarome Iginla. He plays with skill and competency.

"At first, I felt like I was going to drop," says Ottwaine who, at 5 foot 8 inches, looks more man than child and boasts of his size 10 feet. But not any more. "I feel good, like I achieved something," he says. "I feel more confident. I can do more stuff."

"Since he started hockey, I noticed he started working more as a team," says Ottwaine's teacher, Juliet Daniel. "Group work is no longer a problem ... He's a lot more outspoken, not in a rude way. Before he used to be mouthy. Now when he talks it is with respect ... He has come a long way."

Says Subban: "With Ottwaine you can really see he has turned a new page. He's just a lot better and I'd like to think hockey had something to do with it."

The hockey program is not a panacea, however. A couple of months ago, Beenie was suspended from school for three days for talking back to a supply teacher and pushing over a chair.

However, a week after his suspension Beenie seemed back on track, staying a half-hour extra after school to finish his project for a Grade 7 science fair. For Subban, that's a glimmer of hope. Still, by season's end, any improvement in Beenie was marginal. There was less disruptive behaviour, less absenteeism, but he remained a discipline problem. And he is still at great risk, Subban admits.

Beenie is a "bit of a bully," adds his teacher Darlene Jones. "He loves to control things to make up for his size. But he's trying."

Says Subban: "I think with so many of these kids, we can't change them overnight. Let's face it, the hockey program isn't going to work miracles here. It's a long-term thing. The idea behind the hockey program is to introduce and reinforce the Heros values of respect, listening and fun ... When they leave, you want them to carry on those values." Read more!

Oakville parents claim French immersion bias

Halton group files claim, saying French schools have too many girls, few special needs students

Kristin Rushowy
Toronto Star
March 23, 2009

The handful of Oakville schools that only offer French immersion are driving students out of their neighbourhood in search of an English program and are also leading to "segregation" based on gender and ability, a group of parents charge.

Despite voicing their concerns and making many presentations to the Halton District School Board, the parents say their worries have not been addressed, and earlier this month filed a claim of discrimination
The French immersion schools typically have a higher population of girls and fewer special needs students.

"The French immersion program in (the board), as currently structured and housed, is having a significant and detrimental, discriminatory effect on students based on sex, ability and place of origin," says the March 10 letter of complaint to the Halton board's executive officer of human resources, signed by 20 parents and community members, most of them on school councils in Ward 4, north of the QEW around Third Line.

"Specifically, the French immersion program is having a discriminatory effect ... on special education students, ELL (or ESL) students, boys, core French students" and they cite the board's own policy against "indirect discrimination or systemic discrimination."

The board, however, says the programs are in response to the extraordinarily high demand for French immersion in Oakville – the only place such "single-track" schools are located within Halton – and that it is ultimately parents' decision to enrol or not enrol their children in French immersion.

The board's own website, however, does refer to the "natural streaming" that takes place.

Parents at École Forest Trail, which the board opened as French-immersion only, say concentrating the program in one location provides a better immersion experience for students, quality programming and stronger teaching and resources. They also say many walk-to-schools zones in the ward overlap so that families aren't always excluded from a neighbourhood school.

"Over the past five years, we've seen an increase of 1,500 students alone," much of it in the north end of Ward 4, says board superintendent Tricia Dyson, who oversees the area.

"In the southern part of Ward 4, the communities have matured, so some of the schools have available space ... adding to that is the Grade 1 uptake on French immersion – 40 per cent of children coming out of kindergarten in Ward 3 are choosing it. Five years ago, it was 25 per cent."

She said the board has "no worries" about segregation.

According to 2007-8 provincial data, there were no special education students in Grade 3 and 2 per cent in Grade 6 at Forest Trail and the proportion of girls was 62 and 63 per cent, respectively.

Compare that to nearby Captain R. Wilson public school, where 10 per cent of Grade 3 and 14 per cent of Grade 6 students were special education students. Girls comprised 47 per cent of Grade 3s, and just 45 per cent of Grade 6s.

Lesley Dalgarno, one of the group of parents who has gone before the board about the effects of French immersion, said she's worried for Pilgrim Wood, where her three children attend.

The board has proposed that it become a "dual-track" school – offering English and French immersion – in part to help ease overcrowding at École Forest Trail. If Pilgrim Wood were to offer English and French immersion, about 130 children would be uprooted from Forest Trail. A nearby school, Palermo, is to open in 2010 possibly as a dual-track. The board also says it would look at "imbalance" between the English and French programs in those schools every year. A vote is scheduled for Wednesday.

Delgarno, president of the Pilgrim Wood home and school association, says area parents have nothing against French immersion, but in the past schools that have moved to dual track tend to lose the English programming because the board puts no caps on French enrolment. The board also needs to consider admission by lottery to end the discrimination, she adds.

