Raising e-Readers

Earlier this year, Thomas Fitzgerald wrote a great piece for the NY Times on Bringing Up an e-Reader.  His piece cited the Center for Literacy at University of Akron which is doing research on efficacy on e-reader integration into the work of K-12 classrooms.

Some lessons from experts for us all as we integrate more and more technology (and especially e-readers) into the school work, homework, and recreational life of children are the following:

1.  Don’t allow reading to move into auto-pilot with children. Lisa Guernsey with New America Foundation that “we are seeing evidence that parents expect the e-books to do it all and are stepping back from the engagement with their children.”  Find discussion points about the e-book(s) being read.

2.  Chris Ludrosky amplified the point in #1 above.  Intermittent supervision and support with e-books is important. Making sure that students are “…reading or learning to read [and not]…playing an app or a game.”

3.  Most important is advice from Vanderbilt’s Gabrielle Strouse who said whether it is an e-book, a game, etc. “co-interacting, co-viewing, is the best way for them to learn.”

E-books and e-reading are not going away,  in fact, for children who get immersed in e-reading, old books don’t really cut it any more.  Teacher Kourtney Denning said it best:  ”We have to transform learning as we know it.”

Parents and a School’s Technology Capacity

In a recent survey reported in the 2012 EdWeek Technology Counts edition, here are where parental interest lies in conjunction with a school’s use of technology for parent involvement:

74% of parents find it important to have access to curricular materials, online textbooks to use with their kids at home.

62% find it important to find online updates on their child’s homework assignments, projects and upcoming tests.

53% want updated daily grades and progress in school.

51% want special alerts when a child is missing assignments, has low grades or is in danger of failing a class.

42% want updates from teachers about class activities and topic studied.

32% of parents see technology tools to facilitate collaboration between their child, the teacher(s), and themselves as important.

22% want online access to videos and podcasts of the teacher’s “lectures”.

As we find more ways to engage parents in the work of their child and before we criticize a parent’s lack of involvement, it is probably wise to play to their collective sense of where technology can help them actually be involved and effective.

Have a great week.

70% of Americans Favor Charter Schools

In the recent Phi Delta Kappa (PDK) Gallup Poll on the Public Attitudes Toward the Public Schools in 2011, 70% of Americans favor charter schools.  Of those respondents 30 and younger 78% favor charter schools, and 75% report charters as favorable among those in their 30s and 40s.  PDK is asking their readers to let them know why on the PDK Facebook page.  Here are my hypotheses:

1.  In traditional school districts talented school superintendents, school leaders, and teachers are often over-powered by politically-driven and power-hungry elected officials.  There are great positive examples of well-meaning, thoughtful, and helpful elected officials.  Traditional school systems provide a landscape for many to pilfer and wield power counter to the needs of students and the system.

2.  More meaningful choices for families exist within charter school offerings.  Charters are often on “shorter leashes” in the various accountability structures and can be put “out of business” much more easily than  traditionally operated schools.

3.  Charters can better resist building low-value-add bureaucratic structures than most all traditional school system leaders appear to be unwilling to.  For charter schools, this can free up more funding to be applied at- or closer-to the real work-in classrooms.

What are your thoughts on this and why favorability on charter schools seems to be rising?

Jumping to ill-conceived Conclusions from Educational Research

Flores, Fix, & Batalova (2012) conducted compelling research on English Language Learner (ELL) programs and students with limited English proficiency for the Migration Policy Institute.  Through rigorous research they concluded that “quick exiters” among ELL programs-meaning those students who exited ELL programs in 3 or fewer years appeared to fare better in meeting basic reading and math proficiency than students who stayed in ELL programs for 5 or more years.

Use this as an example of how educators and education policy folks might jump to ill-conceived conclusions from a quick read of the research.  If you try this, see what they say.  Here are some startling reactions I heard from a few colleagues from citing this one small excerpt from the research during my recent travels:

1.  From someone in Massachusetts I heard:  Decrease ELL services to 3 or fewer years for all limited English proficiency kids.

2.  From a retired state level educator in Florida I heard:  Cut funding for ELL services after 3 years to force school districts and schools to play to the research.

3.  And worst of all in South Carolina I heard:  ”Those kids who could not exit from ELL services in 3 years were probably special ed anyway.”

Scary isn’t it?

Continuing with this one example to highlight the perils of erroneously applying good research, there is little in this study that speaks to other variables such as quality of the ELL programs being offered, quality of the whole-school strategies being employed in the target schools (e.g. as reading and writing across the curriculum).  These were not the intent of the study in the first place.  From using this study as a basis for reading other related research, we know that there is string defense in students not lingering in ELL programs and to immerse students in English as much and as often as possible.  The best defense is associated with giving kids the most robust and personalized ELL services in the first place (during the first 2 or 3 years).

As a strong proponent of everything we do being steeped in research-driven decisions, I believe we must mind our Ps and Qs and coach others to do the same when applying ANY research to practice and policy.  Applying research in reckless fashion is as bad as applying no research to the work we do.

6 Literacy Experiences for Every Child, Every Day

Teachers and coaches, here is something that every teacher in every classroom can actualize every day in the work of K-12.

1.  Every child reads something (s)he chooses (every day)

2.  Every child reads accurately (every day)

3.  Every child reads something (s)he understands (every day)

4.  Every child talks with peers about reading and writing (every day)

5.  Every child listens to a fluent adult read aloud (every day)

6.  Every child writes about something personally meaningful

source:  Allington & Gabriel, (2012).  Every child every day.  Educational Leadership, 69 (6) 10-15

Jacksonville is emblematic for the greater issues of our Nation

As a followup to the post from May 21, 2012-link is below:

FEEL GOOD Education?! Geez!

