tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35954406678731378892024-03-04T20:33:10.373-08:00Teaching High SchoolHistory, economics, politics, psychology, and the classroomTeaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.comBlogger153125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-59160594198162287132014-08-01T13:03:00.000-07:002014-08-01T13:03:04.522-07:00The Culture of Parenting<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The author, September, 1964</td></tr>
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Perhaps every generation looks at its childhood as idyllic. I have idolized my pre-adolecent summers from 1964 to 1974 as a 9AM to 9PM adventure in the Northern California suburban outdoors, mostly playing pickup games of baseball but also hanging out with other boys and hiking in the hills, fighting crayfish and attempting to catch bullfrogs, riding our bikes around town, creating small explosives with match heads, and releasing paper gliders off of kites. I had to conform to two rules: report back for meals and be home before it got dark. My parents did not set up play dates, nor did they supervise any of the activities. No parents on my block did. My father's summers in the 1930s and 1940s were similar, though growing up on the streets of Brooklyn and San Francisco he witnessed considerably more violence and cruelty than I. Skipping forward to the 1990s and beyond, however, my children experienced a quite different style of parenting during their summer break. They participated in organized sports and the games were closely observed by their parents. They were driven to play dates. They never simply left the house without telling me where they were going. They never went out and came back in twelve hours with bruises and bee stings.<br />
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Historian Jon Grinspan traces a short history of parenting from the late 19th century to today in the May 31, 2014 New York Times article <u>The Wild Children of Yesteryear</u> (link <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/01/opinion/sunday/the-wild-children-of-yesteryear.html?_r=0" target="_blank">here</a>). Boys were expected to spend "their childhoods in a rowdy outdoor subculture" to foster a young republican outlook: self-reliant, democratic, striving and entrepreneurial. Late 19th and early 20th century changes, especially the progressive movement, urged laws to protect children. Additionally demographic changes (less children) created more worried parents. The movement to becoming helicopter parents, Grinspan argues, began not in the 1970s but before the McKinley administration.<br />
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Parents have becoming more involved in education as well, and what parents think is good for educating kids may not be. Sociologists Keith Robinson and Angel Harris argue that parental involvement in children's education is unnecessary. In the April 12, 2014 NYT article <u>Parental Involvement is Overrated</u> (link <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/04/12/parental-involvement-is-overrated/" target="_blank">here</a>)and in their book, <i>The Broken Compass: Parental Involvement with Children's Education</i>, Robinson and Harris argue that "most forms of parental involvement yielded no benefit to children's test scores or grades, regardless of racial or ethnic background or socioeconomic standing." Occasionally parental involvement did matter, but the research showed it depended on which behavior and which ethnic group. For example, regularly reading to elementary school children benefited white and Hispanic children but not black children. The researchers argue that policy makers need to take into account the factors of behavior, academic outcome, grade level, racial and ethnic background, and socioeconomic standing when advocating for the very few parental involvements that help kids. More simply, though, "parents should set the stage and then leave it." This adage may apply to kids' play lives as well.</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-83528859203733645442014-07-02T20:18:00.004-07:002014-07-02T21:33:35.816-07:00Franklin and Winston<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Journalist Jon Meacham has written a fascinating memoir in<i> Franklin [Roosevelt]) and Winston [Churchill]: an Intimate Portrait of an Epic Friendship</i> (2003, Random House, New York). The book should be read by every president that manufactures alliances and manages international conflicts. That would be every one! If our current president had read this book he may not have as quickly characterized Churchill as a reactionary colonialist and removed the Churchill bust from the White House. Churchill was a defender of the British Empire and unwilling to let colonial people have self-determination, but he was also the last European hope against Hitler. His success in lining up American help against the Nazi's, not an easy task in isolationist America, not only saved Britain. Churchill was instrumental in getting the U.S. in the war before it was too late for the free world.<br />
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Meacham analyzes the contrasting management styles of Roosevelt and Churchill. Roosevelt was practical, devious, always withholding a part of himself. He controlled his emotions completely, met women he wasn't supposed to see, and could completely compartmentalize his personal and private life from his public duties. He was a fair weather friend--publicly embarrassing and ignoring Churchill when, acting in matters of state as he saw them, he cozied up to Stalin. Roosevelt had utmost faith in his ability to charm anyone, even the Soviet dictator, and had he lived until the end of 1945, he may have been able to convince Stalin to act less aggressively in Poland and the rest of Eastern Europe. Roosevelt may have reacted less vociferously than Truman to Soviet provocations, keeping tensions between America and the Russians below the boiling point. Right before his death, Roosevelt avoided confrontation and suggested a middle course with Stalin (P.341).<br />
<br />
In contrast to FDR, Churchill was a straight shooter, courageous, honest, devoted, warmhearted, magnanimous, and an ornate, brilliant orator. He saw black and white, good and evil, when battling Naziism, and history shows his was the correct attitude, when many in his government wanted to make a negotiated peace with Hitler. He was also prescient in predicting and exposing the nefarious intentions of the Soviet empire after the war was over. Roosevelt was starting to come around to Churchill's view of Stalin when Roosevelt suffered the cerebral hemorrhage that ended his life.<br />
<br />
Two themes run through the book that also resonate throughout the history of 20th and 21st century presidents. Should a president campaign as though he is healthy even though he is gravely ill, and how much time does a president need in order to recuperate from the weighty pressures of the office?<br />
Roosevelt had congestive heart failure and hypertension, which eventually killed him. At some level he knew he was dying but felt he had to lead the war to a successful conclusion, and no one else could have done it as well. The last point is debatable, but it was obvious to all who met him that FDR looked terrible by mid 1944. He looked haggard, had lost weight, and had energy for only four hours of hard work each day, when the war demanded much more time from the leader of the western world. Roosevelt campaigned like a champion in the 1944 election for a fourth term, slogging through a nasty storm in New York City in an open car. The press put the photographs in all the newspapers. He was fine the voters thought or, wanted to think.<br />
<br />
John F. Kennedy was also much sicker than voters knew. Despite his chronic ill health he looked like Adonis (according to journalist and newscaster Walter Cronkite) in his critical televised debate with Nixon and governed with youthful vigor. (See my review of Kennedy <a href="http://mikespinrad.blogspot.com/2011/12/john-kennedy-revisited.html" target="_blank">here</a>.) If voters knew the truth about Kennedy's health would they have voted for him over Nixon? Woodrow Wilson was cursed with chronic ill health before his debilitating stroke near the end of his second term. Running against the athletic and larger-than-life Theodore Roosevelt in 1912, Wilson could not afford to let the American people know he was a frail academic.<br />
<br />
Do presidents need to be flying to Camp David, playing golf, attending lavish banquets, and just plain enjoying themselves as much as they do? Presidents are always "on" and Meacham's book gives the reader more respect for the formidable pressures of the office, especially in war time. Older, sicker men need time to recharge, whether it's collecting stamps (FDR) or <strike>collecting conquests</strike> vacationing at Hyannis Point (JFK). The American people can rightly ask if a president is vacationing in order to work better or, like a Roman emperor, taking the job for what it's worth in order to enjoy frequent, free and lavish vacations.<br />
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Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-77483901111677543232013-08-25T17:16:00.002-07:002013-08-25T17:16:35.880-07:00How are Teachers Evaluated?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The following is an email I sent to a student who wanted to know what I thought about high school students evaluating teachers.<br />
<br />
<div id="yui_3_7_2_1_1377475697603_2076">
High school teachers have many
stakeholders. From the top down, they include the Federal government (No
Child Left Behind Act) which mandates continued test
score improvements, the State of California, which tells teachers what
to teach, the District,
which hires and pays teachers, and the taxpayers (the parents), which
support the school district. Those actually being taught, the high
school students, have no voice in the process other than choosing which
classes to take. Even then there are many mandatory
classes, and students can perhaps select a certain teacher, but they
cannot avoid the class. Why is that? The State has determined that
students must learn certain things, and that the State (thinks it) knows
better than the student what those things should
be. If the parents disagree, they can homeschool or send their child to
a private school, but the students still need to learn certain
subjects, like it or not. Since that is the case--students learn
information that they may not be interested in (Shakespear,
geometry, Reconstruction)--it does not make sense for students to be
involved in the teacher assessment process. Should slaves assess their
masters? Note, however, that students already evaluate their teachers
informally on the internet. Comments I have read
on <span class="yshortcuts" id="lw_1377475759_0">RateMyTeacher.com</span> do
not give me confidence that high school students can assess teachers
properly (even though I do well there, personally). Additionally, all
teachers get a reputation and are sought after or avoided based on these
rumors, fair or not. </div>
<div id="yui_3_7_2_1_1377475697603_2076">
</div>
<div id="yui_3_7_2_1_1377475697603_2076">
Teachers are evaluated by principals using fair but strict
standards based on equity, preparation, engagement, safety, etc. Most
students don't pay much attention to these things but they are the
essence of good teaching!</div>
<div id="yui_3_7_2_1_1377475697603_2122">
</div>
I would be more comfortable
including student ratings in teacher assessments if they were in
elective, not mandatory classes, and answered (on a Likert scale) items
such as "does this teacher teach to standards" and "did this class
prepare me for a career
or college?"<br />
<br />
Thanks for the opportunity to respond to your query. </div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-12395199579020574582013-08-04T16:18:00.001-07:002013-08-04T16:18:08.601-07:00Review of Jim Rogers' Investment Autobiography, Street Smarts<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">credit: sg.asiatatler.com</td></tr>
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Famed investor Jim Rogers has published a book that is part autobiography, part geopolitics, and part investment wisdom. <i>Street Smarts: Adventures on the Road and in the Markets </i>(Crown Publishing, 2013) gives his views on investing, which countries are growing more powerful and which are declining, what America must do to reform its society, and the value of raising children. Despite its wide scope, the book does not meander. Rogers engaged me throughout with his ideas about television (like me, he avoids it), politicians, ethics, and what it takes to succeed.<br />
<br />
As an autobiography, the book reveals that Rogers single mindedly tried to understand how markets worked and struggled without pause to do so. He enjoyed learning how the world works, so he was motivated to understand markets as well as wanting not to lose money. He worked on holidays and through weekends. He had few distractions as none of his earlier marriages lasted long or produced children. The picture on the left shows Rogers with his third wife, Paige. He now has two Mandarin-speaking daughters as well. Rogers insists that he was successful because of his ability to think independently and willingness to travel and look at information sources himself.<br />
<br />
The two main themes of the book are the transition to Asia as the economic powerhouse as American leadership declines and "a cyclical shift away from financial firms as a source of prosperity" (P. 5) in favor of producers of real goods, especially foodstuffs. (As an aside, brick and mortar education may be replaced by distance learning, and Rogers predicts many of today's elite universities will go bankrupt.)<br />
<br />
Rogers states that the United States needs to do five things to be saved: change the tax system, change the education system, institute health-care and litigation reform, and bring the troops home" (P. 241), but he is doubtful that these reforms will occur because of the power of special interests. He suggests that the legislative branch no longer meet in Washington, D.C., and instead the representatives and senators should in their local areas and meet virtually, avoiding the power of the special interest groups.<br />
<br />
Since Rogers conducts his business dealings ethically and believes his good name is invaluable, I found it interesting that he glosses over human rights violations in many of the leading Asian countries, comparing these problems to those in early America: lack of real democracy in the early years of the American Republic and the existence of a late 19th-century plutocracy. In other words, according to Rogers the United States committed many of the same sins now found in Asia. I find this comparison unfair as our government has committed crimes of omission (because the Constitution limits its powers) rather than commission, such as throwing people in prison because of their beliefs. Rogers' unwillingness to come to terms with Asian oppression is the weakness of this book. He feels that China, Myanmar, and North Korea will eventually change for the better. So invest today! Despite this flaw, the book is well worth reading.<br />
<br />
I have previously recommended Rogers' <i>Investment Biker</i> book to my economics students and will add this book to my list of recommended books as well.<br />
<br />
See my previous blogs about North Korea <a href="http://mikespinrad.blogspot.com/2011/12/if-i-was-north-korean.html" target="_blank">here</a> and food prices <a href="http://mikespinrad.blogspot.com/2013/08/the-biggest-urbanization-program-ever.html" target="_blank">here</a> and <a href="http://mikespinrad.blogspot.com/2011/11/crime-and-end-of-cheap-food.html" target="_blank">here</a>.</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-39283359897664211342013-08-01T14:56:00.002-07:002013-08-01T17:40:55.774-07:00The Biggest Urbanization Program Ever and Food Prices<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR13yPe9Lelb3ojUI_Y0LXDyonSh7AdoQd1rR8W0MhnG0FfwcYxxBIgMN-CttlDJS-mUOYluXY3052vgcRJUqtkcXus3ptsFj7COeASOix7qI_eIhg_WK9LyvAr0Hp3zkW_zdFHyPxTTI/s1600/urbanization-and-income.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="182" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR13yPe9Lelb3ojUI_Y0LXDyonSh7AdoQd1rR8W0MhnG0FfwcYxxBIgMN-CttlDJS-mUOYluXY3052vgcRJUqtkcXus3ptsFj7COeASOix7qI_eIhg_WK9LyvAr0Hp3zkW_zdFHyPxTTI/s320/urbanization-and-income.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Source: NYT</td></tr>
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According to the New York Times (link <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/16/world/asia/chinas-great-uprooting-moving-250-million-into-cities.html?pagewanted=all" target="_blank">here</a>), China is in the midst of a program to move 250 million people from the countryside to cities, joining the 450 million that already live in Chinese cities. China's goal is to be 70 percent urban, and therefore modernized by 2025. A quarter of a billion people will be watching their ancestral villages return to the earth and are pushed into modernity "replacing small rural homes with high-rises, paving over vast swaths of
farmland and drastically altering the lives of rural dwellers" <br />
<div class="articleHeadline" itemprop="headline" style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-weight: normal;">(<u>China’s Great Uprooting: Moving 250 Million Into Cities</u>, June 15, 2013 <i>New York T</i></span>i<i>mes</i>)</div>
<div class="articleHeadline" itemprop="headline" style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<div itemprop="articleBody">
The building frenzy is on display in places like Liaocheng, which grew
up as an entrepôt for local wheat farmers in the North China Plain. It
is now ringed by scores of 20-story towers housing now-landless farmers
who have been thrust into city life. Many are giddy at their new lives —
they received the apartments free, plus tens of thousands of dollars
for their land — but others are uncertain about what they will do when
the money runs out. </div>
<div itemprop="articleBody">
Aggressive state spending is planned on new roads, hospitals, schools,
community centers — which could cost upward of $600 billion a year,
according to economists’ estimates. In addition, vast sums will be
needed to pay for the education, health care and pensions of the
ex-farmers. </div>
<div itemprop="articleBody">
While the economic fortunes of many have improved in the mass move to
cities, unemployment and other social woes have also followed the
enormous dislocation. Some young people feel lucky to have jobs that pay
survival wages of about $150 a month; others wile away their days in
pool halls and video-game arcades (ibid). </div>
</blockquote>
Economically, city dwellers create demand for goods and services and country-dwellers do not.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The primary motivation for the urbanization push is to change China’s
economic structure, with growth based on domestic demand for products
instead of relying so much on export. In theory, new urbanites mean vast
new opportunities for construction companies, public transportation,
utilities and appliance makers, and a break from the cycle of farmers
consuming only what they produce. “If half of China’s population starts
consuming, growth is inevitable,” said Li Xiangyang, vice director of
the Institute of World Economics and Politics, part of a government
research institute. “Right now they are living in rural areas where they
do not consume” (ibid.)</blockquote>
<br />
In addition to moving people from rural to urban areas, the Chinese government is trying to get rid of unsightly hamlets and make way for large industrial projects such as dams. My uncle, fresh from a visit to China, writes: <br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Mike, </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Here are a couple of pictures of Chongqing showing the poorer area that will soon be demolished and replaced by modern high rise apartments. The other [third picture] shows a modern 'village' on the Yangtze River that replaced a village that now is under the river since the dam was completed. 1.5 million people were relocated when they built the dam.</blockquote>
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<a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=3595440667873137889" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"></a>Will this great experiment work? Will China succeed in creating a massive modern economy, dwarfing the demand for goods and services enjoyed in the United States, or will it create a large underclass of unskilled, slum dwellers? I don't know. I will guess, however, that this urbanization program will create greater demand for food. City dwellers tend to eat more animal and processed products, creating more demand for grains, sugars, and other basic foodstuffs. Farmers, rapidly decreasing in number, eat closer to the base of the food chain. I also believe that China's gamble on urbanization will decrease the supply of food. The government is paving over farmland or giving it to local governments and agribusiness. Meanwhile, brilliant investor Jim Rogers writes:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Until prices reach a point where growing food is profitable, the world's farmers, who are currently aging and dying, are not going to be replaced. Prices must rise, and they will. In recent years, the world has been consuming more food than it has produced. Those inventories that were so high in the 1980s are now historically low, somewhere near 14 percent of consumption. The world is facing drastic shortages. Food prices are on the way up (Rogers, Jim, <u>Street Smarts: Adventures on the Road and in the Markets</u>, Crown Publishing, 2013, P.28).</blockquote>