Area Trustee Kathryn Bateman-Olmstead, whose children attend Forest Trail, has proposed that Palermo open as French-immersion only to meet demand, something fellow parents at Forest Trail applaud.

She also said while some parents, at one time, might have been counselled not to put their children in French immersion, that has changed. She believes the French-immersion-only programs have kept schools open and fully enrolled, where they might not be otherwise.

In Halton, French immersion students study French for half the day and English the rest.

Doug Willms, an internationally recognized educational researcher at the University of New Brunswick, looked at the streaming effects of French immersion there. "It's not explicit," he said, "but it's de-facto streaming: parents of children who have higher ability and less behavioural problems are more likely to choose French immersion," as are more affluent families.

When school systems are segregated along social class lines or by student ability, then children from families of a low socioeconomic status and children of lower ability on average learn at a slower pace while students from families of higher socioeconomic status and with higher abilities tend to do only slightly better, he added. Read more!

Canadian Council on Learning Videos

The Canadian Council on Learning (CCL) is an independent, non-profit corporation that promotes and supports research to improve all aspects of learning—across the country and across all walks of life. CCL has created 5 knowledge centres to address 5 key areas of learning: Aboriginal Learning; Adult Learning; Early Childhood Learning; Health and Learning and Work and Learning.

Promising Practices is a series of five videos produced for the Canadian Council on Learnings 2006 Composite Learning Index. The series highlights effective lifelong learning practices across Canada in CCLs five main research areas: Health and Learning, Adult Learning, Work and Learning, Early Childhood Learning and Aboriginal Learning.

The Canadian Council on Learnings Adult Learning Knowledge Centre (AdLKC) is pleased to announce its launch of six short videos illustrating the power of adult learning. Each video provides a story on how adult learning has positively affected communities, individual learners and professional community-based organizations.

The Canadian Council on Learnings new Reading the Future report provides Canada's first projections of adult literacy levels, through to 2031; an unprecedented look at the face of low literacy; and effective approaches to improve literacy among six identified groups. Success stories: Turning the page on low literacy is a video series where the profiled adults explain what motivated them to improve their literacy skills and how that decision has changed their lives. http://www.ccl-cca.ca/CCL/Reports/ReadingFuture/

Evolving Education: Learning in the 21st Century is a three-part series that presents viewers with compelling questions about the way we educate students and offers successful, if provocative, answers. The series celebrates three case studies that reflect the ideas of John Abbott, an advocate of cognitive apprenticeship.

Read more!

A New High School, With College Mixed In

Would something like this be a benefit to Canadian high school students?

By JAVIER C. HERNANDEZ
New York Times
March 18, 2009

A school that officials are billing as a kind of hybrid between a high school and a community college is set to open in Brooklyn this fall.

At the five-year secondary school, called the City Polytechnic High School of Engineering, Architecture and Technology, graduating students would receive both a high school diploma and an associate’s degree.

The school will blend a curriculum focused on career and technical education with advanced courses in subjects like computer systems and architectural technology at the New York City College of Technology.

The new school is long overdue, said the city schools chancellor, Joel I. Klein, at a news conference Wednesday at Lehman College. Mr. Klein, along with Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, also announced increases in the number of public school graduates attending City University of New York schools like Lehman and the College of Technology.

Currently, 11 city schools allow high school students to earn college credit at CUNY before they graduate.

City Polytechnic, in Downtown Brooklyn, will be the first city high school to allow students to take college-level courses in professional areas like information technology and construction management.

Students will begin taking college material in their third year at City Polytechnic, and attend classes at the College of Technology in later years.

Officials say the new school makes the transition to college courses much easier, and shaves one year off the route to an associate’s degree.

Under a data-sharing agreement that began in August, the Department of Education has provided CUNY with course, grade and testing data for graduates of its schools, and CUNY has provided information to the city on how its graduates are faring in college.

The enrollment data released on Wednesday showed that since 2002, the number of public school graduates enrolling in CUNY has increased by 49 percent, to 24,354 from 16,342. Some of that is a result of a 35 percent increase in the overall number of students graduating from city schools, to 43,651 in 2007 from 32,261, in 2002, but city officials attributed the rest to increases in the high school graduation rate and the number of students taking the SAT.

The number of Hispanic public school graduates attending CUNY colleges and programs, in particular, has grown significantly. Last year, there were 8,777, up from 5,055 in 2002, an increase of 74 percent.

“People who say we have to dumb down just don’t get it,” Mr. Bloomberg said. “You raise the standards and people work up to those standards.”

But even after enrolling in college, many public school graduates require remedial instruction in reading, writing and math. In 2002, 82 percent of public school graduates at CUNY community colleges required such courses; in 2008, 74 percent did.

