- As of 2013 more than 50% of US students are eligible for a free or subsidized school lunch. As this number continues to climb, the challenge of teaching low-income children can no longer be considered a side issue in American education. Helping poor kids succeed is now, by definition, the central mission of American public schools. Achievement gaps between poor and non-poor kids have remained the same by some measures and increased by others in spite of the fact that closing the gaps has been a government priority for decades. If you work with kids who are growing up in poverty or other adverse circumstances, you know that they can be difficult for teachers and other professionals to reach, hard to motivate, hard to calm down, hard to connect with. This book revisits the research that Paul wrote about in How Children Succeed. It extends his reporting to new discoveries, new models, and new approaches to interventions with children, both inside and outside the classroom.
- Social-science literature is rife with examples of small, high-quality programs that seem to become much less effective when they expand and replicate. Therefore, the aim here is to examine interventions not as model programs to be replicated but as expressions of certain underlying ideas and strategies. The second challenge is to find strategies to address the problems of disadvantaged children. Here we consider the developmental journey of children, and particularly children growing up in circumstances of adversity, as a continuum — a single unbroken story from birth through the end of high school.
- “America’s public schools are being hijacked and destroyed by greed, fraud, and lies.” James Meredith – 1st black students at the University of Mississippi 10/1/1961. This quote sums up the purpose of this book. The authors limited themselves to only 50 and hope that readers will send in some more that do not appear herein. Myths are beliefs in things that may or may not be true. They fill in the void left by ignorance. The focus here is on myths that are untrue and that are having unhappy consequences. Hoaxes are different in that the person pushing them knows them to be dubious or untrue, but also knows that they will greatly benefit the pusher. Liars are different in that they don’t even believe what they are saying. Once again the lies are promoted for someone’s self-interest. The overridding myth is that America’s public schools have failed. The authors do an excellent job showing that this is not the case.
- The focus here are the international tests where the US usually ends up in the middle of the pack. This is where we have been since the first efforts at country sorting where made in the 1960’s so it’s not like we have gone downhill. If you sort out the poor kids our scores are at the top with countries like Finland where poverty is 5%. The fact that the tests are in different languages and use the metric system makes them less valid. Never the less, reformers have used these scores to promote unproven reforms.
- The same test scores are used to show that private schools are better than public schools, but once you take socioeconomic the status of the students into consideration, public schools do better. Private school students are wealthier and whiter. Teachers have more autonomy, better resources, and few students with disabilities and English language learners. They also have less violence and discipline problems as they can control who they accept and who they get rid of. While charter schools are actually public schools, they share many of the same qualities as operators can game the system to control their population. While comparing publics to charters is difficult, the evidence we do have indicates that publics do better. The big reason in my mind is that when compared to public school teachers, charter school teachers are less experienced, less likely to be certified, less well paid, and have higher turnover rates.
- Creativity isn’t a science or a formula. It is one of those things you can’t just buy and use. Developing creativity in yourself is a lifespan job. You need to take frequent small steps to surpass your average results. It takes much patience to overcome obstacles, such as lack of time or strength, someone’s critique, or your own doubts in an. You must realize that creativity is something you are born with, and if you do not use it, you may lose a part of yourself. Fostering creativity, however, in someone else is even more difficult. Thus, if you are an educator or a parent and want your students to use their imagination to provide outstanding solutions, you can’t just assign them a task and expect creativity to flourish. Imagine that creativity is under a heap of gravel and to get it out pulling isn’t enough. Piece by piece you need to uncover it and bring to surface.
- Outside the box thinking and imagination without borders are two essential constituents of creativity. I noticed that usually adults try to place children into a certain framework of standard behavior and rules. Of course, it’s a normal phenomenon since society trys to prevent chaos and self-destructive acts resulting from extraordinary behavior and thinking. However, making an obedient citizen of a child can stifle creativity and the desire to produce something unique.
- When I hear about “suppressed creativity”, I recollect one example of a family I knew once. The mother had an unaccomplished ambition of becoming a singer. She projected this dream on her daughter who didn’t like being in the spotlight at all. She escaped from her family and their cage of restrictions via her creative drawings. Fortunately, the girl had enough willpower to stand her ground and resign from a signing career. Yet not every person endowed with unique creative mindset can resist their family and school that just do not see it in you. That’s why fostering creativity is so important for every person, teacher, and parent.