Look for food prices to increase, whether inflation appears or not. (See my previous blog on this issue <a href="http://mikespinrad.blogspot.com/2011/11/crime-and-end-of-cheap-food.html" target="_blank">here</a>.)</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-5358448720654949202013-07-23T15:17:00.000-07:002013-07-23T15:21:50.330-07:00Child Care--When is it Good or Bad for Children?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Child care is a helpful option for adults. It lets them, especially mothers, have more possibilities after choosing to have a child--free time to work or to get a respite away from children. However, under what conditions is child care good or bad for the children? When do children in pre-kindergarten child care have outcomes as good as those raised by a parent or other primary caretaker? The <u>Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development</u> (link <a href="https://www.nichd.nih.gov/publications/pubs/documents/seccyd_06.pdf" target="_blank">here</a>) by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) gives complex answers to these two questions.<br />
<br />
Why look at another government study? "The NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development (SECCYD), is the most comprehensive study to date of children and the many environments in which they develop" (P. 6). This longitudinal (16-year), national project studied more than 1,000 children from one-month of age.What are the findings?<br />
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On the one hand the NICHD study finds that children "who were cared for exclusively by their mothers did not develop differently than those who were also cared for by others" (P.5). On the other hand, "children with higher quantity (total combined number of hours) of experience in non-maternal child care showed somewhat more behavior problems in child care and in kindergarten classrooms than those who had experienced fewer hours" (ibid.) How can we reconcile both statements? One may conclude from this study that longer hours of child care was correlated with children behaving slightly worse--less socialized and less ready for the rules of the classroom. But parent characteristics, that is, whether the parents were emotionally supportive and created a cognitively enriched environment, whether parents had higher education and family income, whether both parents were together and raising the child, and, and whether the parents were psychologically well-adjusted and sensitive to the child's needs (P.25) were more important than the child care (P.5).<br />
<br />
If parent characteristics are most important and if middle class families are, in the aggregate, less chaotic than disadvantaged families, child care quality becomes critical primarily for disadvantaged, chaotic households if one takes the research to its logical conclusions. The NICHD study does not support this conclusion (P.15), but other studies do, especially the longitudinal Abecedarian <a href="http://abc.fpg.unc.edu/" target="_blank">project</a>, which showed cognitive improvements in disadvantaged children up to young adulthood. These disadvantaged kids also developed better health habits, were more likely to go to college and make more money, and were less likely to end up in trouble. The Abecedarian study also positively affected the behaviors of the teenage mothers of these children, making it more likely they would finish their schooling and be self-supporting.<br />
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Yet, how many disadvantaged mothers are able to take advantage of high-quality child care such as that offered by the Abecedarian project? Most disadvantaged parents do not have access to high-quality child care, using instead a relative or friend down the street. This care is not as bad as that of Uncle Ernie (in The Who's rock opera, <i>Tommy</i>), but unlicensed and unregulated care by relatives or friends is often poor quality, and, of course, unlicensed and unregulated care at centers is often poor quality as well. The NICHD authors admit that most child care is not high quality (P. 1 5). Low-quality care and low-quality parenting can be poor combination.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Children were somewhat more likely to be insecurely attached to their mothers if they were in lower quality care, but only if their mothers were also lower in sensitivity during interactions with their children (P.13).</blockquote>
<br />
These effects were less strong in the NICHD study, stronger in other studies. Insecurely attached children have increased stress and coping problems (Spangler 1993) and are less equipped to handle the rigors of public school. I will give more data on the dangers of low-quality care below.<br />
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Now let us leave the world of research and enter the even more murky universe of psychological theory. John Bowlby, founder of attachment theory, wrote that children belong with their mothers. Here is a <a href="http://www.childrenwebmag.com/articles/key-child-care-texts/child-care-and-the-growth-of-love-by-john-bowlby" target="_blank">summation</a> of his famous book, <i>Child Care and the Growth of Love</i>:<br />
<ul>
<li>Maternal deprivation is a key cause of mental ill-health.</li>
<li>Mothers are central to a child’s development with fathers and extended family members providing a supporting role.</li>
<li>Any maternal separation will adversely affect a child to some degree.</li>
<li>Efforts should be made to avoid family failure but even state
support may not be enough where the fundamental problem is failing
parents.</li>
<li>Adoption should be undertaken as soon as possible.</li>
<li>Where possible, the mothers of illegitimate children should be given the support to care for their children.</li>
<li>Fostering, if possible with the extended family or neighbors, should be used for short term emergencies.</li>
<li>Group care should be confined to treatment, the care of adolescents
or the short-term care of younger children and sibling groups.</li>
<li>In both fostering and group care parental contact should be encouraged.</li>
<li>Treatment, whether for physical or mental illnesses, should if
possible be provided in the child’s natural home and otherwise in homes
close enough for parental contact.</li>
</ul>
NICHD researchers do not find differences in attachment security between kids in day care or at home, but Bowlby, interviewed well after his WWII orphanage observations that were the crux of his theory, was not a proponent of center-based care! And it is a stretch to imagine either Bowlby or (famous attachment researcher) Mary Ainsworth approving of center-based care where the child's primary (love) object can change day-to-day. <br />
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As a son and brother of academic researchers, I trust the scientific method over theory or other forms of evidence in determining the efficacy of child care. However, the most vociferous criticisms against child care come from heavily emotional personal stories. Conservative writer Karl Zinsmeister supplies plenty of anecdotal fodder in his <a href="http://www.thelizlibrary.org/site-index/site-index-frame.html#soulhttp://www.thelizlibrary.org/liz/daycare.html" target="_blank">article</a>, <u>The Problem with Day Care</u> (<i>The American Enterprise</i>, May/June 1998). Much of it bemoans the lack of ANY high-quality child care.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Author Linda Burton is another person who has described in detail what she came across while scouring her hometown (the Washington, D.C. area) for day care: <br />
<br />
In one instance, I found the "absolutely marvelous" family day care provider, recommended by trusted friends, sleeping on her sofa while 11 children (she had informed me that she only cared for five) wandered aimlessly around in front of the blaring TV. Another time, on an unannounced visit, I found that the "highly recommended" licensed day care provider confined seven preschoolers to her tiny dining room. I found them huddled together, leaning over a barricade to watch a TV program showing in the adjacent room. <br />
<br />
These are not isolated anecdotes. Anyone investigating the world of full-time day care quickly amasses files of such testimony. A few years ago the Metropolitan Toronto Social Planning Council investigated a sample of 281 day care homes. They reported that a small number were genuinely stimulating, and another small number were out-and-out abusive. The large majority, however, provided care that was merely indifferent. Only a few of the caregivers studied were able to make themselves genuinely interested in each of their individual enrollees. In a significant minority of cases, youngsters were simply ignored most of the time. </blockquote>
Despite the doubts of Bowlby, despite how children cared by multiple caregivers would be a unrecommended practice according to attachment theory, and despite anecdotal evidence, NICHD research has shown few negative attachment effects on children in child care. By 2005, the American Academy of Pediatrics had revised its policy. Based on the NICHD and Abecedarian studies, it's publication, <u>Quality Early Education and Child Care from Birth to Kindergarten</u> (Volume 115, No. 1, January 1) stated a change in favor of child care but only high-quality care (or parenting).<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
When care is consistent, developmentally sound, and emotionally supportive, there is a positive effect on the child and the
family.<sup><a class="xref-bibr" href="http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/115/1/187.full#ref-8" id="xref-ref-8-1">8</a>–<a class="xref-bibr" href="http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/115/1/187.full#ref-21" id="xref-ref-21-1">21</a></sup> Children exposed to a poor-quality environment, whether at home or outside the home, are less likely to be prepared for school
demands and more likely to have their socioemotional development derailed.<sup><a class="xref-bibr" href="http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/115/1/187.full#ref-8" id="xref-ref-8-2">8</a>–<a class="xref-bibr" href="http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/115/1/187.full#ref-21" id="xref-ref-21-2">21</a></sup>
The inadequate outcomes of children in poor-quality care often cannot
be fully remedied in the formal structure of the K-12
educational system because of the need for
noneducational services such as mental and behavioral health care. </blockquote>
As seen in the Abecedarian study above, lasting positive affects were seen when low-income children experience high-quality care. However, as noted by NICHD researchers, the authors of <u>Quality Early Education and Child Care from Birth to Kindergarten</u> write, "most child care centers in the United States are rated poor to mediocre in quality, with almost half meeting less than minimal standards" (ibid.).<br />
<br />
Until child care improves in quality, low-income children will continue to suffer. Economically disadvantaged but "good-enough" parents (as Winnicott would say) may get better outcomes by avoiding low-quality child care if they have an economic choice.</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-61063035221938306422013-07-20T13:26:00.000-07:002013-07-28T17:52:47.185-07:00Unreasonable Search and Seizure: Democracy and The Fall of the 4th Amendement<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc8bbAQXobPmKsdAQ38AAUdieigSUYSAY1np_B3floU7womIkaFPAtOrObyWa2hT2oHA5Sjv-XEISaKwf9lPwv8TpelaXiJx5sBMrgpJtXuq1q08v8Lwe-Sv_d-mnNucLpjTqoyLIbrZA/s1600/malcontends.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc8bbAQXobPmKsdAQ38AAUdieigSUYSAY1np_B3floU7womIkaFPAtOrObyWa2hT2oHA5Sjv-XEISaKwf9lPwv8TpelaXiJx5sBMrgpJtXuq1q08v8Lwe-Sv_d-mnNucLpjTqoyLIbrZA/s1600/malcontends.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">from Malcontends.blogspot.com </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
In the name of security the NSA <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/19/nsa-extended-verizon-trawl-through-court-order" target="_blank">continues</a> to collect Americans' phone and email data. Please read what the Fourth Amendment says. Is there "probable cause" that ALL of us are terrorists? Of course not, and ex-president Jimmy Carter, in between hurling diatribes at Israel and supporting (at one time, democratically elected) radical Islamists in Egypt, complains that something has been lost.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter … in the wake of the NSA spying scandal criticized the American political system. “America has no functioning democracy,” Carter said Tuesday [July 16, 2013] at a meeting of the “Atlantic Bridge” in Atlanta.(link <a href="http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=de&tl=en&js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.spiegel.de%2Fpolitik%2Fausland%2Fnsa-affaere-jimmy-carter-kritisiert-usa-a-911589.html" target="_blank">here</a> or <a href="http://www.infowars.com/former-president-and-commander-in-chief-america-is-no-longer-a-democracy/" target="_blank"> here</a>)</blockquote>
As usual, Carter isn't quite correct, but this time he is heading in the right direction. As shown by the writings of Aristotle and the actions of Robespierre, a democracy can be a tyranny. A constitutional republic, however, protects minorities from being trampled by the majority. We are not a democracy; we are a constitutional republic. For example, Congress could easily pass a law restricting the free speech of racists, terrorists, and communists, but the courts would not allow it (I hope). The Bill of Rights, that is, our Constitution, protects everyone's liberties, even the liberties of those that are unpopular, and protects those liberties despite the votes of the majority. Does our democracy function? Yes. Is it able to check the power of the NSA? Currently, no! That is what Carter is really saying. How did this come to pass?<br />
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Every three months a secret court approves the NSA's searching of American citizens. The (July 7, 2013) New York Times explains: <br />
<blockquote>
The 11-member Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, known as the FISA court, was once mostly focused on approving case-by-case wiretapping orders. But since major changes in legislation and greater <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/17/washington/18spycnd.html">judicial oversight of intelligence operations were instituted six years ago</a>, it has quietly become almost a parallel Supreme Court, serving as the ultimate arbiter on surveillance issues and delivering opinions that will most likely shape intelligence practices for years to come, the officials said....In one of the court’s most important decisions, the judges have expanded
the use in terrorism cases of a legal principle known as the “special
needs” doctrine and carved out an exception to the Fourth Amendment’s
requirement of a warrant for searches and seizures, the officials said. The special needs doctrine was originally established in 1989 by the
Supreme Court in a ruling allowing the drug testing of railway workers,
finding that a minimal intrusion on privacy was justified by the
government’s need to combat an overriding public danger. Applying that
concept more broadly, the FISA judges have ruled that the N.S.A.’s
collection and examination of Americans’ communications data to track
possible terrorists does not run afoul of the Fourth Amendment, the
officials said. (link<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/07/us/in-secret-court-vastly-broadens-powers-of-nsa.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0" target="_blank"> here</a>)</blockquote>
Don't worry. Everything is perfectly legal. Justice was executed in exact accordance with the law in Imperial Rome, Communist Russia, and Nazi Germany too, by the way. You have almost no rights against the NSA's unlawful search and seizure because a secret court, far removed from any democratic accountability, transparency, and checks and balances, broadened a narrow Supreme Court ruling in order to completely gut the Fourth Amendment. The FISA judges may say that NSA's data mining of millions of innocent Americans does not run afoul of the Fourth Amendment. I believe that our constitutionally accountable John G. Roberts' judicial branch should give an opinion.<br />
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If a 2016 presidential candidate comes out strongly against this abuse of federal power (like, ironically, the <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2013/06/08/obama_on_security_secrecy_and_civil_liberties_in_2007_2008__2013.html" target="_blank">2008 Obama</a>), he or she will get a lot of support, especially from Jimmy Carter.<br />
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<u>Postscript July 26, 2013:</u> The Obama administration fights a Congressional amendment to cut the NSA's budget. Unfortunately, the pro-NSA forces won in Congress, though the vote was close. Could this scandal create a left-right alliance? (links <a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/white-house-scrambles-to-defeat-bill-to-defund-nsa-program/article/2533418" target="_blank">here</a> and <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20130724/us-nsa-surveillance/?utm_hp_ref=homepage&ir=homepage" target="_blank">here</a>) See also how Obama resembles Bush here in <i>W's Apprentice</i> <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21578047-presidents-use-executive-orders-many-them-praiseworthy-aims-will-end" target="_blank">here</a> John Roberts himself picks the FISA judges (link <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/26/us/politics/robertss-picks-reshaping-secret-surveillance-court.html?hp&_r=0" target="_blank">here</a>).<br />
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Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-75323367359665607922013-07-15T12:04:00.001-07:002013-07-15T12:04:30.717-07:00Energy Consumption Continues to Increase<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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David Owen's <i>New Yorker</i> article (December 20, 2010), <u>The Efficiency Dilemma</u> should be required reading (link <a href="http://www.davidowen.net/files/the-efficiency-dilemma.pdf" target="_blank">here</a>) for anyone interested in energy consumption. Owen analyzes Jevons' Paradox: the more the efficiency, the greater the consumption. Owens writes, "The problem with efficiency gains is that we inevitably reinvest them in additional consumption." Refrigerators, computers, dishwashers, driers, automobiles, and air conditioning units are all much more efficient than before. However, we use more of them and total energy use (and greenhouse emissions) has climbed.<br />
<br />
Owen writes about his family's experience with home air conditioning, 60 years ago a rare luxury. Today air conditioning is found in most homes in the Midwest and South as well as in most office buildings and new cars. The costs are less than before so people don't hesitate to use air conditioning day and night.<br />
<br />
Owen concludes that efficiency will not bring about lowered energy consumption. Like anything else, making energy more costly will create incentives to use less of it.</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-40128083861455319182013-07-07T17:52:00.002-07:002013-07-08T13:55:28.270-07:00Can Government Spend Us Into Prosperity--Evaluating Keynes<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1F-0_UYCU8N02DMKTFjJI65HoMqCnFi2XQ2oewwurAY9Rj30Qhe7_62cUhfgwr4by6BBcl5m77mOhl0eJxJtrSvR_EuAZJIVbx0QGK8hgFn-IrSzAgNhA-8TMHLvQxB7BWwLp6ujC8MI/s1600/keynes.jpg"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1F-0_UYCU8N02DMKTFjJI65HoMqCnFi2XQ2oewwurAY9Rj30Qhe7_62cUhfgwr4by6BBcl5m77mOhl0eJxJtrSvR_EuAZJIVbx0QGK8hgFn-IrSzAgNhA-8TMHLvQxB7BWwLp6ujC8MI/s200/keynes.jpg" /></a>New Yorker magazine economics writer John Cassidy defends the father of orthodox macroeconomics, John Maynard Keynes, in The Demand Doctor, (The New Yorker, October 10, 2011, link <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/10/10/111010fa_fact_cassidy">here</a>). As an AP Macroeconomics teacher, I can confidently state that I and all other AP Macroecon instructors teach Keynesian theory. That is, we show how society benefits from creating "aggregate demand." Governments manufacture aggregate demand by cobbling together large public works projects or, less directly and less powerfully, giving money back to the people in the manner of tax cuts. Despite my or perhaps because of my familiarity with the theory of aggregate demand, a month before Cassidy's article was published I predicted Obama's Keynesian stimulus would fail (link <a href="http://mikespinrad.blogspot.com/2011/09/obamas-new-goverment-stimulus-bill-will.html">here</a>). Keynes' method of attacking unemployment through public works projects is more controversial than ever. Conservatives blame the Obama stimulus for the worst stretch of unemployment since the Great Depression: 54 months of unemployment at 7.5% or worse (link<a href="http://cnsnews.com/news/article/54-months-record-stretch-75-unemployment-continues"> here</a>), and only 47% of Americans have full-time jobs.<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
If today the same proportion of Americans worked as just a decade
ago, there would be almost 9 million more people working. Just in the
last year, almost 2 million Americans have left the labor force. With a
majority of the population not holding a full-time job, it isn't
surprising that economic growth has been so weak.
