February 12, 2012
Alan Schwarz
Sixty educators from across the nation roamed the halls and ringed the rooms of East Mooresville Intermediate School, searching for the secret formula. They found it in Erin Holsinger’s fifth-grade math class.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/13/education/mooresville-school-district-a-laptop-success-story.html?_r=2&hp
February 8, 2012
School reform advocates are rightly encouraged by new data showing that New York City students at small, specialized high schools are more likely to graduate than students in large, traditional high schools.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/09/opinion/successes-of-small-schools.html
February 8, 2012
Graeme Paton
Tony Little said teachers were often unable to innovate because of the demands of official inspections and the need to get pupils into leading universities. He warned that schools in Britain were less independent than those in the United States which have more freedom to validate and run their own courses.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/9067441/Schools-held-back-by-university-demands-says-Eton-head.html
February 4, 2012
Tamar Lewin
This is the University of Washington’s new math: 18 percent of its freshmen come from abroad, most from China. Each pays tuition of $28,059, about three times as much as students from Washington State.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/05/education/international-students-pay-top-dollar-at-us-colleges.html?ref=education
February 4, 2012
Annie Murphy Paul
THE word “dyslexia” evokes painful struggles with reading, and indeed this learning disability causes much difficulty for the estimated 15 percent of Americans affected by it. Since the phenomenon of “word blindness” was first documented more than a century ago, scientists have searched for the causes of dyslexia, and for therapies to treat it.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/05/opinion/sunday/the-upside-of-dyslexia.html
January 31, 2012
Katie Ash
The flow of venture capital into the K-12 education market has exploded over the past year, reaching its highest transaction values in a decade in 2011, industry observers say.
What You (Really) Need to Know
January 20, 2012
Lawrence H. Summers
A PARADOX of American higher education is this: The expectations of leading universities do much to define what secondary schools teach, and much to establish a template for what it means to be an educated man or woman. College campuses are seen as the source for the newest thinking and for the generation of new ideas, as society’s cutting edge.
Boys raised by traditional families ‘do better at school’
January 12, 2012
Mary Beard
The year 2011 has been an unusually good one for the late Terence Rattigan: Frank Langella starred on Broadway in his play Man and Boy (a topical tale of the collapse of a financier), its first production in New York since the 1960s; and a movie of The Deep Blue Sea, featuring Rachel Weisz as the wife of a judge who goes off with a pilot, premiered at the end of November in the UK and opens in the US in December.
http://www.nybooks.com/shared/a696d45da04e0f98b0c1298047f154e5
Music Training Enhances Children’s Verbal Intelligence
January 4th, 2012
Tom Jacobs
A just-published study from Canada suggests early music education stimulates a child’s brain, leading to improved performance in an entirely different arena – verbal intelligence.
http://www.miller-mccune.com/education/music-training-enhances-childrens-verbal-intelligence-36701/
Textbooks ‘being replaced by smartphones and e-readers’
December 28, 2011
Graeme Paton
Traditional textbooks are dying out in schools as children increasingly rely on smartphones and e-readers to access information, according to a leading headmistress.
Online Learning Personalized
December 4, 2011
Somini Sengupta
SAN JOSE, Calif. — Jesse Roe, a ninth-grade math teacher at a charter school here called Summit, has a peephole into the brains of each of his 38 students. He can see that a girl sitting against the wall is zipping through geometry exercises; that a boy with long curls over his eyes is stuck on a lesson on long equations; and that another boy in the front row is getting a handle on probability.
The New Digital Divide
December 3, 2011
Susan P. Crawford
FOR the second year in a row, the Monday after Thanksgiving — so-called Cyber Monday, when online retailers offer discounts to lure holiday shoppers — was the biggest sales day of the year, totaling some $1.25 billion and overwhelming the sales figures racked up by brick-and-mortar stores three days before, on Black Friday, the former perennial record-holder.
With Blocks, Educators Go Back to Basics
November 27, 2011
Kyle Spencer
Huddled together on the reading rug of a prekindergarten classroom on the Upper West Side, three budding builders assembled a multilayered church with a Gothic arch. Nearby, another block artist created a castle with a connecting courtyard. Meanwhile, a fifth toiled earnestly on a shaky tower, eliciting oohs and aahs from across the room when it came tumbling down.
School ‘Reform’: A Failing Grade
September 29, 2011
Diane Ravitch
It is a well-known fact that American education is in crisis. Black and Hispanic children have lower test scores than white and Asian children. The performance of American students on international tests is mediocre.
