June » 2009 » Carol J. Carter

Teaching Social Responsibility

CAROL’S SUMMARY:
In the article below, which comments on the lead story in Educational Leadership, Charles Haynes explores the value of students who know how to be good human beings relative to the other qualities and skills we emphasize as a society, something Haynes calls “the moral habits of the heart”. Certainly, learning math, science, English and foreign languages are important, but these skills wonâ€™t serve students well if they donâ€™t have emotional and social intelligence to solve their own problems, as well as those of their communities and the world.

Schools can help students develop compassion and a sense of responsibility by emphasizing some of the worldâ€™s greatest problems in a project-based learning format.Â Â When students are challenged by understanding the complexities of overfishing, sanitation problems in third world countries or the rise of AIDS,Â they are given an avenue in which to be involved and are motivated to make a difference.Â Â Â Research shows that todayâ€™s students have a greater sense of social responsibility than the generation that preceded theirs.Â So, as educators, we need to tap in to that interest to help teach critical thinking, problem-solving and citizenshipâ€”including what it means to be a global citizen.

LifeBoundâ€™s new book in print this July, Critical and Creative Thinking for Teenagers, examines some of the greatest problems facing the world right now and provides a framework to help students solve those problems.

ARTICLE:
ASCD
by Marge Scherer

The lead story in my newspaper this morning features the upcoming G20 summit in London at which international leaders will discuss whether regulations, bailouts, and stimulus plans will do anything to stem the financial crisis. Another story is about North Dakota, where residents are wearily watching whether the sandbag barriers they’ve built will hold back the Red River. The stories have their similaritiesâ€”looming disasters, overwhelming forces, demands for people to come together to solve the problem before it is too late. The flood story seems a simpler one. But perhaps it only seems easier to battle a raging river than to battle raging greed.

To view entire article visit
this link.

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Studies Explore Whether the Internet Makes Students Better Writers

CAROL’S SUMMARY:
What influence does all of the brief-communication like texting, blogs, and twitter have on studentsâ€™ ability to perform well in writing tasks for college, career and life? The article below cites a Stanford study exploring this very topic. While students are, arguably, writing more today than ever, the writing is of a brief nature. To get ready for college and career writing, students will need to think more thoroughly at the outset, review their work once the write it and often consider two or more drafts to get it high-quality. This is a process which most students will have to learn and high schools will need to teach so that students can be college-ready.

In the world of work, writing is often expedient. However, there are many times when writing cannot be done quickly without a high cost. Students will need to develop the judgment to know the difference.

Finally, faculty will need to understand the ways in which students writeâ€”texting, blogs, Twitter, FaceBookâ€”so that they can help bridge the gap between what they do now and what they need to learn. If faculty cannot make this leap, they likely will not connect with students in ways that will be lasting.

ARTICLE
Chronicle of Higher Education
By JOSH KELLER

As a student at Stanford University, Mark Otuteye wrote in any medium he could find. He wrote blog posts, slam poetry, to-do lists, teaching guides, e-mail and Facebook messages, diary entries, short stories. He wrote a poem in computer code, and he wrote a computer program that helped him catalog all the things he had written.

But Mr. Otuteye hated writing academic papers. Although he had vague dreams of becoming an English professor, he saw academic writing as a “soulless exercise” that felt like “jumping through hoops.” When given a writing assignment in class, he says, he would usually adopt a personal tone and more or less ignore the prompt.

“I got away with it,” says Mr. Otuteye, who graduated from Stanford in 2006. “Most of the time.”

To view the entire article visit
http://chronicle.com/free/v55/i39/39writing.htm

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The Value of Education in a Recession

The new employment statistics are out and, not surprisingly, they weigh in favor of those with college degrees especially in this economy:

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6 Lessons One Campus Learned About