In June, the number of Americans who wanted to work full-time, but
were forced into part-time jobs because of the economy, jumped 352,000
to over 8 million.(Mike Flynn, Breitbart.com, link<a href="http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/07/05/only-47-americans-have-full-time-job" target="_blank"> here</a>)</blockquote>
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<div>
Liberals argue that Obama's stimulus was a success. If the government had not intervened, we would have entered another Great Depression. This argument fails to persuade me, since it can never be proven one way or another. We cannot go back in time and try a laissez-faire policy, though an uninterested federal government allowed the economy to work itself right out of depressions (or "panics" as they were called) throughout the 19th century. Liberals and Keynesians employ a much better argument by examining the size of the stimulus package. Cassidy writes<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
He would also have noted that the stimulus was—especially compared with
the devastation it meant to address—rather small: equivalent to less
than two per cent of G.D.P. a year for three years. Even this overstates
its magnitude, given that much of the increase in federal spending was
offset by budget cuts at the state and local levels. In its totality,
government spending didn’t increase much at all. Between 2007 and the
first half of this year [2011], it rose by about three per cent in real
dollars.</blockquote>
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<div>
<br />
In other words, the biggest Keynesian spending project ever, worth $825 billion, was too small. We should have spent more than a trillion dollars. Economist Larry Summers calls for another trillion on infrastructure (source <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/05/magazine/larry-summers-and-glenn-hubbard-square-off-on-our-economic-future.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0" target="_blank">here</a>). I wonder if those that advocate for such things figure what might happen if we had a national debt that was even bigger than $16 trillion and what that might do to the economy. According to writer Bill Bonner, even "if America taxed 100 percent of all household wealth, it would not be enough to put its balance sheet in the black" (link <a href="http://dailyreckoning.com/the-patsy-revolt-of-2010/" target="_blank">here</a>). (Well, never mind; an extra trillion dollar stimulus didn't happen and probably won't any time soon.)<br />
<br />
Economist Larry Summers worries about unemployment. If only the stimulus of 2009 was bigger or he could do it twice<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhfLHy4EFXW2x6aVajh6z4ePqdaqz7Drc7QdbCKll5zENqSqAxPKbUfID14LPCD-fjpGKGbYrqqZp0CyYDSkiTnwNrnmZtd7FDBUF1qua3cmYB8RaUQm302WtQlPJEcIqDZ3a1MJQVH-0/s1600/summers3-superJumbo.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhfLHy4EFXW2x6aVajh6z4ePqdaqz7Drc7QdbCKll5zENqSqAxPKbUfID14LPCD-fjpGKGbYrqqZp0CyYDSkiTnwNrnmZtd7FDBUF1qua3cmYB8RaUQm302WtQlPJEcIqDZ3a1MJQVH-0/s1600/summers3-superJumbo.png" height="229" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Source: New York Times</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
. <br />
<br />
What else went wrong?Cassidy also argues that the government needed to solve the banking and housing problems. "Following the crisis of 2008, both the Bush and the Obama Administrations moved promptly to shore up the banking system, but they neglected to deal with the housing debacle."<br />
<br />
I think these excuses are poor, and the culprit can be found elsewhere. The Obama stimulus failed. (The president promised six percent unemployment by 2012 and a reduction of poverty.) Why didn't it work? The answer may have more to do with a faulty tenet of Keynesian theory--the multiplier. Cassidy writes <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
a recent working paper published by the National Bureau of Economic
Research looked at data going back to 1980 and found that government
investments in infrastructure and civic projects had a multiplier of
1.8—pretty close to Keynes’s estimate [of two].</blockquote>
Well, maybe not. Cassidy discards the research of Robert Barro, saying his work doesn't apply in a recession.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Echoing the arguments that Keynes’s opponents at the Treasury made
during the nineteen-thirties, conservative economists like Robert Barro,
at Harvard, argue that it [the muiltiplier] is close to zero: for every dollar the
government borrows and spends, spending elsewhere in the economy falls
by almost the same amount. Whenever individuals see the government
boosting spending or cutting taxes on a temporary basis, Barro
maintains, they figure that these policies will eventually have to be
paid for in the form of higher taxes. As a result, they set aside extra
money in savings, which cancels out the stimulus. </blockquote>
Equally powerful is the work of Stanford and German professors Cogan et al (link <a href="http://www.volkerwieland.com/docs/CCTW%20Mar%202.pdf" target="_blank">here</a>) in their article<i> New Keynesian versus Old Keynesian Government Spending Multipliers</i>, which argues that old Keynsian models used multipliers that were six times too high. Spending projects lower unemployment much less than was previously believed.<br />
<span style="-webkit-composition-fill-color: rgba(175, 192, 227, 0.230469); -webkit-composition-frame-color: rgba(77, 128, 180, 0.230469); -webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(26, 26, 26, 0.296875); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 15px; line-height: 19px; text-align: -webkit-auto; white-space: nowrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
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Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-62161000297374054712013-06-28T16:28:00.001-07:002013-06-28T16:30:50.041-07:00Review of Faith or Fear<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij3XcJ0TBLZDUStlhtorM2dhfBTufULHw1QEQ6l2JoygWMmpXOIAjsQguvy-9KoitxQdCp5r-Twh2SS442MldgeDNsKL8zEQ-0H8s1Alsjtq-6jIaA-K7j64-LppGA54Dlwdn9MPFVXao/s275/abrams.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij3XcJ0TBLZDUStlhtorM2dhfBTufULHw1QEQ6l2JoygWMmpXOIAjsQguvy-9KoitxQdCp5r-Twh2SS442MldgeDNsKL8zEQ-0H8s1Alsjtq-6jIaA-K7j64-LppGA54Dlwdn9MPFVXao/s275/abrams.jpg" title="Elliott Abrams (source Wikipedia)" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Elliott Abrams (source Wikipedia)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
In the June 21 J Magazine<a href="http://www.jweekly.com/article/full/68917/sadly-conservative-judaisms-lead-ship-is-sinking-fast/" target="_blank"> op/ed</a>, local Conservative Rabbi Menachem Creditor bemoans the shutdown of the Conservative movement's college outreach program. He then explains why the American Conservative movement (USCJ) is declining, but declining it is. "Fewer and fewer synagogues are affiliated with USCJ..."<br />
<br />
Elliott Abrams, in his book <i>Faith or Fear, How Jews Can Survive in a Christian America</i>, tackles the problem of Jewish continuity. Will Jews in America survive the ravages of assimilation and population decline? <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The results of the National Jewish Population Study of 1990, and several other major works of research, draw the portrait of a community in decline, facing a demographic disaster. The term "disaster" is no exaggeration: Jews, who once comprised 3.7 percent of the U.S. population, have fallen to about 2 percent....Demographers predict a drop of anywhere from one million to over two million in the American Jewish population in the next two generations (pp.1-2).</blockquote>
At the same time, however, Orthodox Jews are increasing their numbers. Never has the Orthodox community been more vibrant, opening day schools and synagogues and demanding that marriage stay within the faith. Ironically, " the very Jewish groups who most loudly profess their anxiety about Christians are, with a frequency never before seen in all of Jewish history, marrying them" (P.99). Intermarriage is rampant because antisemitism among Christians has declined significantly over the last 80 years. At the same time much of the non-Orthodox Jewish community has abandoned Jewish ritual practice and injunctions against intermarriage. In its place the mainstream Jewish community has taken up the religion of secularism and liberalism--all religion is an anachronism and abhorrent. So the liberal Jew cares not about the Christian's faith (or his own) since it is simply a collection of old and ridiculous superstitions, and now, since she no longer demonizes his Jewish background, the two can and will marry.<br />
<br />
Can the non-Orthodox denominations of American Jewry be saved from extinction? According to Abrams, it matters less if one is Orthodox as long as Jews use Orthodox tactics: high levels of admission to (private religious) day schools. Jewish communal groups need to lower tuition rates to make this happen. Secondly, mainstream American Judaism must increase ritual observance--more Torah study, keeping kosher, observing the Sabbath, etc. Abrams argues that one does not have to become fully Orthodox and completely observant--just ratchet up one's level of ritual commitment. If you do not believe, do it anyway for the generations that will come after you. Only then will American Jews continue to thrive.<br />
<br />
Elliott Abrams is, of course, the neocon, responsible for much national policy in the years before the Obama administration. One should therefore not be surprised that his book is a conservative reaction to the problem of Jewish continuity. The other option, Alexander Schindler's idea to convert secular non-Jews and non Jewish spouses has not convinced the children of these unions to stay Jewish (P. 118).<br />
<br /></div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-17425069831292281112013-04-14T18:35:00.003-07:002013-04-23T14:53:20.442-07:00Poor in America<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7vSxLMdGszDifjzp_xK1ivD_u7iL4T90-sX2Q3WUSuPbgsuPVPwKMDXYcICcLEZNULoZbGO5MA2esdH-4aIIi0CsRHQVf1Ghh-8-iFlwg-4Hqw-zeymmOdzPCAGB80PWUAaqEIJSQSxM/s1600/child-poverty-in-america.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="237" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7vSxLMdGszDifjzp_xK1ivD_u7iL4T90-sX2Q3WUSuPbgsuPVPwKMDXYcICcLEZNULoZbGO5MA2esdH-4aIIi0CsRHQVf1Ghh-8-iFlwg-4Hqw-zeymmOdzPCAGB80PWUAaqEIJSQSxM/s320/child-poverty-in-america.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<u>U.S. Poverty Rates Higher, Safety Net Weaker than in Peer Countries</u> (Issue Brief <a href="http://www.epi.org/files/2012/ib339-us-poverty-higher-safety-net-weaker.pdf" target="_blank">#339</a>, July 24, 2012) argue Elise Gould and Hilary Wething of the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Poverty rates in the United States increased over the 2000s, a trend exacerbated by the Great Recession and its aftermath. By 2010, just over 46 million people fell below the U.S. Census Bureau's official poverty line..."</blockquote>
When one compares American poverty to comparable and similar developed countries the U.S. is found wanting. American poor, characterized as the 10th percentile in income, fare poorly compared to the American median income, receiving less than half the income of the average worker, far below the international peer average of 62 percent. Secondly, "inequality in the United States is so severe that low-earning U.S. workers are actually worse off than low-earning workers in all but seven peer countries..." Third, in the late 2000s, "17.3 percent of the U.S. population lived in poverty--the highest relative poverty rate among OECD peers." (The relative poverty rate is defined here as the share of individuals living in households with income below half of house-hold size-adjusted median income. Poverty rates are based on income after taxes and transfers.)<br />
<br />
The extent of child poverty is even more severe. In "2009 the United States had the highest rate of child poverty among peer countries at 23.1 percent..." and the child poverty gap, the difference between those in poverty to those with median income, is 37.5 percent, again, the highest among peer countries. Thus American poor kids face high relative deprivation compared to the rest of American society.<br />
<br />
Lastly, the United States, through taxes and transfer programs, spends little compared with its peers to reduce child poverty. Child poverty is not merely about who can afford a burger and fries. It also affects educational achievement. David Berliner argues that targeted " economic and social policies have more potential to improve the nation's schools than almost anything currently being proposed by either political party at federal, state or local levels" (quoted in <i>American Teache</i>r, January/February, 2013).<br />
<br />
So how have things changed during the last two years? The U.K.'s <i>Mail Online</i> <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2302997/U-S-sees-highest-poverty-spike-1960s-leaving-50-million-Americans-poor-government-cuts-billions-spending.html" target="_blank">reported</a> recently (April 2, 2013) the headline: <u>U.S. sees highest poverty spike since the 1960s, leaving 50 million Americans poor as government cuts billions in spending... so does that mean there's no way out? </u><br />
<u><br /></u>
The article states<u>:</u><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
As President Barack Obama began his second term in January, nearly 50 million Americans — one in six — were living below the income line that defines poverty, according to the [U.S. Census] bureau. A family of four that earns less than $23,021 a year is listed as living in poverty. The bureau said 20 percent of the country's children are poor. </blockquote>
Notice that we have grown the number of poor from 46 million to nearly 50 million and child poverty has decreased from 23 to 20 percent (though I suspect a rounding error). The Mail Online claims that the level of poverty is the worst since Lyndon Johnson's Great Society programs started. Who's to blame? Liberals that say budget cuts are at fault and conservatives that say budget deficits and policies anathema to capitalism are to blame.<br />
<br />
Lastly, the Wall Street Journal <a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2013/04/05/some-15-of-u-s-receives-food-stamps/" target="_blank">writes</a> "the number of recipients in the food stamp program, formally known as the<b> Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program</b> (SNAP), reached 47.3 million, or nearly one in seven Americans" in January, 2013. "Though annual growth continues, the pace has slowed since the depths of the recession."<br />
<br />
Examining the SNAP <a href="http://www.fns.usda.gov/pd/34SNAPmonthly.htm" target="_blank">website</a> myself, the participation level in January, 2013 was 47.7 million, only 20,000 less than the record the month before and three million more than fiscal year 2011. The poor seem left out of the recovery.</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-53296304646028005032013-02-18T19:33:00.003-08:002013-06-30T13:07:38.673-07:00Obama's $9/hour Minimum Wage<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_oVHet0SwjYoWSVqBMxZsXMUu1jfTShDeNOm8CIAiZoS3NveJ68zCTds_IQPLJXs17DLRFrmbCYffx208PujrsnLvDYSd2AkNdSMrRiQj2aL1MUBUW2kV6_3evHZfqlPNSuPXyuHxdFY/s1600/price_controls_floor.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_oVHet0SwjYoWSVqBMxZsXMUu1jfTShDeNOm8CIAiZoS3NveJ68zCTds_IQPLJXs17DLRFrmbCYffx208PujrsnLvDYSd2AkNdSMrRiQj2aL1MUBUW2kV6_3evHZfqlPNSuPXyuHxdFY/s1600/price_controls_floor.gif" /></a></div>
The American people can assess the <u>political</u> merits of Obama's proposed $9 minimum wage easily enough--the rights of employers (liberty) versus societal responsibilities to the workforce (equity). Obama does not trust business, big or small, and believes that government must intervene to protect workers. One will agree or disagree with the president depending on ones political leanings. Liberals and a few moderates will support raising the minimum wage, but most citizens, conservatives and the majority of moderates, will not.<br />
<br />
Evaluating the minimum wage controversy from an <u>economic</u> perspective is even more clear. The diagram (left) of a minimum wage, a type of price floor, shows that without government intervention, level Qf workers are employed. After the government mandates a price floor above the free market equilibrium point, a minimum wage, the amount of workers employed drops to Qd. In other words, according to economic theory, the minimum wage increases unemployment. How much? The unemployment (the surplus) is the difference between Qs and Qd. (The supply line is the supply of available workers at different price levels and the demand line is the demand that employers have for those workers at different price levels.)<br />
<br />
The higher wage brings out a greater supply of workers. In this case, more teenagers will flood the job market, looking for that $9/hour instead of going to summer camp or on a trip. However, the demand for these workers falls because much entry level labor is not worth $9. Thus there is a surplus of workers and greater unemployment than before.<br />
<br />
That is the theory. Cal professor David Card, interviewed in the UC Berkeley alumni magazine disagrees, but only partially. Here is part of the <a href="http://alumni.berkeley.edu/news/california-magazine/summer-2013-new-deal/5-questions-david-card" target="_blank">interview</a>:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<br />
<strong>In 1994 you published a study with Alan Krueger that found
that raising the minimum wage would not create higher unemployment.