In an interview, Mr. Klein said education officials were concerned that so many students must relearn material from high school. But he said the city has renewed its efforts to establish higher standards, for instance, by requiring rigorous Regents diplomas for all students.

“We still need to make sure all our kids are college ready,” he said. “That’s what raising standards is about.”

CUNY officials expect record enrollments this fall, with more than 250,000 students. Officials say the economic crisis may cause students to bypass more expensive private schools.

Justin Simmons, a 2007 graduate of Brooklyn Technical High School who appeared at the news conference, said he was accepted at George Washington University in Washington, but chose to attend Lehman College because of financial reasons. “When times get hard,” he said, “people have to turn inwards, and reorganize their thinking.”

. Read more!

Improving Education For Aboriginal Students

McGuinty Government Building Stronger Relationships with Aboriginal Communities

The Ontario government and First Nation, Métis and Inuit organizations are working together to achieve better outcomes for Aboriginal students at all levels of learning.

Several new initiatives will help build stronger relationships and provide increasing opportunities for First Nation, Métis and Inuit students in Ontario. The Ontario government will:

* Provide $6 million in funding through the Access to Opportunities Strategy, to improve access to postsecondary opportunities and boost the number of Aboriginal graduates in Ontario.

* Work with the federal government and First Nation partners in talks about the future of Aboriginal postsecondary institutes in Ontario.

* Within the context of federal responsibility for on reserve Aboriginal education, work with the federal government and First Nation partners to improve the relationship between schools on reserve and provincially funded schools.

* Establish two new bodies to advise the Ontario government about Aboriginal education and training, including:
o A time-limited working table to provide advice about the development of a First Nation, Métis and Inuit Postsecondary Education and Training Policy Framework, and
o An advisory council on First Nation, Métis and Inuit Education to provide advice to the Minister of Education on the implementation of the Ontario First Nation, Métis and Inuit Education Policy Framework launched in 2007.

These new initiatives build on Ontario's Aboriginal Education Strategy and will help close the education gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal students.
Quotes

"As we work together to create strong relationships between the government and our Aboriginal partners, we are improving the educational opportunities for Aboriginal youth and creating a stronger, more inclusive education system for all students," said Minister of Education Kathleen Wynne.

"Ensuring that all Ontarians have access to valuable postsecondary education and training is our priority," said Training, Colleges and Universities Minister John Milloy. "We will continue to work closely with the Aboriginal communities across Ontario to ensure that all Aboriginal students in our province have access to the training, support, guidance and opportunities they need to reach their full academic and career potential."

"Closing the education gap between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal students is vital to ensuring greater success and opportunities for future generations," said Aboriginal Affairs Minister Brad Duguid. "Our province and Aboriginal communities will only grow stronger when everyone in Ontario can access quality education and training opportunities."
Quick Facts

* Almost 2,000 students are currently taking Native Language courses.
* The government invested $15.4M in Aboriginal postsecondary education initiatives within colleges, universities and Aboriginal institutions in 2008-09
* There are approximately 50,000 Aboriginal students in the Ontario publicly funded school system and approximately 11,000 Aboriginal students in Ontario enrolled in postsecondary education.



Read about the government's Aboriginal Education Strategy. Read more!

Graduation Rate Continues To Rise

McGuinty Government Building Future Prosperity Through Student Success
March 9, 2009

More students are graduating high school than ever before.

Last year, seventy-seven per cent of Ontario students graduated with a high school diploma, two percentage points more than in 2006-07. This represents an increase of nine percentage points – or 13,500 more students – compared to 2003-04.
Over the last five years, the province has introduced new programs that better engage high school students. Instead of using a one-size-fits-all approach, new programs allow students to customize their high school experience to match their strengths, interests and career goals. This creates a more engaging learning environment for students and better prepares them to pursue future opportunities beyond high school.

Ontario's higher graduation rate is building the foundation for a strong economy. By obtaining a high school diploma, students are staying on the right path to gain the skills and experience required for the jobs of tomorrow.
Quote

"The future prosperity of Ontario relies on our young people. We must give them the tools they need to be successful after high school."
– Kathleen Wynne, Minister of Education

"The Ontario business community firmly believes that our province must focus on economic renewal and business competitiveness and an educated workforce is paramount to achieving that goal. Higher high school graduation numbers are an important step towards success in the global competition for skills."
– Len Crispino, President and CEO of the Ontario Chamber of Commerce
Quick Facts

1. Since 2003-04, 36,000 additional students have achieved their high school diploma.
2. The province remains committed to achieving an 85 per cent graduation rate by 2010-11.
Read more!

Exercise Balls Instead of Chairs in the Classroom?

HWSDB
February 17, 2009
It’s true. SAGE students are on the ball, literally. Students in Grades 2 to 5 are sitting on exercise balls instead of chairs in their classroom.

