AJC.com > Blogs > Get Schooled > Archives > 2006 > March
March 2006
Homework During Spring Break
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
An e-mail from a parent tells the following tale of woe:
“Young teacher, who will be getting married and honeymooning in the islands during spring break, assigns a project consisting a Power Point presentation due the week after returning from break. For many of the students it’s the first such presentation. This week (the week before break) she allows them 4 hours of computer lab to work on their projects.
Two students, my child included, get as much as possible done on the assignment this past weekend to free them up over the break. When they go to their first computer lab the teacher discovers they are light years ahead of the rest of the class. She then threatens to assign more work to these two students increasing their requirements on this project. Let me explain my child really gets into projects and has a track record for turning them in at least a week early and generally receives one of the highest grades given on a project.
Should I have a chat with the teacher and explain that, while I understand her stress level at this time, students, too, often make plans for spring break? Should I just let it slide? Or, should I broach the subject with the administration leaving the teacher unnamed?”
Advice for this parent? Do your kids have schoolwork to do over spring break? Teachers, do you assign work over spring break? Or is spring break supposed to be homework-free?
Speaking of spring break, I am desperately seeking parents accompanying teenagers on a spring break trip for a story I’m doing. If you are such a parent and you’re willing to help me out, please shoot me an e-mail at pghezzi@ajc.com. Thanks!
Skipping a Grade
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Here’s a story by Heather Vogell about a family where the three oldest children have all skipped a grade.
The family says the secret to their kids’ success is Mom and Dad having a good relationship with their kids’ teachers. Also, they do a lot of studying at home, especially over the summer.
Would you want your child to skip a grade? Any stories from parents who have skipped a grade? What are the pros and the cons.
The Small Class Trade-off
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Looks like the new class size law is a boon for people in the trailer industry. School systems will add hundreds more trailers to comply with the mandate. Here’s Diane Stepp’s story.
Would you rather your child be in a trailer with a small class or in the building with a larger class?
“A Smart Person … Not A Nerd”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Sure, some kids worry about being perceived as a nerd. But at competitions like the state spelling bee and Mathcounts, it’s cool to be uncool. (Of course, the real revenge of the nerds comes later, in adulthood. Who has the most high-paying career options?)
My colleague Bill Torpy picked up this gem while covering Mathcounts last weekend. “Samuel Kallman, a seventh-grader at the Davis Academy, observed: ‘Most of the kids regard us as nerds; we are nerds,’ Samuel said with a laugh. Then he caught himself. ‘I think of myself as a smart person, not a nerd.’ “
Is nerdiness underrated?
SAT or ACT?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
You might not know it from living in Georgia, but there’s an alternative to the SAT. The ACT is a college admissions exam that attempts to predicts college success. It’s not really easier or harder than the SAT, just a different test. More tied to subject knowledge. Just as mysterious in how it’s graded. But some kids who find the SAT tricky say the ACT is more straightforward in what it’s asking.
Yes, Georgia colleges accept the ACT as well as the SAT. Some students take both.
What’s your preference?
Retired Teachers … Come Back!
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
With the strict, new rules on class size, recruiting enough teachers will be even harder. For years, districts have counted on retired teachers coming back to help fill their slots. Retired teachers have experience. They’ve seen it all. And it’s not they’re - I hate to even use this highly charged word - old. Many teachers retire before age 55.
Any retired teachers out there… Are you thinking of going back? Have you gone back already? What’s it like?
Crossblogination - Visit our Talk of the Town blog for a discussion of parents hiring private tutors for their preschoolers (!?!). Read Aileen Dodd’s story here.
Riding the Bus
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A student was stabbed on a Gwinnett school bus Wednesday. He was treated and released from the hospital, while the attacker faces disciplinary action from the school district and criminal charges, according to a letter the principal sent home. Here’s Laura Diamond’s story.
Given the number of kids hauled to and from school on buses every day, I’m in awe of how smoothly the system generally runs. But … you have the adult sitting up front, watching the road, and all the kids behind the driver. Some buses have monitors, adults who sit in the back and help keep things safe and civil. But some parents just don’t think their kids are safe on a school bus.