Given the more recent economy and the growing number of fast food and
retail workers demanding a $15 per hour wage, do you believe your
findings from 20 years ago still apply?</strong>
<br />
<strong>David Card</strong>: Currently the federal minimum wage is
$7.25. So a rise to $15 would be more than a 100 percent increase in the
minimum. Our New Jersey-Pennsylvania study focused on a 19 percent rise
in the minimum wage (from $4.25 to $5.05). I don’t think one can
extrapolate from a 19 percent rise to a 107 percent rise. In fact, faced
with a $15 minimum wage, I suspect that employers in many low-wage
areas of the country would simply refuse to comply. Realistically there
is not much chance of more than a 25 or 30 percent rise in the minimum.
For that range of increase I think our results would still be relevant.
In fact, a number of studies since our work have confirmed our finding
that the employment losses associated with a modest rise in the minimum
wage are barely detectable.
</blockquote>
<br />
On the other hand, tying increases of the minimum wage to inflation, a "never-ending escalator" of cost increases for business, has disasterous potential. See the study <a href="http://www.nfib.com/research-foundation/studies/business-size-impact-module/nj-minimum-wage?utm_campaign=NJMinWageStudy&utm_source=Research&utm_medium=Release&utm_content=njstudy" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
<br />
Will the minimum wage help the few workers that get entry level jobs? Yes, but not much. A full time worker making $9 an hour earns $18,000 per year, well below the poverty line. Nations do not become wealthy by enacting price floors. Instead, countries enrich their citizens by increasing productivity. The best way to do that is to better American education and increase research and development.<br />
<br /></div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-27732274615881384292013-01-28T14:43:00.001-08:002013-02-05T19:45:13.323-08:00Differentiated Instruction and Teacher Development<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5WQKRCi5WiExHKZCoKmOCwrT4q8Sj3V7oNGuKreXty_ZQhaM3tqgtfzl-dSy94WBCIA_4bI2or4XfcwhuvsbjGI6NfmgmUbzCffJSaupdDbbSU1TNqYrW9fctvXUl0Lja_THK66QJQJM/s1600/twainharteAug12+006.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5WQKRCi5WiExHKZCoKmOCwrT4q8Sj3V7oNGuKreXty_ZQhaM3tqgtfzl-dSy94WBCIA_4bI2or4XfcwhuvsbjGI6NfmgmUbzCffJSaupdDbbSU1TNqYrW9fctvXUl0Lja_THK66QJQJM/s320/twainharteAug12+006.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--><u>Why Use Differentiated Instruction</u><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
Teachers must assess the abilities of different
learners, fast and slow. PLC experts demand that all kids learn, not just the
gifted kids. Therefore, teachers must adjust their practice for students of
different abilities. If teachers don’t adjust enough, some kids will be bored
or shut down, leading to classroom management problems, and not all will learn.
If the teacher adjusts too much (in the extreme, giving every student an
individualized lesson) the lesson plan becomes overly fragmented and the lesson
loses any forward momentum. Therefore, the instructor must employ differentiated
instruction carefully. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Categorizing student abilities as high, medium, and low provides
differentiation and allows for most variation in ability. (See below for a better
model.) I ask myself, how will low/medium/high ability students handle this
lesson, and what do I have set up in the lesson itself to allow these three different
ability kids to excel? Teachers can benefit from incorporating pairing and
group work in lessons, because it allows all types of kids to master the
material. I avoid special lessons for the low achievers. I would rather give
them extra help or extra time and use pairings and group work. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What to do right now</u>: Experiment with pairing and
group work as shown below.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Pairings</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At the beginning of the school year give the kids five
minutes (literally) to find four partners—their 12:00, 3:00, 6:00, and 9:00
partners. You can also do this for them to better assure randomness and a more
homogeneous selection of partners or go the other direction and make sure that
certain students of different abilities are working together. Later in the
year, you may yell out, “Work out the reading problem with your 9:00 partner,”
and everyone will know what to do and will get help from a stronger student or
teach a weaker student.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Group Work</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As noted above, jigsawing material works as a fun way to get
kids work together to learn long readings. The stronger students take the lead
in presenting the material to the rest of the class. These gifted kids know
they must simplify the material for everyone else. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Advanced Work Cleverly
Hidden through Choice</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If I add choice to assignments, I can trick advanced kids
into tackling advanced work. Many advanced kids, unfortunately, do not want to
do more work and have an uncanny ability to avoid working longer than everybody
else, so I offer a question that requires less time than other questions but a
higher level of thinking. The gifted kids will usually bite.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Another Model for Differentiating Students</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I am exploring a more complicated alternative to organizing
students along one axis: high, medium, and low aptitude. I have experimented
with monitoring two criteria, aptitude and willingness to work. I then
differentiate instruction based on ambition in the classroom as well as
ability. The Wechsler (WISC) IQ test can be
substituted for ability if the assessor does not have historical grades for the
student. Why use an IQ test? Outside of California,
where the IQ test has been banned from schools for political reasons, IQ tests
correlate very well with K-6 scholastic achievement, more modestly for the
higher grades. French psychologist Alfred Binet developed the IQ test to quickly
find students that needed extra help in school. As a Californian I have to make
an educated guess about a student’s ability. I usually base my inferences on the
student’s performance in my class, performance in earlier classes, and state
test scores. Please note that I have not yet directly addressed cultural
diversity and language issues. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If a student prefers not to present in public, look the
teacher in the eye, or win at a game (forcing others to lose) he may not
perform as well as he could in some assessments. This student may be assessed more
accurately through traditional paper and pencil tests and group work that
emphasizes cooperation over competition. The teacher can then more confidently evaluate
this student’s willingness to work and his abilities. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I have also encountered students, usually from impoverished
families, that work hard in class, but do nothing at home. They may be working
a job, watching siblings, or simply be partial to a belief system that limits
school work to the time spent in the classroom. These kids may be best assessed
by examining their in-class work, but grades will deservedly suffer if no work
is done outside the classroom. A college-prep high school curriculum demands
some homework from students. What if a student does not have sufficient
academic English skills to succeed in your class?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This problem can be best addressed by making literacy issues
a part of your everyday curriculum. There are plenty of native-born American kids
that don’t understand the meaning of key vocabulary words such as imperialism,
totalitarianism, and Cold War. Teachers must address literacy issues for
everyone. Once you address the literacy issues, you can better assess the
English as second language (ESL) student’s talents as laid out
below. If a student does not have a good enough grasp of English to put a few
sentences together on paper, that student should be in a special sheltered class
specifically tailored for kids that need to work on English as well as the
curriculum. This is an administration issue, not a teaching issue. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Yet despite everything, if you have students in your class
with a poor grasp of English you can still assess whether they are hard workers
and whether they have academic talent—ask them about their school experience in
their country of origin and check on their current math grades. I want all kids
to learn, and I am pained because I have had very limited success teaching kids
with little or no English skills placed in a regular (not a sheltered) class.
The best I can do is to enlist other kids from the same ethnic group to help
teach the ESL student and use the text book publisher’s Spanish resources,
which of course, are of little help if the student doesn’t speak Spanish. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you keep diversity issues in mind, you may find a two-criterion
model, below, helpful in analyzing differential instruction in your
classroom.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Willingness to Work versus Classroom Ability or IQ</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u><span style="mso-no-proof: yes;">Ambition or Willingness</span></u><span style="mso-no-proof: yes;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span>Student
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="height: 125px; margin-left: 167px; margin-top: 16px; mso-ignore: vglayout; position: absolute; width: 2px; z-index: 1;"><img height="125" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\02\clip_image001.gif" width="2" /></span><u><span style="mso-no-proof: yes;">to Work</span></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.0in;">
High <span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>B <span style="mso-tab-count: 4;"> </span>C</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 7;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 6;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 10;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>Low<span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>A<span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>D</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-ignore: vglayout;">
</span></div>
<table align="left" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td height="9" width="167"><br /></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td><br /></td>
<td><img height="2" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\02\clip_image002.gif" width="326" /></td>
</tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: .5in;">
Low<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><u>Ability or IQ</u> <span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>High</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Student A has low ability and does not try to learn the
material. She skips homework assignments and gives up on the class. To pass the
time she talks to her friends and mocks you when your back is turned. Would
this child pass the class if she worked harder? That is the million dollar
question. If the answer is yes, the teacher must work with all stakeholders
(parents, counselors, coaches) to motivate the student. Occasionally a “deal”
will help, such as “I’ll pass you with a D minus if you pass the final with a
grade of C.” </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If the answer is no, we have encountered student B, and administration
and counselors must work together to place the child in an appropriate class.
Neither the student nor the teacher is well served by leaving student B in a
class where failure is guaranteed. An immediate intervention is in order. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Student C, the denizen of AP classes and honor rolls, makes
teachers look good, though student C would probably do well even if the teacher
lectured in Aramaic. Paradoxically, the most ambitious and experienced teachers
instruct at the AP level, but the mid and low level classes require better
classroom management skills and more time differentiating instruction than the
AP classes. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Student D tries, sometimes successfully and sometimes not,
to get by with natural talent and information learned previously, usually
outside the class. Student D is either lazy or placed in a class that does not
interest her. This type of student acts as a poor role model for the rest of
the class and reinforces the insidious stereotype that good students are born,
not made. I want to kick these kids upstairs to the AP classes, where they are
forced to perform or perish. If a D kid is stuck with me in a regular (not
advanced or AP) class, I must grit my teeth and bear the frustration. These
kids are used to getting by on raw talent, and my track record inspiring them
to work has been rather disheartening. I was, more often than not a D kid in
high school myself and didn’t start working hard until college. Perhaps if I
was forced into social studies AP classes, which were nonexistent in my school
at the time, I would have matured faster. A quick way of identifying whether a
student is an A, B, C, or D student is by examining who feels most frustrated
in the teacher-student relationship. This frustration may express itself
overtly by angry acting-out behavior by either teacher or student unless both
work together to solve the problem. (See below.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Determining student type by assessing who is frustrated</div>
<table border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MsoTableGrid" style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-insideh: .5pt solid windowtext; mso-border-insidev: .5pt solid windowtext; mso-padding-alt: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-yfti-tbllook: 480;">
<tbody>
<tr style="mso-yfti-firstrow: yes; mso-yfti-irow: 0;">
<td style="border: solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Student Type</i></div>
</td>
<td style="border-left: none; border: solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
A</div>
</td>
<td style="border-left: none; border: solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
B</div>
</td>
<td style="border-left: none; border: solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
C</div>
</td>
<td style="border-left: none; border: solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.6pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
D</div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr style="mso-yfti-irow: 1;">
<td style="border-top: none; border: solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Who’s frustrated</i></div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
both</div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
student</div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
no one</div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.6pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
teacher</div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr style="mso-yfti-irow: 2;">
<td style="border-top: none; border: solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Typical comments</i></div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
Teacher: “This kid doesn’t want to pass”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Student: “I hate this class.”</div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
Student: “This class is too hard.”</div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
Teacher: “I want 150 kids like him.”</div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.6pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
Teacher: “This lazy kid will get his comeuppance some day.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr style="mso-yfti-irow: 3; mso-yfti-lastrow: yes;">
<td style="border-top: none; border: solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Possible solutions</i></div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
Meet with student and parents.</div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
Put the student in a remedial class or give the student
tools to catch up.</div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.55pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
Pray for more of these kids.</div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 88.6pt;" valign="top" width="118"><div class="MsoNormal">
Encourage the student to enroll in an advanced class.</div>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Most teachers balk at creating three or four variations of
each lesson in an attempt to service the A, B, C, and D student types. In
addition to the pairings and group work mentioned above, I have had success
with interactive projects and student-centered activities. These projects and
activities have enough inherent appeal and changeability that all but the most
shut-down students participate in the activity and learn. These activities
include:</div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Writing
skits and performing them</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Composing
a political cartoon</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Participating
in a mock trial</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Presenting
with a group where all get a role</li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Long</u><u>
Range</u><u> Goals for Improvement</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Many of the best teachers leave teaching for the
administrative track. While I can’t fault those attracted to power and
leadership roles (as well as much more money), escaping the difficulties of the
classroom, one can improve one’s skills and monetary situation on the teacher
track as well. As a professional, the mindful teacher acts like any other
professional—doctor, lawyer, or CPA—and works to hone her craft, whether or not
the state demands one do so.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Competency in Core Fields
and Successful Classroom Management</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My graduate training was in psychology, not history, but I have
a background as a voracious reader of history. As a “backdoor history teacher”
my preparation was good enough to pass the state board exams for social studies
but not good enough to feel comfortable teaching most history classes. I
continued my reading of history, state standards under one arm and a book under
the other, selecting areas of history where I felt unprepared. Additionally, I researched
and wrote lessons most nights for a couple of years. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After sufficient preparation, we teachers demonstrate
competency in the core classes of our discipline. In social studies, for
example, one must master modern world history and American history. I became
more skilled in managing a classroom, however, by watching master teachers,
reflecting how my classes were going, and setting out a goal on how I wanted my
classroom to work. One teacher told me that I could have whatever type of class
I wanted. What he meant was that teachers can have a quiet disciplined class or
a more boisterous group—it is completely up to the wishes and skills of the
teacher.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Specialized Training</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Many states require high school teachers to earn a masters
degree. If not, get one anyway when you can. A masters degree in history makes
you more marketable than a masters degree in education, but they are both
worthwhile. You are more likely to be hired by the school you want, and you
will earn the most off your district’s salary schedule. If necessary, max out
on the number of units you need after getting the masters degree. I make
between $1,000 to $6,000 per year and after ten years $10,000 to $60,000 more
than teachers with the same amount of experience, simply because I have taken
more classes and earned an advanced degree. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What to do right now</u>: Pursue your District’s
enrichment opportunities and ask if the training can receive course credit.
Often the answer is yes. Every teacher should max out on coursework needed to
earn the most on the salary schedule.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Advanced Placement Courses</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After one shows competency in the most critical aspects of
teaching—competency in core fields and demonstrated skill in running a
classroom—many teachers enjoy specializing with advanced placement (AP) course
offerings. These courses demand a superior level of knowledge and greater
skills in curriculum mapping and time management. Teachers instruct and build
relationships with the most talented and motivated students in the school, who
eagerly pursue college-level work. In addition to strengthening your teaching
capabilities, these classes heighten school board interest in your teaching.
Why? Parents love AP offerings, and they will encourage their children to take
these classes in the future. “If you build it, they will come.” </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When I started my current teaching position, my department
offered one AP US History section. Now we have two sections of AP US History and
also fill multiple sections in AP European History, AP Government, and AP Macro/Micro
Economics. The school population remained stable throughout. Simply having the
courses available manufactured their own demand for them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Always On the Look Out</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I am always on the look out for primary source documents
worthy of including in lessons. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Social
Education</i>, the official journal for The National Council for the Social
Studies includes ready-made lessons using primary source documents. I also
scour books, newspapers and magazines, both online and print editions. Most of
us have certain areas of history that we really enjoy. For example, I have read
many biographies on Theodore Roosevelt and when I start reading the next one, will
mark pages with sticky tags, hoping to use quotes from these sections for my AP
US History class.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Working on Lesson
Plans</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Those that prefer creating lessons in a more
institutionalized setting have plenty of opportunities. I studied American
history and wrote lesson plans for a three-year (Teaching American History) TAH
grant. These lessons were shared with the group, edited after receiving
feedback, and then uploaded to a website for all teachers. The government
awards TAH grants throughout the United States, though I think you
will have more luck finding one in a major metropolitan area.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Leadership Roles</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A teacher doesn’t have to become an administrator to find
leadership opportunities. Schools need committee chiefs. In the last few years
my school administration has looked for teacher leaders for a technology
committee, a number of <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Western
Association of Schools and Colleges (</span>WASC) accreditation committees,
student activities, Parent Teacher Student Association (PTSA), social studies,
foreign language, English, physical education, math, science, and special
education departments, and department fundraisers. Additionally, my state gives
experienced teachers opportunities to mentor new teachers through the
California Beginning Teacher Support and Assessment (BTSA) program. Other states
have similar training programs.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Summing Up</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Buffeted by societal changes and increased demands for
performance but also benefiting from increasing availability of tools to
analyze ones style and evaluate performance, teaching<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>has become a cutting-edge profession. Mindful
teachers must examine the process, what is going on in the classroom as they
teach, and the product, the data that proves that students are learning. I hope
that you continue to reflect on your teaching--what works and doesn’t work—and
make adjustments in that never-ending quest for excellence and learning.</div>
</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-31634868983822109692013-01-26T15:58:00.001-08:002013-01-26T15:58:07.709-08:00Using Assessments in Teaching<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<u>Formative Assessment Validity</u></div>
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A trendy and popular movement in education, the professional
learning community (PLC) may revolutionize teaching practices. In a nutshell,
the movement professionalizes the practice of teaching by forcing teachers to
rigorously analyze their practice by using a powerful tool--collaborative
examination of assessment data. The data, properly collected and presented,
shows how much teaching and learning value the teacher adds to a student, and,
more importantly, the strengths and weaknesses of the teacher’s practice
against specific state standards. Therefore, the teacher knows what she must do
to improve and knows where to find assistance, by collaborating with another
member of the department that has more success teaching that particular
standard. After reading Nassim Taleb’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Fooled
by Randomness</i>, I am less confident in the power of comparing small samples
of assessment data. When we compare larger, “normal” and therefore more
randomly selected student samples,<span class="status-text"> I feel more
confident that the differences between teacher outcomes are statistically valid.