Teacher Karen Must, with the support from the school and Principal Gary Poot, quickly turned this idea into a pilot initiative when SAGE (Scholastics, Arts and Global Education) at Strathcona Elementary consulted with a local physiotherapist to outlining the benefits of replacing chairs with exercise balls.

Why exercise balls? Karen identified that sitting on exercise balls strengthens the core of the body and helps the students settle and calm down. With the children moving and rolling, spinal fluid travels freely up and down the spine which replenishes the brain.

Of course there has to be an etiquette established when students use the balls and the following safety rules have been established:
1. Two feet must be on the floor at all times in order to balance the balls.
2. No bouncing while chewing food.
3. Balls are chairs and not to be thrown.
4. When lessons are taught rolling on the balls is allowed. During DPA (Daily Physical Activity) you can bounce and roll.
5. Have fun sitting on balls!

Another benefit of the exercise balls is that Karen and the other SAGE teachers no longer have to worry about screeching chair sounds. Students are free to move around in an easy manner and this goes a long way to help the students who fidget the most.

Last year one exercise ball was lost due to an unfortunate pencil piercing incident, but no other accidents have been reported. Read more!

Needy schools redefined

More accurate measure of hurdles students face ignores where they live and if they are immigrants
Louise Brown
Toronto Star
March 17, 2009

The map of poverty across Toronto schools no longer counts apartments and immigrants.

In a new way of measuring the socio-economic hurdles faced at different schools, the Toronto District School Board now takes a deeper look at family income and parent education than ever before, but ignores the type of housing students live in and whether they are immigrants.

Experts say living in an apartment does not mean a student is necessarily at risk of struggling at school, nor does the fact they are new to Canada or that they switched schools in the past year.

The changes have redrawn the map of educational risk across the city with some schools, such as Scarborough's Woburn Junior Public School – whose rating has fallen from the most needy of all 475 grade schools in 2007 to 122nd under the new scale – now eligible for less money for students at risk.

Others, such as Dorset Park Public School – up to 101 from 223 in 2007 – are eligible for more funding.

"Will some schools be upset? Yes, but only until they realize these factors really paint a more accurate picture of which communities need more help," said Scarborough trustee Scott Harrison, who represents both Woburn and Dorset Park schools.

The board gives extra money to schools at the high end of the needs scale – the Learning Opportunities Index – to allow smaller classes and more help for students.

But you can't gauge need by apartment blocks, warned Peter Gooch, the board's director of strategy, policy and planning.

"We now know a sea of apartment buildings can include high-end condos, while a single-family dwelling may house a number of families, so we've dropped housing from our calculations altogether," he said.

Moreover, immigrants from some regions such as South Asia and East Asia often do better at school than many born in Canada, he noted, so being an immigrant cannot be seen as a roadblock in itself.

"Some immigrants speak English and some can't. Some are poor and some are not. Some are educated and some aren't. It's too broad a factor to predict how a child will do," says economist Enid Slack, of the University of Toronto, who helped redesign the yardstick the board uses to measure students at risk.

"And the board also has stopped counting students who have switched schools in the past year," she said, "because it proved to tell us very little about how students perform."

The Ontario government gave school boards $413 million this year in Learning Opportunities Grants, of which Toronto's public schools got about $123 million.

Thorncliffe Park Elementary School, tucked in a burst of highrises 10 times more crowded than the average Toronto neighbourhood and housing families from Pakistan, India and the world, is now ranked 175th most needy, down from 14th place in 2007, when apartments and immigrants were part of the equation.

"Thorncliffe Park still ranks as a school with high need, but because of its stable, two-parent families with university degrees and low rate of social assistance, it has fallen down the list relative to other schools," says Gooch.

Harrison said Woburn Junior Public School fell in ranking when the immigrant factor was scrapped, "partly because the majority of parents have high levels of education even though they may be immigrants, and many have low income," he said.

"They can be lawyers and doctors who aren't accredited here in Canada, but that doesn't mean their children face particular burdens," he said.

"The new index better reflects the social and economic world students live in."

Based on neighbourhood data culled from the Canadian Census and Canada Revenue Agency, the board has sharpened how it tracks students' family background to include:

* The percentage of families who live below Statistics Canada's "low income measure," which is half the median income of all Canadians.
* The percentage of families who earn at least some income from social assistance.
* The percentage of families whose parents do not have a high school diploma.
* The percentage of families whose parents have at least one university degree. Read more!

An Introduction to Project Learning

A brief overview of the benefits of a hands-on approach to teaching in which students create schoolwork that demonstrates core subject knowledge.
Read more!

'Merit pay' for teachers

'Merit pay' for teachers garners praise from Barack Obama and local schools
by Barri Bronston, The Times-Picayune
Saturday March 14, 2009,

When Barack Obama delivered the first education policy speech of his presidency last week, including a plug for paying teachers bonuses based on student achievement, he struck a chord with Karen Bucher.