Parents, do your kids ride the bus? Should bus monitors be used more often? What else can schools do to make sure kids are safe on the bus?
SAT Scoring Fiasco
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Becca notes on an earlier thread that she’s distressed about the SAT scoring mess, where 4,411 students got incorrectly low scores. Here’s a story.
It’s hard not to be distressed when the stakes are so high. The College Board created its stronghold on college admissions (along with rival ACT), but its status hinges on credibility. Doing poorly on a standardized test has more ramifications now than ever. Kids get held back. Kids don’t graduate. And in this case, college admissions decisions don’t go a student’s way, all because of a single test score. Is there any way to have enough controls in place to guarantee an accurate score, especially when scoring is so mysterious and not based on a percent correct like a classroom test?
Talk to me!
(Speaking of testing, I’d love to hear from a student or two who took the science test today for the third, fourth or umpteenth time. If you are such a student or a student’s parent, please e-mail me at pghezzi@ajc.com.)
Eschewing the PTA
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A parent asks: “Can you decline to join your school’s PTA/PTO without getting branded an apathetic parent? I am very involved in my kids’ lives and their schooling. I make sure they do their homework. I’m a scout leader, and that takes up a lot of my time. Our PTO spends a lot of time on petty matters and annoying fund-raisers, and I don’t care to be a part of it. I’m feeling a lot of pressure to join anyway.”
(By the way, a PTA, or Parent Teacher Association, is affiliated with the National PTA. Some schools have a PTO, or Parent Teacher Organization, which is not afflilated with the national group but generally serves the same advocacy role at the local school.)
Any parents out there who have made a conscious decision not to join the PTA/PTO? Did you face the scorn of parents who are actively involved? Does your group tend to get bogged down in pettiness and neverending fund-raising? Any tips for running a PTA/PTO parents want to be a part of?
Copying Off the Board
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A friend who teaches middle school was lamenting the demise of copying off the board as an acceptable teaching technique. She said she used to employ this low-tech strategy for social studies, and had good results. Nowadays, her administrators mention this as a “what not to do,” so she comes up with games, role-playing, group projects and other ideas more in sync with the “hands on” mantra.
But she thinks her students learned better when they copied a fact-filled paragraph off the board, followed by a discussion and later a quiz. Also, she thinks copying prepared them for note-taking, which she also taught them on occasion as part of social studies lessons.
Did you copy paragraphs off the board as a child? Is this a strategy worth returning to? Do some teachers still have their students do this? Would their be a student protest if a teacher even attempted to assign such a task?
Announce Campaign Now, Check Test Scores Later
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Denise Majette announced she is running for state school supe. Here’s a story.
She says Georgia students rank among the worst in the nation, according to the story. “I don’t know about you, but 49th or 50th is not acceptable,” Majette said at a news conference at the state Capitol, surrounded by schoolchildren from Toney Elementary School in Decatur.
Pardon the remedial recap, which most Get Schooled readers do not need, but … Georgia is tied for 50th on the SATs, a test about 70 percent of Georgia seniors take. In some states, such as Mississippi, only the most ambitious students take the SAT, with the vast majority preferring the rival ACT.
The only test that provides a national comparison is NAEP. And on NAEP, Georgia students rank in the lower half, but never last or next-to-last. In fourth-grade reading, for example, Georgia’s average scale score of 214 is higher than the following states: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada and South Carolina. In fourth-grade math, Georgia’s average scale score of 234 is better than Alabama, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico, Rhode Island, Tennessee and West Virginia.
I’m just sayin’…
Anyway, good to have a challenger. I’m sure she’ll get up to speed on the issues soon. It may be too soon to say, but who’s your pick, Majette or Kathy Cox?
Bible in the Classroom
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A law allowing Bible elective courses in Georgia high schools appears headed for passage. Here’s a story.
Let’s talk about it, but please remember our ground rules. No personal attacks. No profanity. Stay on topic.
Thanks!