Certainly, teaching technique must be analyzed somehow, and I am more
comfortable examining the teacher’s method itself (which is what this writing
is attempting to do) and less comfortable relying only on outcomes.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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Looking closer at assessments, the linchpin of the PLC
process, teachers have many different types of formative and cumulative at
their disposal. If a department chooses to improve assessments for PLC work,
the assessments must be common to the department at minimum, and later common
to the entire district. In order, easiest to hardest to grade, teachers may use
for their assessments multiple choice, fill-in, short answer or short essay
questions. Longer essays force students to recall and not just identify the answer,
and also compel students to critically analyze and synthesize data. Thus long
essays may enjoy the highest validity of all assessments, but they are also the
most difficult and time consuming to grade. By developing a detailed rubric and
training teachers in using the rubric, teachers can work together to avoid
reliability issues that usually mar grading across different assessors.
Multiple choice tests require no rubric and the reliability between teachers is
perfect—all teachers use the same key. However, since multiple choice tests
often show ability to identify concepts rather than to work with them in any useful
practical way, I have doubts about their validity in judging the “whole”
student. I believe that the AP Board assesses students using both multiple
choice and essays for good reason. As a one-time AP exam reader, I can vouch
for the excellent rubrics and training readers received using those rubrics
when grading essays. (See Figure below for looking at the tradeoff between
assessment validity and cross-teacher reliability.)</div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
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Reliability Versus Validity of Assessments</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="height: 125px; margin-left: 167px; margin-top: 11px; mso-ignore: vglayout; position: absolute; width: 2px; z-index: 1;"><img height="125" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image001.gif" width="2" /></span><u>Validity of Assessment</u></div>
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High</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 5;"> </span>D<span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>E</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 6;"> </span>C</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 8;"> </span>B<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>A<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 7;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-ignore: vglayout;">
</span></div>
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Low<span style="mso-tab-count: 6;"> </span>High</div>
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<u>Cross-Teacher Reliability</u></div>
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<br /></div>
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A: multiple choice assessments</div>
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B: fill-in assessments</div>
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C: short answer assessments</div>
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D: essays without rubric</div>
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E: essays with rubric</div>
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<br /></div>
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Point E, the essays with rubric, combines the highest level
of validity with a moderately high level of cross-teacher reliability.
Unfortunately, essays take the longest to grade and since the department must
create a rubric, demand much preparation time. Teachers consider time a precious
resource as well as validity and reliability. (See figure below.) Multiple
choice tests are popular since they are graded quicker than any other
assessment—you just run them through the scantron machine, and if you are as
quick as I, at 20 per minute.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Time Needed for Grading</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="height: 125px; margin-left: 167px; margin-top: 11px; mso-ignore: vglayout; position: absolute; width: 2px; z-index: 3;"><img height="125" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image001.gif" width="2" /></span><u><span style="mso-no-proof: yes;">Time
Needed for </span></u></div>
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<u><span style="mso-no-proof: yes;">Preparation of Assessment</span></u><span style="mso-no-proof: yes;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span>E</div>
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High</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 4;"> </span>A<span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 4;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>B<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 4;"> </span>C</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 5;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>D<span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span></div>
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<span style="height: 2px; margin-left: 167px; margin-top: 9px; mso-ignore: vglayout; position: absolute; width: 326px; z-index: 4;"><img height="2" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image002.gif" width="326" /></span><span style="mso-tab-count: 7;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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Low<span style="mso-tab-count: 6;"> </span>High</div>
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<u>Time needed
for grading assessment</u></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A: multiple choice assessments</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
B: fill-in assessments</div>
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C: short answer assessments</div>
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D: essays without rubric</div>
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E: essays with rubric</div>
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<br /></div>
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However, multiple choice questions take a lot of time to
compose. Teachers are not trained to create multiple wrong answers! The short
answer test may offer a reasonable compromise between test creation and time to
grade and take the least amount of time when both test composition and grading
time are taken into account. Teachers may prefer one formative assessment over
another based on both time constraints and the level of validity needed. After
administering the assessment, teachers may chose to re-teach a lesson or make
other adjustments to future lessons to increase student learning. Successful
teachers, in the spirit of the PLC movement, work with their colleagues to find
successful strategies for re-teaching.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Informal Formative Assessments</i></div>
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Teachers that include a formative assessment, and therefore
check for understanding at some point in every lesson plan, will ensure that
more students learn. These assessments can be created by the seat of one’s
pants, without preparation, and are usually labeled as “informal” assessments.
These may include a “ticket out of class;” asking a specific student the answer
to a key concept, and then (if that fails) getting the student to partner up or
asking everyone in the class; splitting the class arbitrarily in half and
debating a controversial point; and engaging in games. My favorite three games,
baseball, jeopardy, and flyswatter (matamoscas) can be created quickly when
needed and are so enjoyable that the students ask to play them if there are a
few minutes left in the period.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Baseball
(also mentioned above in my [students’] favorite things): allows students
to pick a question that is easy or difficult. Students ask for a “single”
(easiest), “double” (medium difficulty), “triple” (hard) or “home run”
(very difficult). When a student gives a correct response to the question,
she goes to one of the four “bases” I have set up around the room. If she
gets the answer wrong, she, the batter, is “out” and her team continues
with a new batter. If it’s the third out, the other team bats. Each team
scores runs when hitters are batted in by others or home runs. Rules for
baseball are only loosely enforced, always in a way that allows me to
emphasize material they ought to know. Unprepared or lazy students may ask
for a home run question to avoid showing the class how little they
actually know. When that happens, reserve home run questions for high
achieving students or make a miss of a home run question worth two outs. I
recycle home run questions, using them for a “double” or “triple” question
later since we have lost the novelty of the question, and another student
may have looked up the answer to the question. I can play a few innings of
baseball in fifteen minutes.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Jeopardy:
demands more teacher preparation than baseball. In my advanced classes I
often assign students to come up with answers needed to run the game.
These answers must be categorized by topic and by level of difficulty.
Harder answers are worth more points. Try to run the game similar to the
television show. The winning group can win a nominal prize such as a
picture taken with a digital camera.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Flyswatter
(matamoscas): answers must be set up on the board before class, either by
the teacher or by advanced students. Typically the composer creates 20
one- or two-word answers that match questions the teacher will give to the
contestants. Two contestants compete. Each contestant has his back turned
to the board (and the answers), turning towards the board, rolled up
newspaper (or flyswatter) in hand. The first contestant that swats at the
correct answer on the board wins that round and faces a new contestant.
Both Jeopardy and flyswatter require mere identification of the answer.
Teachers can compose questions that require higher order thinking, a la
Bloom’s Taxonomy, for baseball.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Interactive
lecture: resembles a conversation on two levels. First, the teacher
converses with herself, paraphrasing actual history. What might FDR have
said to officials in the State Department right before meeting Stalin at Yalta? (Play it
out.) What was Reagan’s conversation with Gorbachev as they tried to
hammer out an arms control agreement? (Play it out.) Second, the teacher
asks questions to students. Why did FDR need Soviet help at the end of
WWII? How did Reagan get Gorbachev to go along on arms control? An
interactive lecture presents material in a more entertaining fashion and
checks immediately for understanding.</li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The informal formative assessments above and formal formative
assessments fulfill two objectives: they show if the students learned the
material and, since it’s usually necessary, gave an opportunity to review the
material in an enjoyable way. Occasionally, I let students know that I will be
using the same questions they encountered on an informal assessment on a formal
assessment. Since the formal assessment counts for a grade, I have now
increased interest in learning the material. What if only a few kids have not
learned the material? Should the class be held back for the benefit of a few?
Perhaps the top students need to work with the laggards. I prefer that slower
learners get the benefit of some remedial opportunity built into the school
structure, such as a study hall or mandatory tutoring opportunity. PLC writers
have demonstrated how this can be done. (See figure.)</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Remedial Opportunities when Students Don’t Learn</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="height: 68px; margin-left: 117px; margin-top: 13px; mso-ignore: vglayout; position: absolute; width: 304px; z-index: 8;"><img height="68" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image003.gif" width="304" /></span><span style="height: 39px; margin-left: 462px; margin-top: 24px; mso-ignore: vglayout; position: absolute; width: 12px; z-index: 6;"><img height="39" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image004.gif" width="12" /></span><span style="height: 12px; margin-left: 203px; margin-top: 7px; mso-ignore: vglayout; position: absolute; width: 171px; z-index: 5;"><img height="12" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image005.gif" width="171" /></span>Informal formative assessment<span style="mso-tab-count: 4;"> </span> Teacher
reviews material<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 4.5in;">
Students learn</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-ignore: vglayout; position: relative; z-index: 9;"><span style="height: 19px; left: 383px; position: absolute; top: -5px; width: 52px;"><img height="19" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image006.gif" width="52" /></span></span><span style="height: 12px; margin-left: 143px; margin-top: 7px; mso-ignore: vglayout; position: absolute; width: 75px; z-index: 7;"><img height="12" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image007.gif" width="75" /></span>Students do not learn<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Remedial Opportunity</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For this model to work, teachers need to have enough slack
time in their curriculum mapping for a small amount of re-teaching time, but
the greatest responsibility for re-teaching falls upon the system already in
place such as a school day study hall.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Homework as Formative Assessment</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I use homework primarily (though not exclusively) as a
formative assessment—to find out what the kids do and do not know. Since I use
homework as an instrument to determine where teaching should go instead of an
opportunity to engage in new learning, I keep the assignments short and
infrequent. I prefer the bulk of new learning to take place in class where I am
available to help with understanding of concepts, vocabulary and writing technique.
The education literature does not show a strong correlation between the amount
of homework assigned and student performance, especially with at-risk students.
Therefore, when I do assign homework I use it primarily to give me feedback and
not as an opportunity to grade.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Summative Assessments</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Summative assessments do not enable much learning to take
place—since after the summative there is no second chance—but, ironically,
these assessments are the ones that give both teachers and students headaches
and ulcers. Final exams, standardized tests such as the California High School
Exit Exam (CAHSEE), CST in California
(AKA the STAR test), ACT, SAT, and AP exams, and music auditions put both
teacher and student under a microscope. These high stakes tests determine who
graduates, who goes to a four-year school, and under NCLB, whether a school
that receives federal funding can continue under its current leadership and
teaching staff. Since the feds keep raising the bar, increasing numbers of
schools have become low performing schools. If the government makes no changes
to the process, in a few years all schools will be low performing schools, and,
if they receive federal funding, will be subject to corrective action.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Summative assessments can be gut-wrenching experiences for
both teacher and student, but we can also make these assessments interesting
learning experiences. A final exam can contain an essay prompt that asks for
synthesis—asking the student to retell or put facts together in a creative way,
using critical thinking. Examples could include questions like the following.</div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list .5in;">US
History: Show parallels between the 1968 and 2008 Democratic Convention.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list .5in;">Psychology:
Evaluate this clinical vignette and write up this patient under Axes I and
II. </li>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="circle">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level2 lfo2; tab-stops: list 1.0in;">Describe
how your membership in groups and your beliefs about the meaning of life
have made you who you are.</li>
</ul>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list .5in;">World
History: Explain why the French and American Revolutions progressed
differently.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list .5in;">Economics:
show both theoretically and practically why Keynesian economic policies
will (or won’t) work and give historical examples from the crash of 2008 that
back up your opinion.</li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">How Teachers Benefit
from Summative Assessments</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
By analyzing state testing results through the number
crunching software of Data Director or by hand, teachers can examine the
correlation of semester grades with the state test scores. When a teacher
discovers a gross discrepancy, such as top test scores but a class grade of C, he
needs to explore the reasons why. (See figure.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Standardized Testing Results Versus Classroom Performance
for the Individual Student</div>
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<br /></div>
<table border="1" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MsoTableGrid" style="border-collapse: collapse; border: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-insideh: .5pt solid windowtext; mso-border-insidev: .5pt solid windowtext; mso-padding-alt: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-yfti-tbllook: 480;">
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Standardized Testing
Results</i></div>
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<br /></div>
</td>
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<br /></div>
</td>
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<tr style="mso-yfti-irow: 1;">
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<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">High</i></div>
</td>
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<u>Quadrant I</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Ideal</div>
</td>
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<u>Quadrant II</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Unmotivated but bright student or test results may have
been altered. Classroom assessments may have little predictive validity.</div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr style="mso-yfti-irow: 2;">
<td style="border-top: none; border: solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 110.7pt;" valign="top" width="148"><div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Low</i></div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 110.7pt;" valign="top" width="148"><div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Quadrant III</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Student may have “bubbled” test, randomly picking answers
or student may have cheated his way through the class. Schools must make
standardized tests meaningful and important. Teachers must defend against
cheating.</div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 110.7pt;" valign="top" width="148"><div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Quadrant IV</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Expected valid score. Schools must intervene to help
low-achieving students learn.</div>
</td>
</tr>
<tr style="mso-yfti-irow: 3; mso-yfti-lastrow: yes;">
<td style="border-top: none; border: solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 110.7pt;" valign="top" width="148"><div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Classroom
Performance</i></div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 110.7pt;" valign="top" width="148"><div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">High</i></div>
</td>
<td style="border-bottom: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-left: none; border-right: solid windowtext 1.0pt; border-top: none; mso-border-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-left-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; mso-border-top-alt: solid windowtext .5pt; padding: 0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; width: 110.7pt;" valign="top" width="148"><div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Low</i></div>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Teachers expect students to fall within quadrants I and IV.
Gifted students usually do well on standardized tests and earn high marks in
their classes. Poor students usually do poorly in both testing and grading.
Problems arise when students fall into the other quadrants. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What to do right now</u>: work with your department and come
up with a plan to better the performance of students in quadrants II and III.
Why does your quadrant II student refuse to work at his potential? How can I
arrange my assessments to prevent the quadrant III student from cheating or how
can I get her to take the standardized tests more seriously?</div>
</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-33567632457479025912013-01-21T10:37:00.001-08:002013-01-21T10:37:38.473-08:00Teaching Activities to Use in a Pinch<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Activities to use in a pinch</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Not every school day goes well—students learning and the teacher
enjoying herself. Some days have been and will be quite challenging. I’ve been
threatened and laughed at by students, splattered by water balloons, chewed out
by parents, and criticized by administrators. Even during these difficult and
frustrating times, I found balance with a satisfying teaching moment or successful
lesson. Typically, I would engage in a few of my (students’) favorite things. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">An
informal assessment with “baseball”—I pick the kids and they pick the
difficulty of the assessment question—a single, double, triple, or
homerun. I run them around the class if they answer the question
successfully.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">With
dramatic passion, partaking in a read aloud of a passage of primary source
text.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">A
performance of a skit, created myself or purchased, on a historical topic.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">The
bubble: three or four students discuss a difficult subject while the rest
of the class watches.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Students
pairing-up to discuss or review a concept followed by a demanding Socratic
seminar.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Illustrating
a concept with a cartoon, earning extra credit if the work is funny.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Asking
students to write a short (three-paragraph) story with the six vocabulary
words we just learned</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Providing
feedback on whether a concept was learned through students self-reporting,
using a Likert (one to five) scale.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Psychological
demonstrations and experiments on memory, reinforcement and punishment,
and perception.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Assigning
poster presentations or PowerPoint presentations on controversial history and
economics topics and biographical anecdotes.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Analyzing
primary source documents such as political cartoons, photographs, short
speeches, and editorials placed around the room.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Bringing
in technology—making a video commercial of a concept, “publishing” a
biography in Facebook format, and doing web searches.</li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Some of these activities are teacher-centered and some are
student-centered. They all engage both student and teacher and usually succeed.
Teachers may compose these activities themselves, copy and adopt colleagues’
activities, discover and implement lesson plans from trade magazines such as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Social Education</i> and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">American Educator</i>, find lessons on
various internet sites, buy lessons from publishers, and create lessons through
a summer group devoted to that purpose such as Teaching American History (TAH).
