Kids who CAN read does not equal kids who DO read.

I've known for a long time that simply teaching kids to read isn't enough.

Most videogames require reading out of textboxes and such, but that's not book reading, now is it?

In order for kids to actually take the time to read books, they have to LIKE doing it. Just knowing HOW isn't nearly enough.

This has become painfully obvious in Aerisolphal's own class.\

The "not-so-great" readers are more than happy to sit down with Aerisolphal and I and have US read a book WITH them. But once we're not with them, they're just as amused playing with blocks or drawing with markers.

In the meantime, the "great" readers, don't really even need us with them. They'll go out and find their own books to read by themselves.

That there shows the profound difference between those who CAN do it, and those who LOVE TO do it. We ought to be teaching more than just the HOW. We ought to teach the WHY and the FUN of it. That's how we'll get these kids to read!

Videogames Good? This I gotta see!

As a proponent of non-violent-specific videogameing, I've started getting tired of hearing people demonize ALL videogames EVERYWHERE.

As a result of this repeated offence, the article I just read came as a breath of fresh air.

I don't know many people who would argue against games like checkers, chess, backgammon, and mancala. All these games teach strategy and problem solving. But I've always been supportive of taking this argument yet another step further and defending games like TowerDefence, Creeper World Training, and, especially, MineCraft. These games don't just teach strategy (indeed, the "strategy" portion of MineCraft is minuscule) but they mainly teach spatial orienting.

When MineCraft exploded on to the world just a few years ago, people didn't start playing it just because it was "fun". More often, they played it because it allowed them to use virtual LEGOs (another activity which has been praised for teaching spatial orienting).

Videogames like this can allow children to truly experience "fun" and "school" in the same setting, something I've always said is essential to learning.

Are we throwing GT students under the bus with our faulty education system?

Yes and no.

Many schools thankfully offer advanced and AP* courses to meet the expectations/needs of their more gifted students.

However, at the same time, more and more students are being lost, as Albert Einstein was, by the simplicity of more and more required, plain courses.

Now, I absolutely do NOT mean to insult the school system. Most of this argument is coming directly from the article. I think schools like Cowles and Roosevelt are very supportive of their GT students. It is their GT program  put me in this position.

And for that, I am more than grateful.

One Size Does Not Fit All...And Never Has

I have never believed in the idea of teaching someone only the least they need to know. I don't think anyone thinks this.

The reason "elective" courses are made available in middle and high schools is so that students can have multiple experiences, and explore new horizons for the future. Had I not taken the optional three semesters of psychology I had been allowed to, I might not be as interested in it today.

One of the basic concepts of our modern society is opportunity and opening new paths to the success of every member of the next generation. Allow students to do whatever they wish, and the future will be FAR more better in every regard.

More School, More Success?

I am an advocate of school. I'm among those who believe that education can lead one to success, no matter the background of the student.

But I do understand how money can be an issue for a student's success. Money keeps children out of colleges, and away from taking SAT/ACT and AP* Tests.

But public education on its own can work miracles if it's a good school.

One thing in the article I read that I couldn't understand was the argument that poverty stricken parents couldn't "afford" to send their kids to the extra-curricular activities that the more wealthy kids could. This kind of struck me by surprise, as I myself do not know of many extra-curricular activities that cost things aside from sports and the fine arts. Clubs, even those that are linked to academic subjects like math and science clubs are mostly free so far as I'm concerned. But maybe there are extra fees I was never aware of, though how there were without me noticing, I can't think of.

Not all public schools are awful, and if it's public, the poorer classes could access it. Roosevelt, Hubble, Cowles, all great examples of great schools that are absolutely free of charge.

I expected this article to be one of those "year-round" school advocacy papers, but it had far more to do with affordability then the actual length of the year or day. I'm skeptical about some of their arguments, but the rest actually seems rather sound.

Six Motivating Factors in Education

School policy has been focused on cracking down on the amount of technology in classrooms. Teachers and administrators alike tend to see technology as the ultimate distraction from instruction and learning.

While there may be support behind this belief, the fact also remains that smartphones provide a large base both for social contact and research. Some teachers have realized this, and often allow students to use their phones to look up various subjects or to use them for private work studies.

The article I just read, while not focused solely on technology, used it as a prime example of what the article calls the Six Motivating Factors of learning, which I will list off here:

1) Do It Yourself

Clay Shirky stated in this article that social groups who stay in contact over facebook and twitter could turn from simply speaking about what they know, and start using their collective knowledge to take action. The affects of facebook and twitter in a wider social sense was clearly demonstrated during the initial events of the Arab Spring of 2011-12, from Tunisia's self-immolating protester, to inciting Iran's Green Revolution, to overthrowing the government of Egypt. Shirky believes that actions like this taken over these social networks would not only encourage learning, but allow students to speak and discuss about what they learn on a daily basis.