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2011/sep/29/school-reform-failing-grade/
Steven Pearlstein: Mark them tardy to the revolution
May 28th, 2011
Ever since the first elementary school teacher rolled the first television set into the first classroom to air the first course offering from “educational television,” there’s been the hope and the promise that technology would revolutionize the way teaching and learning would be done.
Dan Meyer: Math class needs a makeover
Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity
Obama’s Right-Wing School Reform
Diane Ravitch
Recently, I wrote a book, The Death and Life of the Great American School System, in which I took issue with a number of currently popular education strategies that I had once supported, and now, seeing their questionable outcomes, challenge.
http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2010/jun/10/obamas-right-wing-school-reform/
Prince Charles’s elite teachers will bring back Chaucer and the Crusades
November 6th, 2011
Secondary school teachers will be taught by top historians and literary dons at Cambridge University as part of a two year master’s degree in advanced subject teaching.
Grading the Teachers
October 22nd, 2011
Bill and Melinda Gates
America’s schoolteachers are some of the most brilliant, driven and highly skilled people working today—exactly the kind of people we want shaping young minds. But they are stuck in a system that doesn’t treat them like professionals.
Bullying as True Drama
By Danah Boyd and Alice Marwick, The New York Times (from September 22, 2011)
“The suicide of Jamey Rodemeyer, the 14-year-old boy from western New York who killed himself last Sunday after being tormented by his classmates for being gay, is appalling. His story is a classic case of bullying: he was aggressively and repeatedly victimized. Horrific episodes like this have sparked conversations about cyberbullying and created immense pressure on regulators and educators to do something, anything, to make it stop. Yet in the rush to find a solution, adults are failing to recognize how their conversations about bullying are often misaligned with youth narratives. Adults need to start paying attention to the language of youth if they want antibullying interventions to succeed.”
How to Stop the Drop in Verbal Scores
By E.D. Hirsch, The New York Times (from September 18, 2011)
“The latest bad but unsurprising news on education is that reading and writing scores on the SAT have once again declined. The language competence of our high schoolers fell steeply in the 1970s and has never recovered. A decline in reading and writing scores on the SAT demonstrate that current reform strategies focused on testing and improving teacher quality are not enough.”
How To Help Your Child’s Brain Grow Up Strong
National Public Radio (from September 14, 2011)
“Babies may look helpless, but as soon as they come into the world, they’re able to do a number of important things. They can recognize faces and moving objects. They’re attracted to language. And from very early on, they can differentiate their mother from other humans. Aamodt and fellow neuroscientist Sam Wang explain how the human brain develops from infancy to adolescence in their new book, Welcome to Your Child’s Brain. The two researchers also offer tips for parents to help their children eat their spinach, learn their ABCs and navigate elementary school.”
http://www.npr.org/2011/09/14/140340903/how-to-help-your-childs-brain-grow-up-strong
Study: Single-sex education may do more harm than good
By Michael Alison Chandler, The Washington Post (from September 22, 2011)
“The push for more single-sex instruction in public schools is based on weak, “misconstrued” scientific claims rather than solid research and may do more harm than good, according to a study published in the journal Science on Thursday. The authors, a group that includes psychologists, child development specialists and a neuroscientist who specializes in gender, argue that while excellent single-sex schools exist, there is “no empirical evidence that their success stems from their single-sex organization,” as opposed to the quality of students, the curriculum or short-lived motivation that comes from “novelty and belief in innovation.”
Private Schools ‘preparing to dump the National Curriculum’
By Graeme Paton, The Telegraph(from May 30, 2011)
“But Nicholas Oulton, a former classics teacher and managing director of Galore Park, the education publishing firm behind the independent curriculum, said the private sector “could not wait” for Government reforms that were “unlikely to fit their…”
What if the Secret to Success Is Failure?
Why our children’s success — and happiness — may depend less on perfect performance than on learning how to deal with failure.
