Summer learning losses are a real threat to all students entering the summer months. Providing kids with educational games, activities, materials, and experiences during their summer vacation is crucial in retaining information learned during the school year and preparing them for the transition into next year.
For low-income kids, the oncoming summer vacation can bring forth different feelings than it does for privileged students. Due to a lack of accessibility, availability, and financial resources, low-income students often don’t have equal summer learning opportunities as privileged students, which contributes to increased summer learning losses and puts them at a disadvantage at the start of each new school year. Some of these students care for younger siblings all summer. Others play the role of parent to parents who may struggle with addiction or other issues. Others are in foster families or are raised by a grandparent because their parents are in prison or not fit to raise them.
This year, teen unemployment rates are soaring between 23.2 – 23.8 percent 1, which may prove to be even more problematic for low-income teens looking to work more hours to contribute to the family, make money for the upcoming school year, or to simply keep busy and off the street.
Teens enjoy using their summer months to unwind from the long academic year, but many also expect to spend summer working a summer job, or increasing the hours at their part-time job, to save money, get experience, and have something structured to do. And these are the lucky students who have the luxury of being able to get a “legitimate” job. Â Many disadvantaged students living in the housing projects or at poverty level will be struggling to avoid street temptations and other fast ways to earn money. This year almost one out of four American teens ages 16 to 19 were unemployed in February. On average, over the last 20 years, teens have held a steady unemployment rate of between 14 and 18 percent. The teen unemployment rate in 2012 has reached 23.2 to 23.8 percent.1
Since 2008, researchers have been conducting studies which have challenged the idea that students have different learning styles, according to Annie Murphy Paul in the article “Do Students Really Have Different Learning Styles?” Studies have shown that students do have preferred ways of learning, but that the mode in which information is presented — whether using kinesthetic, auditory, or visual lessons — has no effect on their ability to “absorb information”.  What is useful, and where I differ from the research Paul’s references, is the critical area of learning styles and self knowledge: to make a better commitment to study to how you learn, to link learning to careers and fields which match your abilities, and to manage both learning strengths and weaknesses.
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The classroom bully is not a new character, but technology has given the bully new shape. The Internet and the accessibility of handheld devices for younger and younger kids has afforded the bully to be more elusive and far-reaching, both in audience and victims.
Findings of a new cyberbullying study illuminates the changes and challenges well. According to the study, physical bullying decreases as children get older, but cyberbullying increases. The study also found:
 (“One-Fifth of Third-Graders Own Cell Phones” — CNET)
Is it mandatory that educators use technology to engage young minds in the digital age?
For many schools and individuals, the terms “student” and “education” have become redefined — and undefined — by digital tools. For example, “students” can still be teens who attend a brick and mortar high school, but they might also be a retired lawyer who takes advantage of Stanford’s free online classes. Some students attend a “flipped-classroom” where they take a lesson at home on YouTube and come to class to do their homework. Some students master activities through gaming, answer tests on their cellphones, and collaborate with peers by developing computer software.
Most states are adopting the new Common Core Standards, requiring that students’ reading curriculum include more rigorous and nonfiction materials. In fact, the goal is to have 70 percent of a student’s reading come from informational texts by graduation, according to the article “New Literacy Standards Could Challenge Even Passionate Readers.” This shift in reading content is aimed at helping build reading skills students will need in college, career and throughout their lives.
Spring break is coming to an end and that’s a sure sign summer vacation will be here before we know it. When students go on summer vacation it is important for them to be mentally challenged. Why? Students who aren’t engaged in learning activities don’t  retain information learned during the school year and often start the following year behind their counterparts who do grow their brains in the summer.
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The phrase “education reform” doesn’t usually conjure positive feelings, however, emerging research can make thinking about the new possibilities exciting. We live in a time of fundamental change with research that should influence the decisions we make on how to move away from the past and move forward into the future. Neurological research is one area that is taking us beyond simply teaching and learning and showing us the how behind teaching and learning to develop the most effective practices.
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Summer vacation will be here before we know it, and while it is an exciting time for students to take a break from academia, it is also where students experience the largest learning losses. No student is safe from summer learning losses if their brains aren’t kept active throughout the summer months. However, students in lower-income families are generally at a much higher risk to suffer from learning losses which continues to increase the achievement gap between lower and higher income youth.
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