Zero Tolerance For Zero Tolerance?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
For a few years after Columbine, there was one outrageous news story after another. Child suspended for this and expelled for that, often so-called crimes where the intent was hard to find. I fielded calls from a mother who said her son brought a ziplock of flour to school for a science experiment and ended up in front of a tribual. (Turned out he also had a lighter in his pocket, which didn’t help his cause.) There was the high school girl who drove her brother’s pickup to school without realizing there was an ax in the bed underneath a drop cloth. And don’t get me started on gang colors and how many Moms have called swearing their child was not in a gang but happened to wear the offensive colors. Oh yeah, those red lasers. I got a call about a kid suspended for assault or something like that because he shined a laser in someone’s eye.
In some cases, common sense does prevail. DeKalb’s former superintendent Renie Hallford once overturned a principal’s decision to suspend a child who brought a tiny plastic gun to school.
And I have to say, I don’t get nearly as many zero-tolerance-gone-crazy calls as I did in the years following Columbine.
School administrators are under tremendous pressure to make sure their schools are safe, and they are not mind-readers who know what kind of scheme a student might be cooking up. But … the zero-tolerance mindset has clearly triggered some over-the-top punishments for students with no intent to harm.
Parents, teachers, students, have you gotten caught in a zero-tolerance alternate reality? Have schools lightened up somewhat in recent years?
Dropout Crisis Exaggerated?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A recent op-ed piece in Education Week caught my eye. The author says the dropout crisis is exaggerated. “The new conventional wisdom seems to have exaggerated the African-American dropout rate by a remarkable amount - doubling it from 25 percent to 50 percent.” Lawrence Mishel heads a group called the Economic Policy Institute and a similar version of his piece is online here.
The organization’s Web site says it is a nonpartisan think tank. You can judge for yourself.
Mishel takes those of us to task who simply subtract the number of graduating seniors from the ninth grade class three years earlier and assume everybody else quit. Economists frown on this method - understandably, I don’t like it either - and prefer census data. Education researchers dismiss this information saying people lie on census surveys about their education background, the author says.
I don’t think anyone believes the often-quoted Georgia graduation rate of 65 percent in 2004 is based on the soundest data. (It does take into account where a student goes after leaving so schools aren’t penalized for transfers and other situations where the child not quit school altogether.) But the dropout rates reported by schools are often ridiculously low - 6 or 7 percent. What exactly happens to some kids who stop coming to school is unknown. They slip away without notice.
The author does not say the dropout rate isn’t a problem, just that it has improved nationally over time and is not as dire as is often portrayed.
Thoughts?
College Student Speaks: “Not Just Drinking the Night Away.”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Gwinnett student Jerry Oberholtzer, who is a junior at Clemson, dropped a line in response to an earlier post to say - basically - hey, college students work hard! (The earlier post was about professors responding to e-mails in the middle of the night and what I characterized as other ways colleges cater to today’s 24-hour student.)
Here’s an excerpt:
“I am a junior here at Clemson University, and I am BUSY! Long gone are my freshman days of going to class then playing Playstation all afternoon! I now have a job, an apartment, food, and gas I have to pay for. On top of that I’m in a Service Organization and I like to catch a sporting event in there too.
So when a professor offers to be available in the wee hours of the morning for a question, I jump at the chance. I’ll walk you through a typical day in my life here in Clemson.
I get up about 8am or earlier depending on what I have going on that day. I scheduled my earliest class for 10am (and you’ll see why in a minute). But getting up at 8 gives me time to maybe finish some homework, refine a paper or hit up the bank before class. I’m done with classes between 1:45 and 3:45 depending on the day. On days I work (I’m a waiter) I have to report at 4pm. So that is not much time between class and work. Work lasts sometimes till 2am, but I never get off earlier than 11. After that if I have something due the next day I have to stay up and work on it. So when I need a question answered, and the prof is awake at the computer, I don’t have to go through the night guessing what to write.
I’m glad I have professors who understand that the average college student is really busy nowadays. Busy with life and not just drinking the night away.