The principal of Hazel Park/Hilda Knoff Elementary School in River Ridge has been running a "pay for performance" program for six years, and she credits it for helping make Hazel Park the top-rated campus among all non-magnet elementary schools in Jefferson Parish.

"It's the teachers," Bucher said. "They work together. They've built a camaraderie. I truly believe that having an effective teacher in the classroom is the most important thing in a child's education."

Performance pay, also known as merit pay, remains a controversial topic in United States public schools 10 years after it was introduced on a large scale in Denver. Since then it has gained some traction, and Louisiana now has 28 schools participating in the national Teacher Advancement Program, including two in Jefferson Parish, two in St. Bernard Parish, six in the Recovery School District in New Orleans and all nine in the Algiers Charter Schools Association. Fourteen more Louisiana schools are considering it.

St. Tammany Parish school officials are looking into starting an incentive pay program, and St. John the Baptist Parish school officials said they would consider the idea. There are no such plans in St. Charles Parish, where public schools are among the highest performers in Louisiana and teachers among the highest paid.

"I do think the notion of incentive pay is a good one," said St. John Superintendent Courtney Millet. "However, the challenge is making sure that an incentive type pay plan is one that is fair, equitable and appropriate."

Unions skeptical
Fairness is one of the chief concerns of teacher unions, which have historically opposed performance pay in favor of raises for all teachers. For such a program to be successful, said Joe Potts, president of the Jefferson Federation of Teachers, administrators must set realistic goals and be upfront as to how the program will be implemented.

"Otherwise, teachers start feeling like they bought into a bill of goods," he said. "Then you start losing the enthusiasm and respect for administrators. The whole key is in how it is presented."

At Hazel Park, agreement from 75 percent of the faculty was needed to start the program. Teachers who objected were offered positions in other schools.

Despite some initial trepidation, the program seems to be working, Potts said. That's partly because bonuses, which range from $1,000 to $3,300, are based on how much students grow academically from year to year, as opposed to how high they score on standardized tests in single year.

Louisiana schools in the Teacher Advancement Program are using a model designed by the Milken Family Foundation of Santa Monica, Calif. It aims to boost student achievement through professional development, teacher assessments and monetary rewards.

Each teacher is eligible for a bonus based on a formula: 30 percent coming from the school's overall performance score growth, 20 percent from score growth of students in the individual teacher's classroom and 50 percent from observations of the classroom by the teacher's peers four times each year.

'Out to get them'
The classroom evaluations were not universally embraced when Hazel Park started the program in 2003, Bucher said.

Previously, teachers were evaluated once a year for the first three years then once every three years unless a problem arose or a teacher changed grade level or school. But now Bucher said, "teachers were getting evaluated four times a year, and it took time for them to get to used to people coming in their classroom and to realize that no one was out to get them. It's a very supportive program to help teachers improve."

Since starting the program, Hazel Park's school performance score -- a function of standardized testing, attendance and drop-out rates -- has risen from 87.6 to 107.7.

The Algiers Charter Schools Association did not have the same kinds of adjustment difficulties because the Teacher Advancement Program was written into the charters of each school when they were reconstituted after Hurricane Katrina, said Kevin Guitterrez, the association's chief academic officer. Teachers accepted positions knowing the program would be an integral part of the schools' culture.

"There weren't the challenges that you might have in an established school," he said. "All of our people and goals pointed toward supporting TAP. As a result, we've had serious student achievement gains."

James Meza, education dean at the University of New Orleans, said the gains that many Teacher Advancement Program schools are enjoying could eventually level off and, with the transience common in urban schools, actually drop.

"Regardless of a teacher's performance, test scores tend to be very unstable predictors," Meza said. "But it doesn't mean the teacher's performance is any less. It's something we will have to track over an extended period of time."

Help from peers
One of the cornerstones of the program is a weekly cluster meeting led by a specially appointed master teacher. The session lasts 90 minutes and lets teachers discuss specific student needs as well as research-based instructional strategies. Master and mentor teachers are available to provide follow-up support in the classrooms.

"I love it," said Olivia Barre, a first-year teacher at Hazel Park. "I can go to anyone for help. I can't imagine being in a school that doesn't have it." Dwanlynette Price, a first grade teacher at Hazel Park, said, she looks forward to the meetings because she knows she will leave with proven classroom techniques.

Last week, she took her students to the play yard, where she led them on an adjective hunt. In teams of two, they scattered across the field, jotting on clipboards such findings as a "small rock," a "long stick" and a "big tree."

Price said the performance pay bonuses have been nice. But more important, she said, the program "has taught me that engagement is vital.