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Too many teachers mindlessly use the textbook as their main
teaching tool. I find three problems with this. First, the state standards and
your department’s agreement on which ones are most critical and not the pages
of the textbook should determine your curriculum. Second, many textbooks
include topics that are not part of the state standards and do not include
enough material on standards that may be more important. Third, students with
poor literacy skills and those unable to steadily concentrate have trouble
reading a dense textbook.</div>
</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-75248086250141338252013-01-18T18:49:00.000-08:002013-01-18T20:52:05.192-08:00Teacher Models and Attitudes<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijkS_0PeWGUka-7nDtaIPxSAHFsUCVg-lUfVj2t-t_LBJir-JmClBqJ90JbOghBGbepUDHtGTqFrlmQ-lUrcLGo9L781Zseho8pdbvV_GEDcH0vroiGrjlJXVTQyDE4WS2SLCLo2eY2GA/s1600/dewey.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijkS_0PeWGUka-7nDtaIPxSAHFsUCVg-lUfVj2t-t_LBJir-JmClBqJ90JbOghBGbepUDHtGTqFrlmQ-lUrcLGo9L781Zseho8pdbvV_GEDcH0vroiGrjlJXVTQyDE4WS2SLCLo2eY2GA/s1600/dewey.jpg" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Observational Learning</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Teachers must manage the classroom by modeling the
behavior they want to see imitated by their students. I learned many teacher
techniques by sitting in the classroom for twenty years (kindergarten through
12<sup>th</sup> grade, four years of college, two years of a masters program
and one year of a credential program). I have observed teachers from the
perspective of a student since the mid 1960s, and I have stolen from the best!
Students will imitate teacher behaviors, especially if they perceive that those
behaviors are noticed and rewarded by other powerful adults. When I go to work,
I dress up as if I’m attending a corporate board meeting in San Francisco. In other words, I wear slacks
and a tie four or five days a week, and if I attend a public event such as Back
to School Night or a district board meeting I wear a suit. My outfit radiates
professionalism, purposefulness, maturity, wealth, and ambition. Parents
mistake me for an administrator or district official and ask me questions,
because I look like I am in charge. Students notice this attention, deserved or
not. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Would I teach better in jeans and a flannel shirt? My dress
does not alter my teaching nor does it change my classroom technique one way or
another. However, my outfit does generate more respect from both students and
parents than if I wear jeans and a flannel shirt. I feel that as an
uber-authority (in the students’ eyes) I will be subject to less acting out
than the teacher in jeans and the flannel shirt. I will enjoy less disruptions
and more successful lessons. I advise all high school teachers to dress up like
business professionals unless they are preparing science labs, art projects, or
physical education programs. Unfair as it is, a kid will construct a poor first
impression of a teacher that looks like a grounds keeper. He will maintain that
impression for a long time, saying to himself, “If he doesn’t have respect for
his appearance and his profession, why should I?” I want a student’s, parent’s
and administrator’s first impression and subsequent sentiments to be working
for me, not against me. Psychologists state that visual clues are used more
than other modalities. Abraham Lincoln bought a new suit so voters would not
“judge the peanut by its shell.” You may be subject to some mocking by your teacher
peers who dress like fast-food workers. Accept the teasing in good cheer. It’s
still worth dressing up. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Similarly, I do not want to discount our power and prestige
by belittling our remuneration. I tell students that this profession pays a
middle class salary and allows me to stay on the same yearly cycle as my
children, and unlike a lot of jobs, I really enjoy the work. I do not criticize
the school board for remuneration issues while at work, nor should you. Save
those conversations for your union meetings.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What to do right now</u>: Dress for success and count
your blessings. You get paid to work in the world of ideas and you get to help
kids.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">How the Best Teacher Models
Perform</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My own best teacher models, my astronomy professor father,
music professors Gene Graves and Frank
Sumares, and psychologist James Temple, were performers. I observed their
techniques on how to attract and hold an audience. My dad used to throw chalk
in the air and catch it behind his back. He showed slideshows of galactic cataclysms
and metaphorically elucidated the expansion of the universe by pretending to be
a raisin in a loaf of baking raisin bread. A teacher doesn’t have to be the
center of attention, but that attention must be channeled somewhere in the
classroom and not allowed to dissipate.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Physical Fitness and Teaching
Success</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Teachers who don’t direct attention to a class project must
direct it to themselves and “work the crowd” like a musician, comedian or
stumping politician. The more the teacher directs attention to himself, the
more energy the teacher must expend, and therefore a teacher that uses this
style often must get enough rest, proper nutrition and exercise. Many, if not
most, successful people say their daily workouts are a key part of their
success. George W. Bush ran on an Air Force One treadmill on his trips to Europe. Barack Obama loves his gym workouts, golf, and
basketball. I recommend doing something vigorous every day, and I often
exercise early (5AM) so I’ll be sharp for my 7:25 class. Ironically, many of my
students, 17 years young, near the peak of their physical prowess, shuffle in
as if they are being led to their execution. They didn’t get enough sleep, have
breakfast, or enjoy a workout. If I get my workout finished early, the students
(and staff) benefit from my alertness and tranquil mood. My equanimity cannot
be disturbed by adolescent angst.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I found an unintended benefit of exercise early on in my
teaching career--showmanship. I hold the attention of students that are more
impressed by physical strength than mental acuity. I tell these kids that I can
do more pushups than they can do. Then I do the pushups when the class needs a
break. Students love this, whether they are athletic or not, and this
intervention often leads to a breaking of barriers and increased respect from
hard-to-motivate kids. See below.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Physical Fitness and Teaching Success</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Out-of-shape teacher ------ less respect from “physical"
students------teacher works harder-----teacher is more tired</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Physically-fit teacher-----teacher is sharp and
“on”------more respect from “physical” students-----teaching is more successful
and fun</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Looking Good and Having Fun, While Modeling Somewhat
Conventional Attitudes</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As you may have surmised, a teacher that dresses as I have
suggested and exercises at 5AM exudes preparation and ambition, zest for life,
drive and purposeness, and success. No bohemian attitudes radiate from my
display. Radicalism and counterculture attitudes are not inherently shocking,
but education stakeholders—colleagues, parents, administration, school board
and students—tend to be fundamentally conservative when dealing with the young.
After stakeholders digest your personal appearance and vivacity, they evaluate
your attitudes and teaching philosophy. I base my attitudes toward teaching on
a simple unarticulated mission statement borrowed from jazz writer Michael
Zwerin (<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Close Enough for Jazz</i>,
Quartet Books, London):
“You can’t beat fun.” Learning must be fun for the students, and teaching must
be fun for you. When I visibly enjoy myself,
acting in a friendly way, smiling, telling stories and jokes about the
historical subject, acting, and giving demonstrations to explain something in a
novel way, the students usually enjoy themselves too. Students, when they like
what they do, work “in the zone” of efficient and deep learning, and the task
becomes play rather than work. As I stated earlier, I want to encourage an
internal, implicit enjoyment of learning and avoid an externally-based reward
for learning which leads to education being looked at like work. (I get “paid”
for it, so it must not be fun.) Thus I model enjoyment and excitement by
learning publicly. When I have the time, I read along with the in-class reading,
remarking to disruptive students that they should not interrupt my learning. In
addition to getting a good laugh, this comment shows students that knowledge is
inherently valuable. I do not read in order to better my grade, make more
money, or impress anyone. I do it because it’s fun. What could be more powerful
than modeling learning for learning’s sake in front of your students? Teaching
and learning must be interesting and exciting. If it’s not, why bother? Neither
you nor the kids are then getting anything out of the partnership, and the
profession doesn’t pay enough to do it only for the money.</div>
</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-67452546057827810052013-01-14T21:25:00.002-08:002013-01-14T21:25:45.841-08:00Classroom Management Issues<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Classroom Management Issues—Day to Day Tenor of the Room</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I keep
classroom management issues, or, more precisely, the tenor or activity level of
the room, constantly in awareness. Are the students excited, absorbed,
interested, and enjoying learning? We all hope so. Sometimes, however, teachers
work with distracted, bored, and angry students. Teachers must deliver a lesson
plan while maintaining awareness about how their students seem to be feeling.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The tenor of the room guides the teacher in selecting how to
deliver the lesson plan. For example, I do not ask students to read a textbook
if they are sleepy or bored. A group activity or discussion could wake them up.
Then, after they have come around, assign the reading. I reserve some room for improvisation
in planning and delivering each lesson, because I cannot predict tomorrow’s mood.
When I judge correctly, matching the type of lesson (reading, activity, group
work, lecture, etc.) with the mood of the students, the lesson goes over well.
When I don’t judge the classroom disposition correctly, or, more likely, become
so enthralled with a lesson that I don’t pay attention to the student’s mood, I
end up working harder to keep everyone engaged and focused.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What to do right now</u>:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If students are:</div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Bored
or sleepy, try a group or partnering activity. </li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Feeling
exhausted and overworked, try a skit or a funny story that relates to the
lesson. The lesson may also need to be broken down into smaller chunks. Or
send the kids to the computer lab with a webquest created for your current
unit.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Overly
excited and scattered, try a short lecture or a read aloud. Follow that
with a silent reading assignment.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in;">Distracted,
try to refocus students using music or art.</li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Group work or partnering, assignments using technology, drama
or storytelling add interest and excitement to the classroom. Lectures, read
alouds, music and art calm down and focus students. Reading a textbook, if set
up correctly with introductions to the material, also calms students down. Do
you want to energize or calm and focus the kids? In my student teaching I was
often overly ambitious. These students could handle an hour-long lecture on the
British Civil War I thought. These were the best students in the school, bound
for the top universities in California.
Their vapid stares by the end of class and poor performance on a subsequent
exam proved that I was wrong. I made two mistakes—lecturing for too long and
not breaking the material down into smaller pieces. Similarly, teachers often respond
to the pressure of high stakes state testing and copious state standards by talking
too much and jamming too much material in a lesson. The results—glassy-eyed students
and ghastly test scores—confirm that teaching less achieves more. Students
learn and retain more when the curriculum is delivered in a variety of ways and
broken down into smaller chunks. If there is extra time in the lesson, check for
understanding and re-teach as necessary. In other words, pursue depth of
learning over breadth of learning. If you and your department have skillfully mapped
out the curriculum beforehand, covering the requisite breadth will probably take
care of itself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Classroom Management Issues—General Overall Environment</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Looking at classroom management issues more globally,
independent of the day-to-day moods of the students, teachers can plan an
environment based on their personality and instructing style. Teachers must
find a general approach to running the high school classroom that sets limits,
yet feels caring and warm to both teacher and student. See Figure I, Teacher
Personality Versus Amount of Structure, below.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Figure I</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Teacher Personality Versus Amount of Structure</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Teacher Personality</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="height: 278px; margin-left: 239px; margin-top: 15px; mso-ignore: vglayout; position: absolute; width: 2px; z-index: 3;"><img height="278" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image001.gif" width="2" /></span><span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span>Warm
and Empathic</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 4;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Amount of Structure</i><span style="mso-tab-count: 3;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><b>A</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="height: 2px; margin-left: -1px; margin-top: 15px; mso-ignore: vglayout; position: absolute; width: 578px; z-index: 2;"><img height="2" src="file:///C:\DOCUME~1\Dell\LOCALS~1\Temp\msohtml1\01\clip_image002.gif" width="578" /></span>Low<span style="mso-tab-count: 11;"> </span>High</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.5in; text-indent: .5in;">
Cold and Uncaring</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Figure I borrows from the ideas of systems theory. The X
(horizontal) axis is the amount of classroom structure, especially rules and
procedures. The Y (vertical) axis stands for teacher personality
characteristics. Point A is Spinrad’s ideal management style for the middle
class high school classroom. The Y axis, warmth and empathy can be observed by
how often the teacher smiles, jokes with students, asks about their family,
friends and extracurricular activities, self-discloses, responds to student
questions, comments on problems (in and out of the classroom), clowns and acts
in a self-depreciating manner, goes off topic to attend to a “teaching moment,”
creates class jokes, signs yearbooks, performs in rallies, writes and uses
music and drama (and other emotion-based devices), and lastly, visibly enjoys teaching
the material and the interacting with students. Most teachers cannot exhibit an
elevated amount of warmth for every class—it takes too much energy and few of
us feel this loving day in and day out. The students would also object. Many
adolescents prefer a more business-like tone from adults. However, I recommend
that teachers consider working on the warm and empathetic side of the cold to
warm continuum. If the classroom is mildly inviting, students will want to
stay.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What to do right now</u>: decide in advance how much and
what you will self-disclose and how much privacy you want for yourself and
family.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The X axis, the amount of classroom structure—rules and
procedures—can be found in how the teacher arranges the room; writes, explains,
and practices rules and procedures; and punishes infractions. Teenagers need and
crave some structure, but too much dampens creativity and openness of ideas,
turning the classroom into a bureaucratic labyrinth instead of a place for
learning. Who wants to go to school at the DMV? So here too, I prefer to teach
in the middle of the continuum, leaning slightly more towards structure, as
shown in the placement of point A. Teachers can increase structure by modifying
the layout of desks. Turning tables or desks toward each other decreases
structure. Desks organized in rows, faced toward the teacher increases
structure. Reviewing rules and procedures throughout the year and enforcing
them increases structure. Routine tasks such as writing lecture notes on the
board before class or always showing a PowerPoint at the start of class
increases structure.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I desire enough structure so that the class is perceived as
safe with the teacher in control. Students must know a few general rules and
procedures and abide by them. That is all. Teachers have the power to add or
subtract structure as they wish, based on the maturity of the students and the class
interactions. Younger students or classes with a critical mass of rebellious or
unruly students require more structure. Mature students that collaborate and
find creative solutions need a teacher who will loosen structure and step out
of the way. Thus I find it foolish to ask most 15-year-olds to brainstorm,
since they cannot handle the freedom. Similarly, teachers perform a disservice
when they keep well-behaved, gifted high school seniors away from disorderly
but creative group projects.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Teachers may adjust the amount of classroom structure in the
same class over the course of a year. Most teachers tend to relax structure and
punitive sanctions over the course of the school year, starting the year on the
strict side and loosening up later if the students can handle the freedom.
Teachers must find the level that works for them and the students. I have seen
classrooms with the strictness of San Quentin State Prison and others that
remind me of the chaos of Grand Central Station at 5PM on a Friday. Since
structure must change with differing circumstances, I don’t always find the
proper level. During a chaotic outdoor event I asked some of my sophomores to
move to a different spot. The art teacher told me to leave them alone—they were
fine where they were. He was right—for his style of teaching. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What to do right now</u>: The teacher can and must adjust
the amount of structure to fit his or her style and fit the needs of
adolescents. These students respond positively to firm limits and a feeling of
safety in the classroom but also require enough freedom to encourage creativity
and exchange of ideas.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Who to Call When the Limits
are Tested</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Adolescents will test the structure and limits set up by the
teacher, since this is what youth do in modern American culture. How should an
educator react? Teachers have not been trained as policemen, drill sergeants,
or probation officers. Lacking preparation, beginning teachers and occasionally
veterans throw the book (figuratively) at the offender, sending him or her to
the office for relatively minor infractions. Sending a student to the assistant
principal (AP) for chewing gum gives both the student and the AP the message
that you, the teacher, cannot handle minor discipline issues on your own. No, instead,
the teacher must handle all infractions except the most draconian. You were
there, and the AP wasn’t, and you know the context of the infraction. Does this
kid always act like this, did the incident serve as a challenge to your
authority, and do you want to keep the power vested in you or give it away to
an AP? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
An AP must be brought in if a student threatens physical
harm to self or others (and you may be required to warn the intended victim as
well) and in incidents involving extreme defiance and controlled substances.
District policy occasionally takes the discipline procedure out of the
teacher’s hands, as in cases of plagiarism or vandalism. Sometimes a few kids
take over a class, especially if the teacher is a powerless substitute, and then
again the AP must be called. In most other cases, in a role similar to
parenting, the teacher serves as lawmaker, judge, and executor of classroom
discipline and must handle the problem herself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Proper Discipline When
the Limits are Tested</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A good dishwasher uses the least amount of muscles, soap and
water to get the job done. Using too much is costly, an inefficient use of
resources, prematurely exhausting, and may even damage the Teflon pans.
Similarly, using the least amount of punishment necessary to change a student’s
behavior leads to a focused, successfully-paced lesson and maintains the effective
mood in the classroom. Teachers also support the adolescents’ sense of justice
when they see minor infractions followed with appropriately light punishments.