2) Do It Now

The immediacy of videos and other material going "viral" is something else that educators could take advantage of. Many colleges and other educational organizations like Khan Academy already use the internet to reach a wider range of students from all over the world. The far reaching arm of the internet has allowed these institutions to reach more people than they could have ever dreamed of before.

3) Do It With Friends

When teachers assign partners to work on various research projects, they do this both to keep friendly chit-chatterers from distracting each other and to make sure know one has to do an assignment alone. However, this strategy blatantly ignores all those students who focus better alone, or endangers forced partners to quickly lose interest in what they are researching. As mentioned in Factor 1, social media allows for students to choose their own collaborators (if they wish for any at all), and therefore allow them to garner further interest in what exactly they are doing.

4) Do It For Fun

 

Projects, science fair presentations, power-point presentations, all things teachers encourage their students to do all the time, so long as they only use the systems provided for them by the school. It's common knowledge that the schools' electronic resources tend to me behind the times and often meet the students halfway in their expectations for projects. Exactly the same actions, and much more options besides are available to these same students through their mobile devices. If they were allowed to use their own resources, the results could be truly staggering by releasing them from the prison of the school systems' close-minded thinking.

5) Do It Unto Others

One of the greatest concerns involving students and social media is the "staggering" amount of cyber-bullying that occurs. While it cannot be denied that such events do occur, far less attention is drawn to the emotional and personal good that comes from social media as well. DoSomething.com is an internet based organization of young people who's job it is to patrol the internet and provide moral support to those who suffer from instances of cyber-bullying and other virtual abuse. If more students were allowed to participate in these virtual groups, they could begin applying the same strategies to their own schools, and what a better learning atmosphere THAT would be!

6) Do It To Show The World

Another thing social media provides is an audience, both supportive and critical. If whole student-bodies could host a twitter feed or facebook hashtag, then an entire school could critique projects and presentations from other students, building a positive base of peers and friendships.

The wonders of social media are vast and in many situation can actually create a better learning environment for students. If more teachers and administrators could be convinces of this, than the rest of the student-body could more easily support each other in their personal endeavors and goals.

Twenty, the Most Beautiful of All Beautiful Numbers

Today, the students were excited to be delving deeper into the number twenty.

Though most of them know how to count beyond a hundred, it's still difficult for some of them to visualize just what these numbers LOOK like.

That was the purpose of our deeper studying.

And, aside from what was going on throughout the day, I got to apply some of the knowledge I've been learning from outside sources to the kids. Especially Dontay.

Ever since getting his glasses, he has been SO much more interested in putting in the work effort to learn. His writing has marvelously improved, and his focus is so much more prevalent than ever before.

I was also reminded today about one of the kids' favorite games: "Walk, Walk, Walk"

Sort of a "Simon Says" sort of game, it involves a "caller", and maybe a "watcher" or two. The Caller tells the children when to walk and when to freeze. when the caller calls out freeze, it is their job, with help from the watchers, to call out the ones who did not stop moving on the freeze command.

I was reminded about the article concerning outside classes and the importance of play when dealing with the children's excess energies. "Walk Walk Walk" is another way to serve this purpose, and a way I had forgotten about entirely!

Student Focused Education

As you've probably learned by now, "individualized education" is something I am a huge supporter of. I truly believe a child's ability to learn is dependent on his will to learn, which is tied to their interest.

Now, by no means do I mean that we should ONLY teach what the kids want to learn. Far from it. What we need is to show kids from an early age what a joy learning really is, and then CONTINUE to do so throughout their lives.

This article on Student Centered Schooling mentioned an extremely important fact, when kids want to learn for themselves, they need the responsibility to handle it.

Again, this is where my nigh-worshiped Montessori system comes in. Liberal education, with some guidance, allows students to constantly experience and garner that "responsibility" factor of learning for yourself. This, more than anything, is what truly prepared me for success in high school.

I truly believe that if we were to keep that independent quest to learn, student success would grow exponentially!

The Importance of "Play" in School

This article spoke of something I had considered to be true for years: “In order for children to learn, they need to be able to pay attention. In order to pay attention, we need to let them move.”

Children's dependence on play is something that has even been proven through evolution. Every species of mammal on the planet prove how essential "play" is to their young. Infant apes begin "play" at an age of 3 months, the human equivalent being about a year. Shouldn't it be common sense to let our children play as often as possible?

This article mentions the unintended side effects of this issue: the growing number of children who are to "giddy" to focus on learning. I've seen this in Aerisolphal's class, with kids like Oliver and Dontay.