By Paul Tough, New York Times Education Issue, (from September 14, 2011
“Dominic Randolph can seem a little out of place at Riverdale Country School — which is odd, because he’s the headmaster. Riverdale is one of New York City’s most prestigious private schools, with a 104-year-old campus that looks down grandly on Van Cortlandt Park from the top of a steep hill in the richest part of the Bronx. On the discussion boards of UrbanBaby.com, worked-up moms from the Upper East Side argue over whether Riverdale sends enough seniors to Harvard, Yale and Princeton to be considered truly “TT” (top-tier, in UrbanBabyese), or whether it is more accurately labeled “2T” (second-tier), but it is, certainly, part of the city’s private-school elite, a place members of the establishment send their kids to learn to be members of the establishment. Tuition starts at $38,500 a year, and that’s for prekindergarten.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/18/magazine/what-if-the-secret-to-success-is-failure.html
Technology in Schools Faces Questions on Value
By Matt Richtel, New York Times, (from September 3, 2011)
CHANDLER, Ariz. — “Amy Furman, a seventh-grade English teacher here, roams among 31 students sitting at their desks or in clumps on the floor. They’re studying Shakespeare’s “As You Like It” — but not in any traditional way.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/04/technology/technology-in-schools-faces-questions-on-value.html
Will Students Take a Mental Health Test?
By Laura Landro, Wall Street Journal, (from August 30, 2011)
“As they return to classes this week, ninth-graders in Wisconsin’s Fond du Lac school district will be sent home with something for parents to sign besides the usual forms for sports activities and field trips: a consent for their children to undergo a mental-health screening
With rising concern about adolescent depression and suicide, more schools are turning to screening tests to identify those at risk and, if necessary, help them get treatment. Voluntary screenings are being offered through school health classes, school-based health clinics and community agencies, which then can refer children for diagnosis and treatment to school psychologists or local health care providers.”
School Curriculum Falls Short on Bigger Lessons
By Tara Parker-Pope, New York Times (from September 5, 2011)
“Many child development experts worry that the ever-growing emphasis on academic performance means many children aren’t developing life skills like motivation, focus and resilience, predictors of long-term success. Many child development experts worry that the answer may be no. They say the ever-growing emphasis on academic performance and test scores means many children aren’t developing life skills like self-control, motivation, focus and resilience, which are far better predictors of long-term success than high grades. And it may be distorting their and their parents’ values.”
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/05/school-curriculum-falls-short-on-bigger-lessons/
Reaping the Rewards 0f Risk-Taking
By Steve Lohr, New York Times, (from August 27, 2011)
“SINCE Steven P. Jobs resigned as chief executive of Apple last Wednesday, much has been said about him as a peerless corporate leader who has created immense wealth for shareholders, and guided the design of hit products that are transforming entire industries, like music and mobile communications.”‘All true, but let’s think different, to borrow the Apple marketing slogan of years back. Let’s look at Mr. Jobs as a role model.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/28/technology/steve-jobs-and-the-rewards-of-risk-taking.html
The Sugary Secret of Self-Control
By Steven Pinker, New York Times, (from September 2, 2011)
“Ever since Adam and Eve ate the apple, Ulysses had himself tied to the mast, the grasshopper sang while the ant stored food and St. Augustine prayed “Lord make me chaste — but not yet,” individuals have struggled with self-control. In today’s world this virtue is all the more vital, because now that we have largely tamed the scourges of nature, most of our troubles are self-inflicted. We eat, drink, smoke and gamble too much, max out our credit cards, fall into dangerous liaisons and become addicted to heroin, cocaine and e-mail.”
Find What You Love,” Steve Jobs’ at Stanford University (From 2005, but still golden)
Wall Street Journal (from August 24, 2011)
“Steve Jobs, who stepped down as CEO of Apple Wednesday after having been on medical leave, reflected on his life, career and mortality in a well-known commencement address at Stanford University in 2005.”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903596904576520690515394766.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
How to Fix Our Math Education
By Sol Garfunkel and David Mumford, New York Times Opinion Pages ( from August 24, 2011)
‘THERE is widespread alarm in the United States about the state of our math education. The anxiety can be traced to the poor performance of American students on various international tests, and it is now embodied in George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind law, which requires public school students to pass standardized math tests by the year 2014 and punishes their schools or their teachers if they do not.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/25/opinion/how-to-fix-our-math-education.html?ref=opinion
The Kids Are Not All Right
By Joel Bakan, New York Times Opinion Pages (from August 21, 2011)
“WHEN I sit with my two teenagers, and they are a million miles away, absorbed by the titillating roil of online social life, the addictive pull of video games and virtual worlds, as they stare endlessly at video clips and digital pictures of themselves and their friends, it feels like something is wrong.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/22/opinion/corporate-interests-threaten-childrens-welfare.html
Do You Suffer From Decision Fatigue?