Figure II, below, illustrates how different interventions affect the pace of
instruction in the classroom.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Figure II</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Interventions with Problem Behavior, Least to Most Interupting</div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
A staring at the problem behavior or nonverbally asking the
offending object to be put away</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
B joking about the problem behavior without looking at it</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
C walking over to where the problem behavior is occurring
while continuing to teach</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
D asking the disrupting student an assessment question on
the task at hand</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
E nonverbally asking for note, gum, cell phone, Ipod, etc.
to be surrendered to teacher </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
F saying the student’s name in a barely loud enough voice
for the student to hear it </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
G writing on the board or telling the class that every
minute of disruption will be added to the time they must stay in class after
the bell rings and following through OR writing on the board or telling the
class that every name written down will get in-class detention writing Latin
verb conjugations or an equally odious task</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
H shut down—standing silently and staring at the class,
waiting for them to react</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
*I taking a student outside to discuss his/her behavior</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
J writing a referral during class and calling for a yard
duty escort to send the offender to the office or calling an administrator to
the classroom</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
K taking a student outside and calling the student’s
guardian on a cell phone—the “nuclear bomb” intervention—very disruptive to
class time and interrupting the pace of learning</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
*The class should be able to see but not hear the actual
lecture. The teacher must use acting skills, appearing angry for the class but
not sounding angry to the misbehaving student. Notice that the teacher avoids
wherever possible public humiliation, since it works poorly with adolescents
who so badly need to “save face” among their peers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Positive Reinforcement</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As one with a background in behaviorism may attest,
reinforcing desired behaviors achieves more than punishing undesired actions. A
reinforced student is a happy student and will repeat the reinforced behavior
(by definition). Some teachers give out primary reinforcers such as candy.
However, explicit (external) reinforcers may take the place of the more powerful
and long-lasting implicit (internal) reinforcers. Teachers should give students
an acknowledging smile and kind word for a job well done, but I do not think candy
or overly effusive praise works well as a reinforcer. Will the student still
perform if the reinforcement is not given? I find the best reinforcers include
doing interesting work and receiving immediate feedback for that work. Both of
these are implicit reinforcers. Grades work well as a reinforcer, and a teacher
that gives frequent assessments, whether or not they are marked in the grade
book, employs a powerful tool. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
These reinforcers, work that is inherently interesting and
performance feedback, also duplicate the behavioral contingencies students will
encounter later in life outside the classroom. Few of us get paid every day,
but most teachers get to learn something new and receive daily feedback on our
performance. Reinforcers work better than punishment. Punishment doesn’t tell
the student what TO do, only what NOT to do. Punishment produces side effects
such as anger and sullenness and so should be used sparingly. Does the problem
behavior require an intervention at all? Some bad behavior will go away if
ignored for a minute. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">When to Use Punishment
Instead of Reinforcement</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Punishment MUST be used occasionally, and the teacher that
tries to survive on using only reinforcement in a class of unsocialized
adolescents will have a harder time than the father trying to logically
convince a two-year-old in the grocery store to stop throwing things off the
shelf. Secondly, teachers must punish poor behavior occasionally or it loses
its ability to serve as a deterrent. We do not have our students for an
unlimited amount of time and cannot afford to waste any-- that ten-minute
disruption may be 20 percent of the class time. Punishment works quickly and it
works well in shutting down unwanted behavior. I have noticed three types of
adolescent misbehavior in the classroom and have labeled them bravado,
shutdown, and clowning. The teacher can determine which of these types is at
hand by monitoring his own emotions.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bravado</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The student full of bravado uses loud profanity and boasts,
also loudly, of fighting or sexual prowess, or substance abuse. The student
wants to impress others with his toughness and show that he’s not afraid of
this teacher or any rules. Other students will watch closely how you react, and
if you do nothing this obnoxious behavior will spread to other students. When
you have one or more of these students in a classroom, teaching feels a bit
scary, like you are a warden in a prison. I rarely see this type of misbehavior
if I have the student for a semester or more. Almost always, the student is in
summer school or I am a temporary teacher, a short-term sub (or student
teacher). Anecdotally I have noticed more bravado in mixed sex rather than
single sex classrooms. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What to do right now</u>: Resist the urge to publicly
mock or confront these students, because they then feel forced not to lose face
These kids often respond to adults that have relations with them. You don’t
have that relationship. If you have time, find someone that does and you will
have all the leverage over this student that you need. This might be a coach,
another teacher, a parent, or the assistant principal. Until you find this
person, stay calm and dignified and ask the student to quiet down. If he still doesn’t
behave, write a referral and with little fanfare send him out of the classroom
or to the office.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Shutdown</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This student refuses to cooperate—won’t read, won’t do the
writing assignment, and won’t participate in any form. Her mind is elsewhere,
not on your class. Often the student will attempt to cheat if worried about her
grade. When you have one or more of these students in a classroom, teaching
feels tiring—the student is capturing all your energy. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What to do right now</u>: Often the student is showing learned
helplessness rather than purposely acting out, so a kind word may be the best
intervention at first. If the student is not suffering but has decided to fail,
get numerous respected adults to remind the student to get to work. These
adults could include the student’s family, coaches, or other teachers the
student likes. Thirdly, make a deal with the student: “You will pass if you
do…” and keep your agreement. Lastly, perhaps this student and the rest of the
class could benefit from a more engaging lesson or some partnering work. You
can’t beat fun.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Clowning</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This student wants attention and wants to stop working. He
may become a hero in the eyes of his fellows by finding a way to allow everyone
else to stop working too. He gestures, jokes, ridicules, belches, makes faces, and
throws things behind the teacher’s back—in a summary steals the attention that
should be on the assignment or the teacher. He turns serious and significant discussions
or debates into a mockery. The teacher has great difficulty focusing the class.
When you have one or more of these students in a classroom, teaching feels exasperating
as your best efforts are deflected and you are unable to build up a head of
steam. <u>What to do right now</u>: Try your best to stay on track by ignoring
the offending student while exhorting the class to get back to work. In more
extreme cases, send out the aberrant student or give him a special job to do
around the classroom or on the critical class assignment.</div>
</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-16780237638512912052013-01-10T06:18:00.002-08:002013-01-10T06:18:40.918-08:00Technology and Teaching<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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The relationships between teacher, student, and parent have changed by evolving societal norms but also by the evolution in technology. Students can reach their parents throughout
the day, through cell phones and email. Similarly, parents expect teachers to
respond quickly to messages. Yet, pedagogy has not advanced much since the days
of my grandfather. He and my children were taught high school with a teacher, a
desk and a board. We have learned, along with 30 or so others, in neat desks
arranged in rows—a factory formula—for 100 years! Why do high school teachers
typically have five classes per day, thirty kids per class, teaching about 150 kids
per day? Through using the factory model, we can educate the most pupils using
the least amount of resources—that is, this model is the most efficient. We
sacrifice the quality of one-to-one tutoring that produced the depth and breadth
of Thomas Jefferson’s learning for the goal of giving everyone at least some
education. Perhaps we can improve on the factory model by using technology.
Internet lessons enable students to enjoy the following advantages.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Excitement of Technology</i>:
Technology is the denizen of the young. Young people create it, become fluent
in the use of it, and find all the possibilities for its use, both technically
and sociologically. They like cutting-edge technology and will more likely
attempt an assignment simply because it uses technology. As an adolescent, I
used microfilm and card catalogs to do research. I had perhaps six good friends
and a few dozen colleagues in the band room and chess club I would consider
close acquaintances. There was no Google search and no hundreds of “friends” on
Facebook. An old-fashioned research assignment that would elicit groans of
protest will instead be tackled with alacrity if it involves researching links
you have set up for them on the internet.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Teachers themselves also now have access to an encyclopedic
amount of information online that they never had before outside of the Library
of Congress, including websites with primary source documents and ready to use
PowerPoints, podcasts, and videos.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Shrinking of Time
and Space</i>: Anyone in the world with internet access (living in a nation
that allows free exchange of ideas) can access an internet class, watching
lectures from famous Yale professors or watch a live cam of life in Jerusalem or Beijing.
Anyone in the world can find out about these through search engines. Summer
school, just a make-up class or two and not an important venue for socializing
or enrichment, will eventually go the way of the dodo bird. Now these few
classes can be taught where the students reside—wherever their computer is
located—without the expenses heating a building or supporting more than a
bare-bones administrative staff. Students download lessons any time of the day
or night, working on assignments at their own pace as long as the product or assessment
is produced by the deadline. A fifty-minute lesson doesn’t have to be completed
in fifty minutes. Fast learners can finish the lesson and the course quickly,
and slow learners can take much more time than they would get in the
traditional classroom.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Self-Paced Curriculum
is Differential Instruction:</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Why does the typical United States history course take
an academic year to complete? Gifted and ambitious students could complete the
textbook readings in much less time but are held back to the slower pacing of
the teacher’s lectures and assessments. These more ambitious self-paced
students can finish course readings in half the time it would take a student in
the regular classroom curriculum. Slower students that need more time than
given in a traditional classroom can review lectures and demonstrations on
video, PowerPoints, and interactive tutorials as often as they like. The
teacher does not force pacing based on an academic calendar. Rather student
needs differentiate pacing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Quicker feedback</i>:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Both students and the teacher depend on the teacher’s
scheduled informal and formal classroom assessments to assess whether students
are learning. In cyberspace, however, lessons typically include formative
multiple choice assessments. These give students immediate feedback on how well
they know the material. Smarter software programs provide internal brachiation,
choosing new questions depending on how the student answered the last one. Of
course, multiple choice tests are not enough. Teachers can assign short answer
tests or essays and quickly return these, graded, to the students. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The internet shortens the time of the feedback loop, from
student to teacher back to student, since this exchange is not dependent on
meeting in a classroom on a certain day of the week. For example, if a student
submits a short answer response at 7PM, she may have feedback from the teacher
two hours later. In a traditional classroom setting this exchange would take at
least 24 hours. Students are “paid” through feedback--any feedback is
reinforcing and makes them want to repeat the activity that led to the
feedback. The faster they get the feedback the more reinforcing it is.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Differentiation of
Curriculum</i>:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Students may be automatically guided to different levels of
instruction depending on how they answer assessment questions, saving both
student and teacher time and avoiding needless frustration. All students may
end the class learning roughly the same amount of material, but they may
progress from different starting points.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Keeping Students Honest</i>:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Essays may also be checked for plagiarism and copying from
others through online services. It is impossible to do a complete check
offline.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Communicating Better
with Parents</i>:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Parents get very frustrated with teachers that don’t return
calls or emails. A good teacher’s website will link to the students’ grades,
the teacher’s email address, and have downloadable current assignments. Parents
have everything they need from the teacher on the website. They need to contact
you less during the year. When they do contact you and you check and reply to
your email daily, parents will feel that you are an empathic and responsive
teacher.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Changed Relationships
of a Virtual Community</i>:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Some students do not participate in classroom discussions.
They may be shy by nature or trained not to be assertive; they may be afraid to
open up in front of peers; they may be overshadowed by louder, more aggressive
students; or they may be disinterested in the way the material is presented.
The online world, the chat room and bulletin board, cannot properly recreate
the give and take of the classroom, the nuance of expression or even the timing
of a joke. However, many students that do not participate in the classroom for
the above reasons will participate in the online virtual classroom. Online
anonymity tends to lessen classroom problems of overbearing students,
embarrassment in front of peers. Teachers can combine the best of both worlds
by mandating that their online class meet physically from time to time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>What to do right now</u>: As soon as you have the time,
get yourself a teacher’s website. Perhaps your school district already has the
capability to set you up. If not, Google, Weebly, and other online businesses offer free
sites and still other companies offer sites custom made for teachers for low
costs, less than $50/year. Search online for “websites for teachers.” Most of
these require no knowledge of code, and an absolute beginner can work easily
within the architecture designed for educators and have lessons online within
an hour.</div>
</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-2322459631013962252013-01-04T12:48:00.000-08:002013-01-04T12:54:53.814-08:00Food Stamps in Antiquity and Today<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiidCrjQ3O1Uf4SLrZt4y8Es-Qf8QIezazISOCHogCXRBEjqj0NSHsaZbwaU5b-wnT4FZDJOi0bUaBmXfG0uhteA5h7cX1uyQbzybyvdf2kRaXC28fSZhrylf0CNTeO4j1EsDhO35ZTzU4/s1600/Augustus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiidCrjQ3O1Uf4SLrZt4y8Es-Qf8QIezazISOCHogCXRBEjqj0NSHsaZbwaU5b-wnT4FZDJOi0bUaBmXfG0uhteA5h7cX1uyQbzybyvdf2kRaXC28fSZhrylf0CNTeO4j1EsDhO35ZTzU4/s320/Augustus.jpg" width="213" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Augustus, Wikipedia</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Food stamps are not a new idea. Taxes earmarked for religious upkeep and gleanings for the poor date back to the Biblical record, thousands of years ago. Somewhat later, near the end of the Roman Republic, politicians instituted handouts of grain for the poor of Rome. Citizens still had to get the grain milled, but they were assured of a monthly supply of food. (Gregory Aldrete in <u>The Roman City: Rome, Pompeii, and Ostia</u> claims the monthly handout was enough for two people.)<br />
<br />
Imperial Rome was no different. Here, in Suetonius' words (tr. by Robert Graves) are emperor Augustus' remarks on the free grain distribution:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
I had a good mind to discontinue permanently the supply of grain to the City, reliance on which had discouraged Italian agriculture; but refrained because some politician would be bound one day to revive the dole as a means of ingratiating himself with the people (<u>The Twelve Caesars</u>, Section 42).</blockquote>
Augustus realized that Italian farmers could not compete against "free" grain, brought over from Egypt, and the image of the small, self-reliant Republican farmer had become a mere myth. He also saw the danger of demagogues using free grain as a means of gaining power. Similarly, Abraham Lincoln felt that homesteaders could not compete against slave labor and came out against slavery for, at first, economic reasons. In our time, African farmers are ruined by the free grain the United States gives to their countries, and food stamp programs alter the turnout of American elections.<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrJ5vd5dDMPFe9tThWcE0PzMVyHR97HdClvPGk2IBZ6vqM2fzj5ezR31B8asQ_4L1uCc1uXy2SZSK0rTCE01z65Mth23u8NauzNSZaKmMNu-7z26N0wESu1n94NtmP2H-mUaV4vWVSTtU/s1600/foodstamps.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="310" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrJ5vd5dDMPFe9tThWcE0PzMVyHR97HdClvPGk2IBZ6vqM2fzj5ezR31B8asQ_4L1uCc1uXy2SZSK0rTCE01z65Mth23u8NauzNSZaKmMNu-7z26N0wESu1n94NtmP2H-mUaV4vWVSTtU/s320/foodstamps.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">from Agora Financial</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