I received some wise-counsel from a well-respected business leader, old friend (a friend since 2nd grade, and a person true to his own faith) in Jacksonville.  Harold said:  I agree with most of it but please,  don’t lump all people of conservative  observant faith into the hater category.   I am as uncomfortable as you with the typical Southern Baptist hardheads……we are not all alike that as I hope you know.

Harold is correct, and I stand corrected.  We should never lump people into groups.  That includes me.

We can however, study what is going on (and not going on in Jacksonville) as representative of so many cities and towns in the USA.  There are haters, there are posturing politicians, and frankly there seems to be a shortage of folks in and around K-12 education who will put kids first, not rhetorically first, but really first in allude decisions made.

Thanks Harold.

Come on Jacksonville.  You can change.  And you must change, before soliciting candidates for school superintendent.  Your willingness to change attitudes about kids vs. adult-interests will greatly affect this search.  Jacksonville has some positive examples in the business, civic, political, and religious leadership.  Others must follow the positive examples if preK-12 education can work well for kids.

JW

FEEL GOOD Education?! Geez!

Since stepping down from Superintendent work in Jacksonville, I still read the Florida Times Union – just to track the culture and progress of that city.  It remains a troubled city with many business, civic and religious leaders who want and deserve a top-notch school system for Jacksonville’s kids and families.  Regrettably, the city has too many school board members, politicians, out-of-touch citizens and certain haters from vestiges of charlatan churches and cliques who espouse ill-conceived ideas and hater-type mentalities.  This struggling newspaper picks up on sensationalism to help sell papers, while too often abandoning credible and accurate journalism.

Today’s featured Op-Ed is a prime example.  The piece entitled “Time to end ‘feel good’ education”  that was allowed to be printed, does more to espouse wrong ideas and hater-type mentalities than solve any real issues.  Main idea of the piece was that children today communicate only “in short bursts with no regard for grammar or spelling.”  This reminded me of the back-in-the-day propaganda from the Jacksonville evangelicals in the 1960s– “Watch out for those boys with long hair.  That is a sure sign of illegal drug and marijuana use.”  Geez!

During my service on The Commission on Writing for America’s Children and Families, we teamed with Pew Charitable Trust to learn, through disciplined research, keen insights on writing instruction.  The most important lesson learned was that we should embrace more-modern genre of writing that kids and now adults engage in.  Texting, abbreviated shortcutting, email-protocols, IMs, and the like are part of the new genre.  At the same time while embracing this new genre, we can help children discern what is proper and what is not for more formal genre of writing.  This is a powerful teaching technique for helping students write even stronger letters to colleges, prospective employers, research reports, novels and the like.

This writer, featured in today’s Florida Times Union reminds me of the citizen who scolded me when we were ratcheting up Duval’s high school graduation requirements so that all kids had a shot at college or a high-wage job.  This guy told me, “Joey, why are you doing this?  More kids will drop out.  And, besides, at the end of the day, somebody has to pick up my trash.”  God help us!  The haters must stand down and let us do this important work for kids, and help us make education feel good in the process.

Have a great week.

JW

More on Bullying and Respect

More points from the literature on school bullying and deepening the work to solve bullying and sustaining cultures of respect in our schools.

In a US Secret Service Study, it was found that most school shooters had been bullied.

In a 10-year study of 70,000 middle and high school students, the National Center for Student Aspirations found that only 37% agreed with the statement, “Students in my schools show respect for one another.”

More and more, school officials are finding that the real work in bullying is a broader problem of cruelty and disrespect of all kinds–not necessarily a targeted group, perceived-class, etc.

In a study of 2,300 middle schoolers, bullying victims had significantly lower grade-point averages than their non-victimized peers.

On any school day, an estimated 160,000 US students miss school because of bullying (and associated fears).

Source:  SUNY Cortland center for the 4th and 5th Rs.

JW

Improving Student Engagement Through Early Career Mapping

See the following from an Ed Week article.

“When students discover their career interests, they often get more excited about school and can see the relevance of what they are learning.  Middle and high schools are increasingly requiring that counselors and teachers work with students to map out their college and career paths.  To engage today’s tech-savvy student, many districts offer individual learning plan programs online.  Students are given online accounts with passwords to track classes; create an electronic portfolio of grades, test scores, and work; research careers; and organize their college search.”

These are good thoughts, however, this work of getting kids focused on possible careers and probable college should start earlier than high school and even earlier than middle school.  Also, we know that simply helping a student make connections between school work and career and college, is important but not sufficient for truly engaging kids.  Our teachers must make real work connections to all the work, tie learning activities to each child’s real life, and help paint a return on investment for each child through his classroom work.

We know a lot about student engagement, and if we increase our frequency of uses of these best practices, we could greatly accelerate academic achievement with all kids.

JW

Supports for First Year Teachers

Richard Ingersoll deduced the following level of support for first year teachers (2007-08).

Percent of First Year Teachers receiving these various supports:

Facetime with administrator – 87%

Mentor assigned – 81%

Beginners’ Seminar – 71%

Collaboration with Colleagues – 58%

Teacher Aide assigned – 31%

Reduced Course Load – 17%

If we care about turn-around of our Nation’s struggling schools, we need to rev these supports for our novice teachers up several notches.

How does you school or school network/district compare?

JW