So what leads me to write you was the fact that I was having this exact conversation a few days earlier with a class of mine. We all came to the conclusion that with the rising tuition and competitive job market in the “real world”, that we as college students are asked to do more than our parents were in the late 70’s early 80’s.
Our success in school depends on these professors who understand us, and schools like Clemson are doing a great job of meeting those needs.”
I got the impression reading Jerry’s e-mail that he and others like him do not like being characterized as lazy or more interested in partying. Surely some college students are - and they tend to get the ink - but others like Jerry are going to class, studying, working and preparing for the job market.
Any other students out there tired of the “drinking the night away” stereotype?
Separating Twins in the Classroom
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
All right … this may seem an obscure education issue. But no school issue is too obscure for Get Schooled…
Should parents of twins have a say in whether their children are in the same class in school? According to this facinating story, Minnesota passed a law guaranteeing parents that right and Illinois is considering a similar measure. With almost 1 in 30 babies being born as a pair these days (!), according to the story, it seems this could be a sticky school issue, especially in affluent communities. (I think I read somewhere that Dacula is ground zero for multiples in metro Atlanta.)
The story says schools have traditionally separated twins entering kindergarten. Given the legislation, I assume some parents do not want this. I can see this being thorny when there is one popular teacher that all parents want their kids to get.
Any twins or twin parents out there? Triplets? Quads? Did you want to be in the same class with your twin? Any teachers or principals who have had twin parents wanting both children in the same class?
Consider the Block
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Block scheduling … the debate goes on and on. DeKalb dad and Get Schooled reader Ernest has been so patient in waiting for me to post about this issue, which has caused a lot of pain and turmoil in DeKalb.
Everyone wants to improve high schools, but many parents are now wondering if a 4 X 4 block schedule - for a primer on block scheduling go here - is the way to go.
Mainly, stuffing courses into one semester seems at odds with Advanced Placement courses. Teachers say the in-depth courses, especially AP sciences, cannot easily be covered in one semester, even with longer classes.
Other districts handle this a variety of ways such as pairing two AP classes together and offering them as yearlong courses or offering after-school tutoring, especially before the exam. In DeKalb, an attempt to pair the AP course with a similar “dummy” course and teaching both courses simultaneously initially caused confusion and sparked an internal investigation.
But AP officials say AP courses generally can be taught on a block schedule. The key is for teachers to understand they are not expected to cover all the material for an AP course. They are expected to teach some aspects of the curriculum in depth. The exam allows students to miss many multiple-choice questions, and puts greater weight on essays.
Still, many teachers aren’t convinced.
Last week, the state school board voted to require school systems using a block schedule to complete an extensive survey. Superintenent Kathy Cox said she wants to consider other factors than just test scores when evaluating the merit of block scheduling.
Let’s hear from those with block scheduling experience, either as a student, teacher or parent. Is it a do or a don’t? And if your high school is on the block … how do you handle AP classes?
The Tutoring Tipping Point
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Remember Concerned Grandmother who was worried that her grandchildren, ages 11 and 13, were unmotivated? Well, she has another dilemma. Andrew, the 13-year-old, is having a hard time in math. He goes to after-school tutoring and appears to be genuinely trying to pull up his grade. He did not struggle with math in elementary school.
Grandmother wants to know if a professional tutor outside the school may be in order.
Parents and parents, how do you know when it’s time for a tutor? How do you choose a tutor?
The 24-Hour College Student
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
In an effort to cater to today’s college student, professors are holding online office hours and having their teaching assistants monitor late-night online forums. Libraries stay open 24/7 and papers get turned in via e-mail at dawn. An Emory University chemistry professor stays up until 4 a.m. answering student’s questions, according to Andrea Jones’ story.
Is the catering to college students getting to be a bit much? First it was apartment-style dorms so students could have private bathrooms rather than have to - gasp - share. Then, on-campus Starbucks, laptops for everybody and wi-fi. Now, it’s professors available to respond to e-mail questions at midnight. (The payoff is in getting a good online review from students, which can be important to a professor’s career.)
Is all this adapting to the needs - or whims - of college students a good thing? (Some call it progress…) Or should students be the ones adapting to college life?