"It's not so much lecture, lecture, lecture. (Students) need to discover. They need to own what they're doing, and if they own it, they will retain it." Read more!

Legislation to force teachers to report school violence overdue: critics

ROMINA MAURINO
Canadian Press
March 12, 2009

TORONTO — Proposed legislation forcing teachers to report serious incidents to school principals is long overdue and should include ways to deal with the causes of violence, opposition critics said Thursday.

Progressive Conservative Elizabeth Witmer said children who are bullied or harassed at school have spent too many years fending for themselves.

"It is time, it is overdue, that this government demonstrate leadership, and take every possible step to protect our students," Witmer said.

"This a dark part of our education system that we need to continue to address.".
While she welcomed the step, Witmer told the legislature she's disappointed the proposed changes will only take effect next February — not at the start of the school year in September.

NDP education critic Rosario Marchese said his party will support the bill, but wants it to also address the causes of violence.

"Mandatory reporting doesn't deal with the issues that we should be talking about," like mental illness and substance abuse, Marchese said.

"Some of these kids are sexually abused and some of these kids bring the violence into the school."

The proposed bill will clarify the role of all school staff and enhance guidelines about reporting incidents of homophobia, sexual harassment and inappropriate sexual behaviour.

The new rules mean teachers would have to report to a principal any incidents of violence that may result in suspension or expulsion, and the principal would have to report it to parents.

"Principals cannot act on these behaviours if they do now know they are happening," Education Minister Kathleen Wynne said in introducing the legislation.

"Students should feel comfortable reporting incidents to staff, knowing that they will be followed up on."

If passed, Ontario would be the first province in Canada with legislation of this kind, Wynne said.

The legislation follows a report calling for action to prevent violence and harassment among students and to make it easier for schools to report problems.

An earlier report by lawyer Julian Falconer, who led a school safety panel convened after 15-year-old Jordan Manners was fatally shot in his Toronto school in May 2007, uncovered an alarming number of unreported incidents of violence and sexual harassment at Toronto schools.

That report concluded many of the more than 250,000 students at Toronto public schools contend daily with a "culture of fear" that pervades many of the city's secondary-school institutions. Read more!

Race and poverty matter as early as Grade 3

First study finds learning gap starts at tender age in some groups
February 28, 2009
Toronto Star
Kristin Rushowy

Students who live in poverty or come from certain racial backgrounds are falling behind in school as early as Grade 3, says a groundbreaking survey of Toronto's public elementary schools.

With such a diverse student body – just one-quarter report two Canadian-born parents and less than half learn English as a first language – the survey found while there are high achievers from all backgrounds, there is a big overall gap when children are as young as 8.

"All parents have high expectations for their children," says the report, released yesterday. "Indeed ... 95 per cent said that they wanted their child to complete further education beyond high school, particularly university."

However, "at this early age, there are already differences between the achievement of some children based on student and family background characteristics, with some of the largest gaps" seen among black, Latin American and Middle Eastern students.

Gerry Connelly, the board's director of education, said the results confirm that lower-income families "face other challenges as they are more likely to be single parents, immigrants to Canada, have low educational attainment and come from racialized groups."

"Poverty in this city is not new, but it is growing at an alarming rate," she said, noting half of the families surveyed earn less than $50,000 a year.

"This requires a call to action on all of our parts. For the (board), it means we need to continue to find ways to close that achievement gap so that our students have the skills, knowledge, hope and positive job choices to be successful.

"It also means we need to advocate for better nutrition programs, housing and social services."

The board is already addressing the gap through programs, such as the Model Schools for Inner Cities, which pumps extra money and resources into schools in high-needs areas and provides free and low-cost snack and meal programs, as well as creating a more diverse curriculum and starting up a new black-focused, or Africentric, school this fall.

When asked if the board can overcome the hurdles students have in their home lives, Connelly said she "feels strongly that when students come to school, they spend six to eight hours in school, and we can, and must, make a difference ... we can level the playing field."

More than 95,000 parents of students in kindergarten to Grade 6 – or more than two-thirds – completed the voluntary, wide-ranging survey, which went out last spring and asked about everything from income to education levels to feelings about safety or the need for snack programs.

Most families reported high satisfaction with their schools and said their children feel safe there.

The board has linked the survey information to provincial test scores, and will use it to provide programming where it's most needed. Individual schools will receive their results in the coming weeks.

The data is so detailed that the board knows that black students whose parents emigrated from Africa tend to do better on the province's standardized tests than black students whose parents were born in Canada or the Caribbean.

This survey follows on the heels of one completed by middle and secondary students in 2007 that asked about everything from racial background, to sexual orientation, to whether they felt safe in their schools, which the majority said they did. Connelly said following that survey, the board set firm targets to lower dropout rates among at-risk teens.

