Structured Homeschooling Gets an A+
ScienceDaily (Sep. 8, 2011) — “There’s no place like home,” an iconic line uttered by Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, might apply to learning the ABC’s, math and other core subjects. A new study from Concordia University and Mount Allison University has found that homeschooling — as long as it’s structured or follows a curriculum — can provide kids with an academic edge.
“Structured homeschooling may offer opportunities for academic performance beyond those typically experienced in public schools,” says first author Sandra Martin-Chang, a professor in the Concordia Department of Education, noting this is among the first nonpartisan studies to investigate home education versus public schooling.
Published in the Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, the investigation compared 74 children living in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick: 37 who were homeschooled versus 37 who attended public schools. Participants were between 5 and 10 years old and each child was asked to complete standardized tests, under supervision of the research team, to assess their reading, writing, arithmetic skills, etc.
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http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/09/110908104009.htm
Simple Teaching Tool Boosts Student Reading Performance, Study Finds
ScienceDaily (Sep. 5, 2011) — Research from North Carolina State University shows that utilizing a freely available literacy tool results in significant advances in fundamental reading skills for elementary school students, without requiring schools to drastically overhaul existing programs. The research focused on children who were characterized as “struggling readers” at risk for a learning disability in reading.
“Our goal is to put effective tools in the hands of teachers,” says Dr. John Begeny, an associate professor of school psychology at NC State, lead author of the study and creator of the literacy tool. “This research shows that our program works, and it’s easy to use.”
Begeny developed the literacy program, Helping Early Literacy with Practice Strategies (HELPS), to give teachers a new tool to promote reading “fluency.” Reading fluency is effectively a child’s ability to read with sufficient speed and accuracy, while also reading with good expression — for example, pausing at commas when reading out loud. When students read fluently, the have a greater capacity for understanding what they read, and they are also more likely to choose to read.
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http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/08/110829114557.htm
A perk of being among the best
Published on August 27, 2011 by Ilan Shrira in The Narcissus in All of Us
Student grades have been rising steadily at many universities over the past few decades, according to a new report that tracks GPAs at more than 200 American schools. This grade inflation is a problem because it dilutes the meaning of grades as a measure of performance. If most students finish college with an ‘A’ average, potential employers and graduate schools have a tougher time distinguishing the most competent and hard-working of their applicants.
The causes of grade inflation have been debated for years, serving up a mishmash of explanations. However, far from clarifying its causes, this debate is often used as a platform to blame grade inflation on whatever the explainer thinks is wrong with universities, or society, in general. To give you a taste, grade inflation has been blamed on the way states fund their public universities, the way student evaluations affect faculty promotions, the increasing use of part-time instructors, too much compassion from instructors, student entitlement, a growing consumer culture, the Vietnam War, and greater diversity on college campuses. While we’re at it, why not blame global warming and the fall of the Soviet empire too?
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While we laud our educational efforts, our performance declines precipitously.
Published on August 27, 2011 by Stanton Peele in Addiction in Society
Americans are being fed the fantasy that we are revolutionizing education for the better — think NBC’s recurrent “Education Nation” feature, the film “Waiting for Superman” and the Harlem Success Academy and similar inner-city charter schools the movie lionizes, and the Obama administration’s “Race to the Top” program and its adoption of the Bush “No Child Left Behind” doctrine. The underlying theme is that kids leap forward in their intellectual skills when we bring in tough-minded educators who demand students and teachers perform or else off with their heads.We need the fantasy that this approach will reverse our long-term educational decline relative to other countries which (a) value genuine intellectual engagement, (b) provide sufficient support for students’ lives to allow them to learn, (c) don’t elect government officials who believe the earth was created in six days, (d) don’t display a national fixation on everyone’s guardian angels.
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