CAROL’S SUMMARY:
Northwest Missouri State piloted the entire curriculum on-line last year using the Sony Reader, the article below states. While there were many growing pains, the university should be given credit for pioneering in an area which is most certainly the future of learning and project-based study. If publishers want to prevent their industry from being the next automotive example, they need to do these things:
Â 1) Buy or partner with Kindle, Sony and makers of these machines. Publishers will need some stake in the hardware business so that they can develop the necessary learning platforms.
Â 2) Work with the gaming theorists. Students today have grown up on games, and we have a lot to learn about meaningful, dynamic ways to retain information from the gaming companies and people who produce these programs.
Â 3) Live and breathe with students– talented students, struggling students, learning disabled students, returning adults and everything in between. Technology allows us to moderate content for these learners to truly produce individuated instruction.
Â 4) Work with your authors. Training, as the article below indicates, is a huge area for both students and faculty. “Star” authors can help negotiate this divide and teach people on-line, in-person and through sessions like Web X.
Â 5) Don’t think book. Think learning experience and realize that technology opens the door for students to have experience as well as knowledge–two things they desperately need to be competitive in the global
world. In the future, publishers will look more like producers of television shows than creators of static books that need revisions every two or three years, as both students and professors will participate in this dynamic process. We need to consider how learning and teaching will be different because of the opportunities that technology affords.

ARTICLE
Chronicle of Higher Education
By JEFFREY R. YOUNG

Northwest Missouri State University nearly became the first public university to deliver all of its textbooks electronically. Last year the institution’s tech-happy president, Dean L. Hubbard, bought a Kindle, Amazon’s e-book reading device, and liked it so much that he wanted to give every incoming student one. The university already runs an unusual textbook-rental program that buys thousands of printed books for students who pay a flat, per-credit fee. Mr. Hubbard saw in the gadget a way to drastically cut the rental program’s annual $800,000 price tag, since e-books generally cost half the price of printed textbooks.

To view the entire article visit
http://chronicle.com/temp/email2.php?id=HrghYKYs4hspNRWQYd6YzpqydhgtTXZs

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The Impact of Student Employment

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

As the article below indicates, working 10 or more hours a week had a positive effect on high-ability students in the areas of critical thinking/ overall academic success and a negative effect for low-ability students. Low ability students, when stressed, tend to drop classes and work more, endangering their loans and scholarships. Students who work 20 hours or less a week report higher levels of engagement in all five areas surveyedâ€”student/faculty interaction, critical thinking, engaging in collaborative learning, etc. A second survey followed additional areas like moral reasoning, socially responsible leadership and overall psychological well-being. Students who work more than 20 hours a week, whether low ability or high ability were at greater risk academically.

The bottom line: More students entering college need to be better prepared academically in order to handle work, academic load, personal life and career preparation. If students come in underprepared, they are much more likely to be done in by the very jobs which are helping them make ends meet.

ARTICLE
Inside Higher Ed
ATLANTA — The idea that college students who work on the side are at a disadvantage is almost quaint. Not because there’s no evidence that spending many hours on things other than academics can impair students — such evidence does exist — but rather because the days are long past when many college students had a choice but to work. As tuitions have risen and more and more undergraduates are enrolling later in life, nearly half of all full-time students and 80 percent of part-time students work — numbers that are likely only to grow in the future.

To view entire article visit
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/06/08/work

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Rising Above I.Q.

In Nicholas Kristofâ€™s article below reviewing John Nesbittâ€™s new book, Intelligence and How to Get It, both authors consider the role IQ and effort has when analyzing Asians, Jews and West Indian-born African Americans. As it turns out, each of the people in these three ethnic groups outperform other ethnic groups and typically white middle class students as well. The people in these ethnic groups arenâ€™t necessarily â€œsmarterâ€ than their counterparts, but because of family support, priority around becoming educated and exposure to more vocabulary at a young age, they get the â€œmost out of the firepowerâ€ that they have.

What all students should be taught in school is this basic lesson: Intelligence and academic success are very much a matter of personal choice and is, therefore, a decision that we can make. As my friend Joe Martin, who was raised in the projects and went on to get his Ph.D says: “Your I CAN is a lot more important than IQ.”

ARTICLE
New York Times
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

In the mosaic of America, three groups that have been unusually successful are Asian-Americans, Jews and West Indian blacks â€” and in that there may be some lessons for the rest of us.

To view the entire article visit
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/07/opinion/07kristof.html?emc=eta1

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Colleges Face Challenges in Helping Foreign Students Adjust to Life in U.S.