During the last four years the number of Americans receiving food stamps has skyrocketed, while the number of Americans supporting the program has diminished. If this was a temporary situation and there was a quick jobs recovery, employment would rise and food stamp participation would fall. The blue and red lines on the graph on the left would intersect, and we would congratulate ourselves for supporting the poor while on the road to economic growth and prosperity. But there is little evidence that employment is roaring back. We have not had a good jobs report (more than 200,000 jobs created/month) in a long time. Unlike Rome, we are not (I hope) going to take over another country and steal its grain. We will be forced to cut other programs and/or raise taxes, which may slow our economy further.</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-59616794443568545852013-01-03T13:46:00.002-08:002013-01-04T11:56:07.801-08:00What Presidents Teach Us about Luxury<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9_MxQMfIu8dVRigb7dSyKKMOP2sohMQb0Hr8-lKktjYSnJc9-kcAXskNUD3epUIIXoM9knkmhWvQkeOFIUL96x3N7Z4Ewb0Mh8KKnUyRPKmArlNo-97_q9MsMNTPyEJiZNf8qmqZOM5o/s1600/eleanor_film_landing_1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9_MxQMfIu8dVRigb7dSyKKMOP2sohMQb0Hr8-lKktjYSnJc9-kcAXskNUD3epUIIXoM9knkmhWvQkeOFIUL96x3N7Z4Ewb0Mh8KKnUyRPKmArlNo-97_q9MsMNTPyEJiZNf8qmqZOM5o/s320/eleanor_film_landing_1.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo from PBS</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Eleanor Roosevelt's austerity in the White House kitchen (abstract <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/11/22/101122fa_fact_shapiro" target="_blank">here</a>) seems quaint today. Franklin D. Roosevelt put up with meals costing ten cents per serving (adjusted by inflation to $1.70 today). Despite the strains of the Great Depression and WWII on a polio-ravaged body, FDR traveled abroad for conferences with the allies, campaigned vigorously, battled the Great Depression (unsuccessfully but with great energy) and the Axis powers (successfully), and vacationed 958 days in close to 12 years as president, about 80 days per year. During much of those 958 days he was still engaged in executive duties in his vacation house in Warm Springs, Georgia. Most considered his vacations neither frivolous nor overly expensive.<br />
<br />
Obama vacations are much more expensive, not because of his rented house (which he pays for), but because his large <a href="http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/473662/Praetorian-Guard" target="_blank">Praetorian Guard</a> must be jetted over to Hawaii and put up in hotels.The latest $7 million dollar vacation can be inspected <a href="http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2013/01/02/inside-obamas-kailua-beach-vacation-homes" target="_blank">here</a>. Let us put this most recent vacation in perspective. This one trip will cost more than the average American would make in 175 years of work. When Obama's wife or children vacation away from the president, they too must be <a href="http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2012/03/malia-obama-vacations-in-mexico-with-25-secret-service-agents/" target="_blank">guarded</a> by a large entourage, and taxpayers foot the bill.<br />
<br />
I am aware that George W. Bush <a href="http://politic365.com/2012/05/08/obamas-vacations-of-any-president-bush-racked-up-the-most/" target="_blank">vacationed</a> a greater amount of time than any president including Obama. However, most of that was at the Crawford Ranch, 1,300 miles away, "working at home," which W preferred. That may be qualitatively different than jetting 4,800 miles to Hawaii to play golf and enjoy a tropical paradise, maybe not, since W's trips were also expensive. Most will agree that the attitude towards luxury and the use of taxpayer funds is quite different than what FDR experienced at the hands of his wife. Neither W nor Obama seem embarrassed by these trips, 54 Christmas trees in the White House, or, most fittingly, lavish White House state dinners (such as the million dollar gala for <a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/spending-on-white-house-dinners-soars-under-obama/article/2511758#.UOX0-qyxnec" target="_blank">Mexico's</a> president). Too bad FDR wasn't invited. He would have enjoyed a little caviar and champagne.<br />
<br />
Eleanor Roosevelt was implicitly telling the public that the Roosevelts may be rich but they can live frugally and responsibly, and she vicariously shares the hardship of most Americans during the Great Depression. The current White House attitude is the opposite in every respect. Corporate boards often tie CEOs' bonus pay to corporate performance. Maybe we should do the same for presidential vacations, limiting taxpayer funds as long as America's economic performance is sub par. </div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-17125468112113578312012-12-27T14:30:00.000-08:002012-12-27T15:00:05.584-08:00How Well Did I Predict the Future? Ten Political and Economic Predictions for Year 2012<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuE_CfM0Rrz5YRiyVltSg_bzoDwbgS3pSr7fx4MNZzWb5pdt3sRs1bfP2LkTerfmOkFE6vd-XAzPyxtavTTp_2MIUHs6fKHzqgmPdD40nKDInnInJmee-WwMLW4awf1Pam2y5Ag9VmicU/s1600/Fortune_cookie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuE_CfM0Rrz5YRiyVltSg_bzoDwbgS3pSr7fx4MNZzWb5pdt3sRs1bfP2LkTerfmOkFE6vd-XAzPyxtavTTp_2MIUHs6fKHzqgmPdD40nKDInnInJmee-WwMLW4awf1Pam2y5Ag9VmicU/s1600/Fortune_cookie.jpg" /></a></div>
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="font-size: large;">12/27/2012</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="font-size: large;">A year ago I made ten predictions in economics and politics. How did I do? I<span style="font-size: large;">'m</span> disappointed--six out of ten correct. This is good enough to win in investing but I expected better. I give myself a grade of passing<span style="font-size: large;">. Please see the links analyzing the results below.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="font-size: large;">12/31/2011</span><br />
<span class="text_exposed_show" style="font-size: large;">Each of these predictions will be graded a year from now as correct or incorrect. No hedging is allowed. I will grade the list next year as 60 percent, passing; 70 percent, fair; 80 percent, good; and 90 percent excellent. You may or may not like the predicted outcomes. This is how I read the trends.</span><br />
<br />
<ol>
<li><span class="text_exposed_show"> California will pass a ballot measure that raises taxes. <u>CORRECT</u>: prop 31 passed</span></li>
<li><span class="text_exposed_show">White flight out of California will accelerate. </span><span class="text_exposed_show"><span class="text_exposed_show"><u>CORRECT</u> </span>link <a href="http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/cr_71.htm#.UGHcpUbCz8A" target="_blank">1</a> <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2012/09/29/Report-225-000-Californians-A-Year-Escaping-State-s-High-Taxes-Burdensome-Regulations-Economic-And-Public-Sector-Instability" target="_blank">2</a> <a href="http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Californias-Population-Moving-Out-182914961.html" target="_blank">3</a></span></li>
<li><span class="text_exposed_show"> Liberals will decry corporate control of politics, but n</span>either Barack Obama nor the Republican nominee will seek
public financing for the 2012 general election, in
order to avoid fundraisin<span class="text_exposed_show">g limits. </span><span class="text_exposed_show"><u>CORRECT</u></span></li>
<li>Inflation will rise over 2011 levels. <u>No</u>, the economy slowed.</li>
<li>Obama's health care bill will be ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. <u>No</u>, shockingly SCOTUS ruled that Obamacare is a tax and therefore legal..</li>
<li><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text"><span class="text_exposed_show">Participation in food stamps and long term unemployment will decrease only slightly, by one percent or less. </span></span><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text"><span class="text_exposed_show"><span class="text_exposed_show"><u>CORRECT</u> Food stamp participation continues to skyrocket. </span>link <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-09-04/food-stamp-use-climbed-to-record-46-7-million-in-june-u-s-says" target="_blank">1</a> <a href="http://www.blogger.com/html%20http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/ir_23.htm#.UFinhEbCz8A" target="_blank">2</a> <a href="http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/record-high-enrollment-food-stamps-46681833-million_654653.html" target="_blank">3</a></span></span></li>
<li><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text"><span class="text_exposed_show"> A rating agency will further downgrade U.S. debt. </span></span><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text"><span class="text_exposed_show"><span class="text_exposed_show"><u>CORRECT</u> </span><a href="http://www.cnbc.com/id/49037337" target="_blank">link</a></span></span></li>
<li><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text">The House of Representatives will remain in Republican hands. </span><span class="text_exposed_show"><u>CORRECT</u></span></li>
<li><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text">The Republicans will capture the Senate.<u>No</u>. The Republican turnout was poor.</span></li>
<li><span class="commentBody" data-jsid="text">Gold will go down to $1400 per ounce. <u>No</u>. Gold is up again!</span></li>
</ol>
</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-73135563439181861252012-12-26T17:20:00.002-08:002012-12-26T17:20:32.021-08:00Pleasure in Imperial Rome<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<iframe frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?lt1=_blank&bc1=000000&IS2=1&bg1=FFFFFF&fc1=000000&lc1=0000FF&t=teachighscho-20&o=1&p=8&l=as4&m=amazon&f=ifr&ref=ss_til&asins=1441134859" style="height: 240px; width: 120px;"></iframe><br /><br />
British academic Ray Laurence wrote <u>Roman Passions, A History of Pleasure in Imperial Rome</u> (Continuum, London, 2009) to fill a void. Historians and researchers had not yet looked deeply into Roman pleasures. This book examines in detail the enjoyment of country villas, the baths, sex, dining, music and dance, violent entertainment, and art.<br />
<br />
Laurence debunks many longstanding myths about Roman society, for example, the myth of orgies. Sex was, for the most part, private. Roman eating could be outlandish but only for the rich. If one was rich one's diet was quite varied and sophisticated, based on contrasting flavors and a fish paste. Laurence connected the culture of consumption, which peaked in the first century CE, to economic growth and a building boom. "Cores from the Greenland ice cap reveal a peak in atmospheric pollution in antiquity occurring about 2,000 years ago, in other words, from the beginning of the first century CE" (P. 161). This level of production needed to produce these levels of atmospheric pollution was not seen again until the industrial revolution in the early 19th century (ibid.). And the Romans built and polluted with a much smaller population!<br />
<br />
Laurence could be talking about 19th century Britain or our own times in America when he tells us that the Roman empire "was the first global economy with cheap products (such as wine) being produced in the provinces for consumption in the capital" (ibid.) The better we understand what went on in ancient Rome, the better we understand our behavior in 21st century America. Since we know what happened to Rome and why, we may have a glimpse on what our future holds as well.<br />
<br />
The book is heavily footnoted by a well-known antiquities scholar but is not dense--it flows easily and is lots of fun to read.</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-67645466411663119072012-12-26T12:43:00.001-08:002012-12-26T12:43:55.670-08:00Striking Parallels in History<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_F4QcoHIIXJA_ZCzcCW5mKqMVx4y1VKEBHyvNWgxFnOm6cjBEmAb1q-ydpEW3IRtDVUg7V5YBU5Vp7y-IVvJSYWbCTWJTNuV4eyM0nKILxC2Uc-0ZCsV2qvKNEFQLuw1bSr9Agi0KSCU/s1600/Dec28+004.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_F4QcoHIIXJA_ZCzcCW5mKqMVx4y1VKEBHyvNWgxFnOm6cjBEmAb1q-ydpEW3IRtDVUg7V5YBU5Vp7y-IVvJSYWbCTWJTNuV4eyM0nKILxC2Uc-0ZCsV2qvKNEFQLuw1bSr9Agi0KSCU/s320/Dec28+004.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Perhaps a future historian might write the following about the United States: "America's very overseas successes from WWII to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan began to create internal tensions as presidents amassed too much power and prestige at the expense of Congress, poor Americans lost their houses and fell into debt, the old European and Asian allies became resentful, immigration policy became illogicical, and a government system developed to rule itself was strained by having to manage nation-building."<br />
<br />
Here is what professor Gregory S. Aldrete wrote about Imperial Rome (<u>The Roman City: Rome, Pompeii, and Ostia</u>, Greenwood Press, Westport, CT, 2004).<br />
"Rome's very overseas success, however, began to create internal tensions as individual generals amassed too much power and prestige, poor Romans lost their farms and fell into debt, the old Italian allies and half-citizens became resentful, and a government system developed to rule a city was strained by having to manage an empire" (P. 8).<br />
<br />
Aldrete's analysis applies to us as well as Imperial Rome and is somewhat chilling, yes? We can have an empire OR we can have prosperity and freedom, but we cannot have both.</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-19018992231189252232012-12-22T21:13:00.001-08:002013-07-01T20:40:53.983-07:00Lincoln--The Movie<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I rarely watch new movies, unmoved by the current excesses of sex and violence that seem to be matched to the tastes of Caligula, but finally, Hollywood has released a movie that is as engaging and intellectually stimulating as the writings of Winston Churchill or Edmund Morris. That movie is<i> Lincoln</i>.<br />
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I knew the movie would be good but was worried about how it would portray the war and all its gore. I was relieved to find that the fighting was de-emphasized. Even Lincoln's assassination at Ford's theater was only announced rather than acted out on screen. The war's violence did not haunt me. Instead, hours after viewing the film, I still felt inspired by Lincoln's leadership, his decision-making process, and his greatness of character.<br />
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I must give credit to Dr. Jane who invited me to go with her and her mother who saw the movie first and knew it would be perfect for me. Dr. Jane bought our tickets for the price of a glass of wine--a bargain I couldn't refuse. As a history teacher I was well aware of what the movie would be about-- a screen play based on <i>Team of Rivals: The political Genius of Abraham Lincoln</i>-- and how Lincoln sought after his cabinet's counsel, managed the great egos of the men involved, and, against the odds, defeated the Confederate armies and passed the Thirteenth Amendment barring slavery. For a specific description see David Wolfford's wonderful review <a href="http://publications.socialstudies.org/se/7701/77011344.pdf" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
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I hope my fellow movie goers will forgive me for whispering excitedly in Dr. Jane's ear, "There's William Seward." "Goodness, it's Edwin Stanton". "It's radical Republican Thaddeus Stevens". "That little guy is Confederate Vice President Stephens." "Do you recognize Robert E. Lee on horseback?" The actors looked uncannily like their namesakes pictured in the history books. The actors also portrayed their characters' personalities accurately. Seward was confident and full of himself. Stanton was serious in purpose and impetuous. Lincoln and Grant were both rough-hewn and honest.<br />
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The movie revolved around the political maneuvering in passing the Thirteenth Amendment. It was quite entertaining watching the anti-Amendment Democrats get bribed (with political patronage), bullied, cajoled, or persuaded to vote for the Amendment. Interwoven with the political fight over the Amendment were the themes of prosecution of the war and prospects for a negotiated peace--these factors determined whether the Thirteenth Amendment would pass on schedule. <br />
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This movie is about personal and political relationships--Lincoln's relationships with his wife and children, his cabinet, his party, the opposition party, slaves and freedmen, the voters, and the public. It is a successful movie because people can be fascinating if you let them be, and <i>Lincoln</i> does.</div>
Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3595440667873137889.post-35256277468651168632012-12-14T20:55:00.003-08:002012-12-16T21:02:46.809-08:00Caesar's Legion--The Military of Imperial Rome Lives<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Vercingetorix and Caesar</td></tr>
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The western Roman Empire has been gone for close to 1700 years, but authors continue to release excellent books about the period. Stephen Dando-Collins' <i>Caesar's Legion: The Epic Saga of Julius Caesar's Elite Tenth Legion and the Armies of Rome</i> can be found in paperback for a song. Dando-Collin's book (Wiley, 2002) takes us on an exciting historical journey through the end of the Roman Republic and Julius Caesar's dictatorship to the fall of Byzantine. However, the book concentrates on the forming of the 10th Legion under Caesar in Spain, Caesar's battles in Gaul, his invasion of Britain, the civil war against Pompei in which Caesar came close to losing, the next civil war in which Octavian was victorious, and the actions of the 10th in Judea, especially the destruction of Jerusalem.<br />
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Dando-Collins vividly describes army life--what it was like to be a Roman infantry soldier from 40 BCE to 100 CE: the technology of the weapons, the arms worn and carried, the uniform, the discipline endured, the recruitment procedures, and especially, what the battles looked and felt like if you were there.<br />
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Once the javelin struck anything, the weight of the shaft caused it to bend like a hockey stick where staff and head joined. With its aerodynamic qualities destroyed, it couldn't be effectively thrown back. And if it lodged in a shield, it became extremely difficult to remove, as the Helvetii [invading warriors from the area that is today Switzerland] now found.What was worse, in their case, with their shields overlapping, javelins were going through several at a time, pinning them together. With members of the [Helvetii] phalanx downed and others struggling with tangled shields, their formation was broken by the these initial volleys. Caesar gave another order. His flag dropped, and the trumpets of the first line sounded the "Charge." With a roar, the front-line [Roman] legionaries charged down the hill with drawn swords. After repeated attempts to free their shields, many Helvetii threw them away, leaving them virtually defenseless (pp. 18-19).</blockquote>
Another sample of Dando-Collins' eloquent and striking narrative, a description of the surrender of an enemy Gallic leader follows:<br />
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Without a word, Vercingetorix removed his sword belt and handed it to Caesar. Caesar accepted the sword, then passed it on to one of his staff. Vercingetorix removed his helmet, with its distinctive Gallic crest, and passed it over. Then his armor, richly decorated with gold and silver--attendants helped him out of it, and then this, too, he presented to Caesar, who in turn passed it to subordinates. Then Vercingetorix sat himself at Caesar's feet. There, in silence, he watched as his hungry, dejected troops came out of Alesia in a long stream with heads hung low, and piled their weapons and armor before the conquering Romans and were then led away into slavery. Finally, Vercingetorix, too, was bound with chains and taken away. (P. 60).</blockquote>
Through its focal point, the history of the 10th Legion, the book closely reviews the major political events of the Empire from Caesar's ascension to the rise of Vespasian. Dando-Collins takes the side of the Romans in the first Jewish revolt of 66-70 CE--not surprising since Josephus, not the Talmud was the author's major source in this section. The Jewish freedom fighters are portrayed as foolish zealots, locked in a bloody internecine conflict when not fighting the Romans. Roman general Titus is portrayed by Dando-Collins as quite reasonable, giving the Jews holding out in Jerusalem plenty of opportunities to surrender with reasonable terms. Unfortunately, the revolt in Judea led to the destruction of the Temple, a tragedy still mourned by Jews today. Many of the survivors were sold into slavery, and Dando-Collins does not mention the thousands of Jewish prisoners that were exposed to wild beasts for the entertainment of the Roman masses (Laurence, P. 135). The destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem may have been a disaster for Titus as well and not just the Jews. Roman historian Suetonius quotes a feverish Titus as confessing that he was punished with death for committing only one sin. Perhaps his disregard of Roman law, entering the Temple and Holy of Holies, and destroying the edifice was that one sin.<br />
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Dando-Collins has written other books of Roman and most recently, Hawaiian history, but Caesar's Legion is a good place to start for those unacquainted with the author and wanting to explore what life was like as a Roman soldier.<br />
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<u>Bibliography</u><br />
Laurence, Ray. <i>Roman Passions; A History of Pleasure in Imperial Rome</i>. Continuum UK, London, 2009.<br />
Suetonious. The Twelve Caesars. Tr. Robert Graves, Penguin Books, Middlesex, England, 1975.<br />
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Teaching High Schoolhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02612557178384909988noreply@blogger.com0