Superintendent Jeff Hainbuch said he learned from the secondary survey that Spanish-speaking parents "were feeling a disconnect" with the schools he oversees, so a network was created for them to arrange information nights and other events.

For elementary students, however, the achievement gap is the biggest concern, Connelly said.

The survey notes a "consistent gap" in standardized test results between students living with two parents and those in single-parent families.

But the "biggest discrepancies are among different racial groups, followed by income groups," the report, by researchers Janet O'Reilly and Maria Yau, notes.

It's not that those falling behind are new to Canada; in fact, almost 80 per cent of students in Grades 1 to 3 were born here.

The survey's authors recommend schools "pay extra attention" and reach out to parents and communities for help, and notes that extracurricular activities, homework programs, vision and hearing tests are needed to support children once they get to school.

They also call for early learning programs for preschoolers and parents. Read more!

Students Stand When Called Upon, and When Not

By SUSAN SAULNY
New York Times
February 24, 2009

MARINE ON ST. CROIX, Minn. — From the hallway, Abby Brown’s sixth-grade classroom in a little school here about an hour northeast of Minneapolis has the look of the usual one, with an American flag up front and children’s colorful artwork decorating the walls. But inside, an experiment is going on that makes it among the more unorthodox public school classrooms in the country, and pupils are being studied as much as they are studying. Unlike children almost everywhere, those in Ms. Brown’s class do not have to sit and be still. Quite the contrary, they may stand and fidget all class long if they want.

And they do. On one recent morning, while 11-year-old Nick Raboin had his eye on his math problems, Ms. Brown was noticing that he preferred to shift his weight from one foot to the other as he figured out his fractions. She also knew that his classmate Roxy Cotter liked to stand more than sit. And Brett Leick is inclined to lean on a high stool and swing his right foot under a desk that is near chest level. Helps with concentration, he and Ms. Brown say.

The children in Ms. Brown’s class, and in some others at Marine Elementary School and additional schools nearby, are using a type of adjustable-height school desk, allowing pupils to stand while they work, that Ms. Brown designed with the help of a local ergonomic furniture company two years ago. The stand-up desk’s popularity with children and teachers spread by word of mouth from this small town to schools in Wisconsin, across the St. Croix River. Now orders for the desks are being filled for districts from North Carolina to California.

“Sometimes when I’m supertired, I sit,” Nick said. “But most of the time I like to stand.”

The stand-up desks come with swinging footrests, and with adjustable stools allowing children to switch between sitting and standing as their moods dictate.

“At least you can wiggle when you want to,” said Sarah Langer, 12.

With multiple classrooms filled with stand-up desks, Marine Elementary finds itself at the leading edge of an idea that experts say continues to gain momentum in education: that furniture should be considered as seriously as instruction, particularly given the rise in childhood obesity and the decline in physical education and recess.

Dr. James A. Levine, a professor of medicine at the Mayo Clinic, advocates what he calls “activity-permissive” classrooms, including stand-up desks.

“Having many children sit in a classroom isn’t the craziest idea, but look at how children have changed,” Dr. Levine said of the sedentary lives of many. “We also have to change, to meet their needs.”

Teachers in Minnesota and Wisconsin say they know from experience that the desks help give children the flexibility they need to expend energy and, at the same time, focus better on their work rather than focusing on how to keep still.

Researchers should soon know whether they can confirm those calorie-burning and scholastic benefits. Two studies under way at the University of Minnesota are using data collected from Ms. Brown’s classroom and others in Minnesota and Wisconsin that are using the new desks. The pupils being studied are monitored while using traditional desks as well, and the researchers are looking for differences in physical activity and academic achievement.

“We can’t say for sure that this has an impact on those two things, but we’re hypothesizing that they may,” said Beth A. Lewis of the School of Kinesiology, or movement science, at the University of Minnesota. “I think we’re so used to the traditional classroom it’s taken a while for people to start thinking outside the box. I think it’s just a matter of breaking the mold.”

While adult-size workstations that allow for standing are commonplace, options for young students are not, and until now, data on the educational effect of movement in the classroom have been scant. But at Marine Elementary, the principal, Lynn Bormann, feels as if she need not wait for the research results.

“We just know movement is good for kids,” Ms. Bormann said. “We can measure referrals to the office, sick days, whatever it might be. Teachers are seeing positive things.”

Marine Elementary lies in a small, fitness-minded, high-achieving school district where experimentation is encouraged. Ms. Bormann bought the desks with money from several grants awarded to the school, which is now in its second full year of using them.

Ms. Brown says she got the idea for the stand-up desks after 20 years of teaching in which she watched children struggle to contain themselves at small hard desks, and after reading some of Dr. Levine’s work.

“As an option,” she said, “it gives students choices, and they feel empowered. It’s not anything to force on anybody. Teachers have to do what fits their comfort level. But this makes sense to me.”