Update: I as talking to my friend Amy about this last night, and she mentioned iPod U - Duke University - which gives every freshman the device as part of its Duke Digital Initiative…
Grad Test: You Be the Judge
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A close vote at the Georgia Board of Education Thursday calls into question how far students should have to go to pass a portion of the high school gradutation test and earn their high school diploma. Read the story here.
A new variance rule allows students who have come within a couple of points of passing on just one portion to get a diploma anyway. It’s a controversial policy based on the statistical concept of Standard Error of Measurement, which says that a student could do slightly better or worse on a test on any given day even if no knew knowledge has been acquired. The SEM on the science portion of the graduation test - by far the biggest barrier to graduation - is six points.
If you were a state board member - I know this requires a major leap of imagination for many - would you have tabled the requests for kids who have one more chance to take the test later this month and force them to take it one last time? Or would you have let them graduate without taking the test again, because they met the criteria spelled out in the policy?
Truth in Cost of Class Size
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Should the public know the cost of reducing class size before the Legislature votes on Perdue’s “truth in class size” bill? Here’s Bridget Gutierrez’s story, which says the price tag is unknown.
If you were a legislator would you insist on getting a “truth in the cost of class size” report before voting on the “truth in class size” bill?
Cafeteria Politics
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
A reader contacted me with this story:
Her fifth-grade daughter attends a high-performing school in metro Atlanta. Her daughter listens to Radio Disney, watches Animal Planet, shops at Limited 2. Her friends share these interests, so she sits with them at lunch. Here’s the problem: she’s black and her friends are white. She says the black girls tell her she should sit at their table. They tell her she is acting white. According to her mother, some of the black girls now treat her horribly.
What’s a girl to do? Mom is especially interested in hearing from others who have experienced this and how they handled it.
UPDATE: Thanks everyone for your posts, especially Teacher2 who took this question to her students. I think the issue has been thoroughly discussed, so I’m turning off the comments.
Cut Scores “Probably” Getting Higher
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Figuring out “cut scores,” the number of correct answers needed to pass a standardized test is like nailing a jellyfish to a wall - while blindfolded. In 2004, the ajc fought for and received cut scores for the CRCT. (The DOE wanted to keep that number secret.) Turns out, third-graders need 17 of 40 questions correct on the reading test.
At the time, officials said the low cut score didn’t mean the test was easy, because the difficulty of the test is relative to the difficulty of the questions. The harder the questions, the lower the cut score. Still for most students, the CRCT is a breeze.
Now, the curriculum has been redone and new CRCTs are coming. Superintendent Kathy Cox has said she’s aware of the gap between pass rates on the CRCT and the NAEP and wants that to “inform the process” in developing the new tests. The new reading and language arts test will be given this spring. In an op-ed piece, which is in response to an editorial, Cox says, “We will set new cut scores, which are the number of answers needed to pass. Will that bar be set higher? Probably.”
Hmmmm… probably? That sound you hear is my head making repeated contact with my desk.
Am I missing something?
Teachers Walking Away
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Heather Vogell, data queen as well as Clayton and Henry schools reporter, crunched the numbers and found Clayton has the biggest problem metro-wide with attrition. Here’s her story.
A 28-year veteran teacher who worked with severely emotionally disturbed children in Clayton told Vogell she went to Henry, because she didn’t think administrators supported her when she was injured on the job. “She tore cartilage in her knee while breaking up a student fight in 2003, and reinjured the knee while ducking to avoid a stick a student at Pointe South Middle had swung at her,” according to the story.
Is the way administrators handle discipline driving teachers away? If so, what can be done?
What is the standard?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
UPDATE: OKAY, I DIDN’T PHRASE MY QUESTIONS VERY WELL. A TEACHER NAMED ROBERT SUGGESTED REPHRASING THIS WAY, AND I AGREE. SO HERE’S THE QUESTION OF THE DAY: WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO PASS THE CRCT?
It isn’t exactly news that the CRCT and the NAEP tell conflicting stories about what kids in Georgia know. And Georgia isn’t the only state with a test-gap problem. I wrote a story anyway, because I am fed up with all the mixed messages and double talk. I just want to know … what is the standard in Georgia schools?