By John Tierney, New York Times Magazine, (from August 17, 2011)
“Three men doing time in Israeli prisons recently appeared before a parole board consisting of a judge, a criminologist and a social worker. The three prisoners had completed at least two-thirds of their sentences, but the parole board granted freedom to only one of them. Guess which one:
Case 1 (heard at 8:50 a.m.): An Arab Israeli serving a 30-month sentence for fraud.Post
Case 2 (heard at 3:10 p.m.): A Jewish Israeli serving a 16-month sentence for assault.
Case 3 (heard at 4:25 p.m.): An Arab Israeli serving a 30-month sentence for fraud.
There was a pattern to the parole board’s decisions, but it wasn’t related to the men’s ethnic backgrounds, crimes, or sentences.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/21/magazine/do-you-suffer-from-decision-fatigue.html
The Start-Up of You
By Thomas L. Friedman, The New York Times (from July 12, 2011)
“The rise in the unemployment rate last month to 9.2 percent has Democrats and Republicans reliably falling back on their respective cure-alls. It is evidence for liberals that we need more stimulus and for conservatives that we need more tax cuts to increase demand. I am sure there is truth in both, but I do not believe they are the whole story. I think something else, something new — something that will require our kids not so much to find their next job as to invent their next job — is also influencing today’s job market more than people realize.’
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/13/opinion/13friedman.html?src=me&ref=general
Appeals Court Upholds Suspension of Student Over Internet Bullying
By Rachel M. Zahorsky, American Bar Association Journal (from July 29, 2011)“A federal appeals court upheld the discipline of a high school student who created a MySpace page targeted at a classmate that described her as a “slut” with herpes. The three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit, in Richmond, Va., affirmed the suspension of Kara Kowalski, a student at Musselman High School in Berkeley County, W.Va., in a unanimous opinion that comes on the heels of several recent cases heard by federal courts involving student-created websites that ridicule school administrators or fellow classmates, Education Week reports.”
New Approach Proposed for Science Curriculums
By Kenneth Chang, The New York Times (from July 19, 2011)
“A new framework for improving American science education calls for paring the curriculum to focus on core ideas and teaching students more about how to approach and solve problems rather than just memorizing factual nuggets.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/20/science/20curriculum.html?_r=1&ref=education
Social Media History Becomes a New Job Hurdle
By Jennifer Preston, New York Times (from July 20, 2011)
Companies have long used criminal background checks, credit reports and even searches on Google and LinkedIn to probe the previous lives of prospective employees. Now, some companies are requiring job candidates to also pass a social media background check.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/21/technology/social-media-history-becomes-a-new-job-hurdle.html
Power Struggle Between the College Board and Top Independent Schools Burdens Students With Overwhelming Workloads
Commentary by Alex Mallory, The Huffington Post (from August 8, 2011)
“The disconnect between course and standardized test content is the product of a power struggle between private high schools (and many public schools as well) and the College Board, which writes most college admissions related standardized tests, including the SAT Subject Tests and AP Exams. Understandably, private high school department heads–many of whom hold doctorates and are leading authorities in their fields of study–do not want to teach to an exam designed by a faceless, sprawling organization hundreds or even thousands of miles away.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alex-mallory/power-struggle-between-th_b_919039.html
Education Needs a Digital-Age Upgrade (instructive parent comments)
By Virginia Heffernan, New York Times (from August 7, 2011)
“If you have a child entering grade school this fall, file away just one number with all those back-to-school forms: 65 percent. Chances are just that good that, in spite of anything you do, little Oliver or Abigail won’t end up a doctor or lawyer — or, indeed, anything else you’ve ever heard of. According to Cathy N. Davidson, co-director of the annual MacArthur Foundation Digital Media and Learning Competitions, fully 65 percent of today’s grade-school kids may end up doing work that hasn’t been invented yet.
http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/07/education-needs-a-digital-age-upgrade/
Salman Khan, Founder of Khan Academy
By Will Oremus, Slate.com, Updated Tuesday, Aug. 2, 2011
“His folksy lectures are revolutionizing how kids learn math and science. Before he started the most popular education site on the Web, Salman Khan was neither an educator nor an entrepreneur. His outsider status helps explain why he’s been able to solve a problem that schools and other startups never could: how to harness technology to change the way kids learn.”
http://www.slate.com/id/2299863/
Watch Khan’s TED talk on “flipping the classroom,” as well as Khan Academy videos on calculus and the origins of the Earth.