At Somerset Middle School in nearby Somerset, Wis., the children in Pam Seekel’s fifth-grade class rotate in their use of both traditional and stand-up desks.

“At a stand-up desk,” Ms. Seekel said, “I’ve never seen students with their heads down, ever. It helps with being awake, if they can stand, it seems. And for me as a teacher, I can stand at their level to help them. I’m not bent over. I can’t think of one reason why a classroom teacher wouldn’t want these.”

Pat Reisenger, director of the Education Minnesota Foundation, a teachers’ union arm that awarded Marine Elementary its first grant to buy stand-up desks, is eagerly awaiting the results of the studies.

The new desks have “become something, to be honest, of a fad,” Ms. Reisenger said.

“We’re talking about furniture here,” she said, “plain old furniture. If it’s that simple, if it turns out to have the positive impacts everyone hopes for, wouldn’t that be a wonderful thing?” Read more!

Ted Talks- Brewster Kahle: A digital library, free to the world

Brewster Kahle is building a truly huge digital library -- every book ever published, every movie ever released, all the strata of web history ... It's all free to the public -- unless someone else gets to it first.
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Student Expectations Seen as Causing Grade Disputes

By MAX ROOSEVELT
New York Times
February 17, 2009

Prof. Marshall Grossman has come to expect complaints whenever he returns graded papers in his English classes at the University of Maryland.

“Many students come in with the conviction that they’ve worked hard and deserve a higher mark,” Professor Grossman said. “Some assert that they have never gotten a grade as low as this before.”

He attributes those complaints to his students’ sense of entitlement.

“I tell my classes that if they just do what they are supposed to do and meet the standard requirements, that they will earn a C,” he said. “That is the default grade. They see the default grade as an A.”

A recent study by researchers at the University of California, Irvine, found that a third of students surveyed said that they expected B’s just for attending lectures, and 40 percent said they deserved a B for completing the required reading.

“I noticed an increased sense of entitlement in my students and wanted to discover what was causing it” said Ellen Greenberger, the lead author of the study, called “Self-Entitled College Students: Contributions of Personality, Parenting, and Motivational Factors,” which appeared last year in The Journal of Youth and Adolescence.

Professor Greenberger said that the sense of entitlement could be related to increased parental pressure, competition among peers and family members and a heightened sense of achievement anxiety.

Aaron M. Brower, the vice provost for teaching and learning at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, offered another theory.

“I think that it stems from their K-12 experiences,” Professor Brower said. “They have become ultra-efficient in test preparation. And this hyper-efficiency has led them to look for a magic formula to get high scores.”

James Hogge, associate dean of the Peabody School of Education at Vanderbilt University, said: “Students often confuse the level of effort with the quality of work. There is a mentality in students that ‘if I work hard, I deserve a high grade.’ “

In line with Dean Hogge’s observation are Professor Greenberger’s test results. Nearly two-thirds of the students surveyed said that if they explained to a professor that they were trying hard, that should be taken into account in their grade.

Jason Greenwood, a senior kinesiology major at the University of Maryland echoed that view.

“I think putting in a lot of effort should merit a high grade,” Mr. Greenwood said. “What else is there really than the effort that you put in?”

“If you put in all the effort you have and get a C, what is the point?” he added. “If someone goes to every class and reads every chapter in the book and does everything the teacher asks of them and more, then they should be getting an A like their effort deserves. If your maximum effort can only be average in a teacher’s mind, then something is wrong.”

Sarah Kinn, a junior English major at the University of Vermont, agreed, saying, “I feel that if I do all of the readings and attend class regularly that I should be able to achieve a grade of at least a B.”

At Vanderbilt, there is an emphasis on what Dean Hogge calls “the locus of control.” The goal is to put the academic burden on the student.

“Instead of getting an A, they make an A,” he said. “Similarly, if they make a lesser grade, it is not the teacher’s fault. Attributing the outcome of a failure to someone else is a common problem.”

Additionally, Dean Hogge said, “professors often try to outline the ‘rules of the game’ in their syllabi,” in an effort to curb haggling over grades.

Professor Brower said professors at Wisconsin emphasized that students must “read for knowledge and write with the goal of exploring ideas.”

This informal mission statement, along with special seminars for freshmen, is intended to help “re-teach students about what education is.”

The seminars are integrated into introductory courses. Examples include the conventional, like a global-warming seminar, and the more obscure, like physics in religion.

The seminars “are meant to help students think differently about their classes and connect them to real life,” Professor Brower said.

He said that if students developed a genuine interest in their field, grades would take a back seat, and holistic and intrinsically motivated learning could take place.

“College students want to be part of a different and better world, but they don’t know how,” he said. “Unless teachers are very intentional with our goals, we play into the system in place.” Read more!