My elementary school would hold "outdoor class" as often as possible. This allowed the kids to run around, as long as they came back to their class' circle to do activities like reading and group math. If this was done more often (as it is surprisingly easy to do), I would venture to say that kids would focus a whole lot more if they were allowed to expel that extra energy boxed up in their souls.

Plus, the glories of fresh air can work miracles on the mind!

Should we teach by "subject" or by "topic"?

Continuing with studying outside sources on education, I came across a short little article on Finland's practice of teaching by "topic" rather than "subject".

Unfortunately, the article was not very articulate on what they specifically meant by "topic". Their basic argument was that instead of teaching "a history subject in the morning and a geography class in the afternoon," their students would instead learn through application of a specific "topic". The article's example of a "topic" was what they called "cafeteria services". This course would be in place of a common vocational course, and would include lessons in "elements of math, languages (to help serve foreign customers), writing, and communication skills."

While I agree somewhat with the idea of not teaching strictly by "subject", the idea of teaching by "topic" doesn't seem to me (with my VERY limited experience, I admit) to be much of a change. Yes, it furthers the individualization of education, something which I readily support, but it seems to me that it just "re-defines" the term "subject". Instead of "subjects" being "science, math, engineering, and math," a student will now define them as "carpentry, politics, and kitchen service". The difference is minimal.

Yes, you get to hear me praise Montessori again.

Yes, I know I'm a biased preacher due to my relative inexperience with many things outside the Montessori system. 

What I would like to add about said system is it's lack of what I would call a "period-schedule format". This allows them to keep some of the "subject" system intact, but allows the different subjects to melt together into a single atmosphere, which I believe encourages these children to more creatively combine and use these skills.

I'm still kind of uncertain about replacing "subjects" with "topics" as I still don't see the difference. But if any new information can be found to support this system, I would be more than happy to research it further.

And Before I Forget...

Today really begun the classes topic on how to research. Each class at Hubble has been assigned a specific habitat to study. Aerisolphal's has been chosen for the Polar Areas.'

So, we began step one, research an animal.

One of the parents helped teach kids how to research using books.

I taught others how to research using the computer.

1) Google

2) Skim Wikipedia

3) Pick a Website

4) Read

It was the first day of the future!

Spacial Creativity and Education

After reading an article on Spacial Creativity I have reached to conclusions:

1) I now understand the purposes of PatternBlocks

2) Either I was extremely lucky or my mother knew where she was sending me to school (I'm inclined to think the latter.

1) Spacial Creativity is the term used to define how people use "space" as a tool in their thought processes. The greatest mechanical genius of our time, Nicola Tesla, was known to be able to determine whether an idea he had for a machine would work or not without even building it by thinking of how the parts would be put together, and then testing out the results in his head.

Genius like this still exists in our world, but often goes unnoticed because the basis of the testing structure of education in the United States is firmly set in writing and math skills. While these are all fine and good, those children who are gifted in spacial creativity often fair worse in literature and basic mathematics.

Which is why some of the kids in Aerisolphal's class love her PatternBlocks. Gwen specifically can do absolutely mind-blowing things with the six simple shapes these blocks provide. In fact, PatternBlocks are one of only two things that I know of which can actively test children for spacial creativity, the other being Tetris.

2) There is no doubt in my mind that education in spacial creativity is something that ought to be harnessed by the public school system, and then I have to remember that some schools have.

The primary example I know of being the Montessori System. Montessori has dozens of simple ways to read the spacial creativity of a child's mind, while at the same time applying and improving upon it. My k-8 years were spent at a Montessori school and it was definitely the place where an imaginative child belonged, as the system allowed almost ANYTHING to be applied to learning.

I believe it was Edison who said "Invention requires only imagination and a pile of junk." If this is true, then school ought to be taught at garage sales.

Who agrees?

A Thousand Pardons for the Delay

After a month of forgetting to post, I'm back and I'm here to make it up.

Many of the following posts will not be observations of the class so much as an analysis of outside sources to enrich the course.

But until then, let's catch up on some important points.

Before Spring

Before all the kindergartners went off on spring break, they finished up their creativity unit by all painting, drawing, or otherwise creating works of art.

For someone who's taken three semesters of psychology, what particularly interested me was that in the dead of winter, all these children drew pictures of blossoming flowers, greening trees, and blue skies. They were ready for spring and summer again!

After they were done creating them, all the pieces of art were hung up in the hallway. The children were then brought out one-by-one and were asked three questions:

1) What do you think it means to be creative?

2) What can creative people do?

 

3) What is your favorite painting? Why? What does it remind you of?

It was a fun experience, and a good way to leave off for the Break.

What follows

In order to add some color and outside influence to my learning, I and my sponsor have decided that I ought to read, analyze, and apply some outside articles on teaching and teaching method. That is what I'll be doing for some of the following blogs.