Please don’t tell me to look on the state’s Web site at the “Georgia Performance Standards.” I have, and I appreciate that they are there for the public to see. But that doesn’t tell me what the expectation is as far as how much of the content children need to know to be considered ready for the next grade.
I’d love to hear from parents, teachers and principals, anyone with a view from the inside. Are you clear on what the standard is supposed to be? Is it low? Is it high? Does it vary depending on the student?
Great Crossblogination topic: How sick is too sick for school? Discuss at the MOMania blog here.
Paying for College Counseling
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Some parents pay top dollar for a private counselor to shepherd their child through the college admissions process. This AP story says, “one exclusive two-year consulting program rings up at nearly $40,000.”
Yikes!
I wrote about local private consultants a few years ago, and the prices were not anywhere close to that. The main advantage I saw was that students got exposed to many low-profile schools, like Elon University, that might not have otherwise gotten onto their radar. With so many students focusing on the same few schools like Duke and UVA, the chances of even a smart student getting in are often slim.
Parents who paid for the service generally told me they thought the guidance counselor at their child’s school was too busy to provide the level of service they wanted.
Parents, have you paid for counseling? Would you consider paying?
Teacher’s Pets
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Okay, so maybe it’s not the most pressing issue in public education, but I still enjoyed visiting classrooms with pets. Here’s the story.
Teachers who have pets in their classrooms tend to be interested in educating their children beyond what’s called for on the CRCT and believe that there is still room for fun in school. DeKalb appears to be the most animal-friendly school district. I couldn’t get to all the pets I heard about in DeKalb classrooms. Cobb was home to a teacher with more than a dozen pets as well as a teacher with a therapy dog that fully participates in the school day.
Any other animal-loving teachers out there? Parents, do pets in your child’s classroom make you smile or sneeze?
Television and Test Scores
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Does watching too much TV hurt your kid in school?
A couple of University of Chicago researchers were surprised to find no negative effect on test scores when they looked at kids in the 1960s who had television and compared them to kids who did not. Television seemed to benefit kids who came from homes where parents didn’t speak English as a first language or whose parents were not well educated.
What that told me is television provided kids with vocabulary and information they might not have otherwise encountered. The study challenges the widely held notion that television is a corruptive force on a child’s brain.
I asked a couple of local experts what they thought about kids and television.
Caitlin Dooley, assistant professor at Georgia State, said it’s important that parents help make television interactive for their children. Parents should talk to their kids about the story and get kids to explain what they’re watching. There are good programs out there, said Dooley, a literacy expert. She likes Blues Clues and of course Sesame Street. She said it’s okay to allow children to indulge in the fantasy world offered by television and the computer, but you want to bring them back to real-world social interactions.
Clare Hobart, pre-first teacher at The Westminster Schools, said she loves television. “I do think you can learn from it,” she said. Her students often tell her things they learn watching Animal Planet and other educational programs. Her biggest concern is the bad language children pick up from cartoons, TV shows aimed at adults and movies. “So many parents say, ‘We don’t let our kids watch television,’ but they run to get the latest movie.”
Connie Lacy, a DeKalb County mother of three boys, let her oldest son, now grown, watch lot of television. Later, when Lacy was raising her two younger children, she made an effort to engage them in things other than television. She says her younger kids have done better in school than her oldest. “I feel like I let him down,” she says of her eldest.
Her younger sons, ages 15 and 12, like to make videos, write stories, record themselves on tape and perform on a stage she built in the basement. Her local library once admonished her for having more than 50 books checked out. Her kids watch TV so rarely that they are out of the loop when it comes to pop culture references, she said. But she wouldn’t change it. “In the long run, I feel like my kids are active and happy.”
I have friends who feel guilty if they park their kids in front of the TV for even thirty minutes so they can have some grown-up talk. On the opposite extreme, some kids are sitting glassy-eyed in front of the tube for hours on end.
How much TV do you let your child watch, and do you worry about the effects of television on their schooling?
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