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

As more and more students add an international component to their education, it is critical to understand how to engage and support students during a time when they are susceptible to culture shock, isolation and academic stress. As the article below indicates, many colleges fall short of their goals in helping foreign students adapt to American culture. The coaching required to help international students with academic, financial and emotional issues can be extensive and challenging, as advisors discover that tactics that work for American college students often donâ€™t work for their foreign counterparts.

Socially, international students often stick together because they can be uncomfortable trying to mesh with our culture. However, survey results taken from undergraduates at several private liberal arts colleges reveal that many international students would like to have more American friends. As perhaps the most important challenge for international students is forming relationships with individuals different from them, the support networks and mentoring programs mentioned in this article are crucial to student success.

Some internationals students arrive on campus with more complex and weighty issues than homesickness or culture shock. They may come from war-torn or politcally unstable countries, such as the Rwandan genocide of 1994, which traumatically affected students attending universities in this country who knew their family members were either in hiding or being killed. In those kinds of cases, colleges must ramp up their crisis intervention programs. This article’s primary charge is for colleges and universities to commit to training advisers, who often are the first person on campus that international students seek out when they need help.

This article also raises a critical issue in coaching: how do we help engage at-risk populations who often arenâ€™t asking for help? This article provides several suggestions, from partnerships between foreign and domestic students to professional counseling to presemester courses on writing, culture, and acclimating to the United States. The importance of providing the right resources, practicing active listening skills and asking the right questions simply cannot be understated, especially when dealing with cultures different from our own.

ARTICLE:
Chronicle of Higher Education
By BETH MCMURTRIE

American colleges pride themselves on welcoming students from around the world. But how effectively are they helping foreign students adapt to and thrive in an American setting?

That is a subject of increasing debate among educators, some of whom question the support systems their institutions have in place.

To view the entire article visit
http://chronicle.com/temp/email2.php?id=vGkW9myprTw9WByRPDS2wrgSyxCCR9nc

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A Changing Student Body: Report Shows Record Enrollment, More-Diverse Population

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

As the Washington Post article below indicates, the demographics in America are changing:

Â· 44% of the nationâ€™s students are minorities

Â· Performance among 17-year-olds has been stagnant since the seventies

Â· Achievement gaps between low income students and high income students continue to widen

Â· Our nation will see record enrollments between now and 2018, when there will be 53.9 million students

Â· In 2007, there were 1.5 million home-school students

Â· Private school attendance is down

Â· Numbers of students earning Bachelorâ€™s degrees has increased 30%.

What will we have to do in K-12 to prepare students in the lowest economic status for success?

What can turn around success for our nation’s 17 year olds?

How can we look differently at K-12 learning to set a world-class standard for performance?

ARTICLE:
By Maria Glod

Public school enrollment across the country is hitting a record this year with just less than 50 million students, and classrooms are becoming more diverse, largely because of growth in the Latino population, according to a new federal report.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/31/AR2009053102229.html?sid=ST2009060100036

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46 States, D.C. Plan to Draft Common Education Standards

CAROL’S SUMMARY:

Our nation is on the verge of a transformational new movement to define educational standards for all grade levels through high school. As the article below states, 46 states are now in agreement that we need to adopt national curriculum standards to help make our countryâ€™s workforce more globally competitive. These states are no longer content to watch ill-prepared students get by in school by passing tests that fail to meet national educational expectations. The outcoming national standards hope to balance the discrepancy between what students score on state versus national tests, and to narrow the widening achievement gap between the United States and the world.

LifeBound offers programs that can help smooth the transition for students all the way from elementary school through high school. Even more importantly, LifeBound works to supplement the traditional educational system with critical life skills and strengths-based materials. Along with the new educational standards due to be released in July, LifeBound will help prepare the next generation of students with the persistence, self-awareness and confidence needed to succeed in our global economy.

ARTICLE
By Maria Glod
Washington Post

Forty-six states and the District of Columbia today will announce an effort to craft a single vision for what children should learn each year from kindergarten through high school graduation, an unprecedented step toward a uniform definition of success in American schools.

To view entire article visit

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/31/AR2009053102339.html?wprss=rss_education

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Introducing a Remedial Program That Actually Works

While our nation is at-risk for financial and real-estate debacles, we are also at-risk for our economy of the future in underprepared college graduates who are swelling our Higher Educational institutions in numbers two-thirds strong in community colleges and almost one-third strong in four year schools as the article below indicates.

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