- For those who are teachers:
Use music or ambient sound in the background to help students concentrate and improve performance.
Engage students in brainstorming ideas, which will help them use different approaches to find solutions.
Separate providing students with new information from creative tasks. Do not mingle both educational processes so as to avoid misunderstanding and confusion.
Motivate your students with counterfactual tasks that will allow them to view a problem from multiple perspectives and think outside the box. - For those who are parents:
Provide space and resources to encourage creative expression.
Don’t evaluate your children’s creative ideas, point out mistakes, or underline fails.
Give your kid more freedom to research something new. Let your child try some extraordinary hobbies or even those activities you consider useless.
Allow your kid to disagree but ask to explain why.
Don’t reward your child for expressing his creativity. Your kid should strive doing that for free. - For those who want to be more creative:
Don’t critique yourself every time you make something new. Just keep on doing that and enjoy this amazing process of discovering your new potential.
Protect this creative kid in you to stay passionate and interested in your own thinking process.
Be patient. It can be easier to tolerate someone’s mistakes than your own.
Be brave and curious about yet unexplored areas of your imagination.
Go for a long walk to relax and unleash your mind.
Let yourself be messy at least once in a while. It will help you to relax, forget about your surroundings and your duties. - Tips may not be enough. You may need some extra tools to express and encourage yourself to develop something worthy. Here are five of the best tools that can wake up a creative kid in everyone.
- BrainPlots
It’s not necessarily to have a group of 6 people to brainstorm new ideas. With the help of Brain Plots you’ll be able to find some unexpected solutions as you work and study. When you tab your ideas in this app, you get suggestions which you can either decline or accept. Then you’ll get a full picture in the form of a TED presentation. - Glogster
This interactive service allows you to work with images, videos, graphics, audio and text in one place. It helps you create a multimedia poster using many creative skills along with critical thinking. Also, this platform develops creative hunger to see the final result of your work. Glogster is a good educational app to complete assignments and projects in a new way. - Studentshare
This service has the largest database (1 000 000+) of essay and research papers uploaded by real students who received at least an A- grade. Using StudentShare you’ll be able to find an effective formula for how to write your next essay with inspiration and no procrastination of your deadline. Plus, you can figure out what resources and references are the most appropriate for your writing task. - Storybird
It is a creative room where writers and readers gather to share their ideas and attitudes on a new story, poetry etc. This educational app certainly promotes thoughtful writing and critical analysis. - Mindtools
This service is targeted at boosting your creativity via special understanding, brainstorming and idea-generating tools. Once you choose the Toolkit category, you’ll see even more features such as Decision Making, Leaderships Skills, Problem Solving etc. Thus, you’ll be able to master the 28 skills and discover new opportunities for your creative world. The main goal of this service is to provide assistance in all stages of the creative process. - If you are seeking a formula to make your creative ability progress, start by planning and outlining what exactly you expect from a certain process. Write down one reason you need to continue creating something after a break even if it’s only to get rid of boredom. Do not restrict yourself with a fixed timeframe since it can make you feel suffocated with a forced creativity. Creative ideas usually come while you process ideas, so what you need is to start creating something that brings you joy and pleasure. Your progress will turn long-term when finished works incite you to the next creative project.
- Veronica is a true edtech expert and a professional blogger with five years work experience. She tries to provide students with up-to-date info on how to improve their study habits. Veronica lives in Delaware, USA..
- This is a very well researched a cited scholarly book. Amy looks at how sexting is commonly viewed as child porn and a factor in cyberbullying rather than a normal part of sexual foreplay. She believes that teaching abstinence when it comes to physical sex is as ineffective as teaching abstinence when it comes to sexting. Rather than acknowledge girls’ sexual agency, many see them as weak minded youth who are suffering from raging hormones and blindly following social trends. In fact, sexing is a modern form of foreplay and only becomes problematic when the receiver violates the sender’s privacy. Not only does the media often blame the victim, so do the courts and society at large. It’s about time somebody started this conversation. As you read this book prepare to change your thinking on the subject.
- The main argument here is that granting young people the right to consensually see, create, and distribute sexual media may be the most effective way to protect them from harm. It is currently criminal with variations in all states. Here Amy discusses a number of specific cases and how laws are designed to punish the person sending sexts. The question arrises as to whether sexting is free speech or not. Also, is it an expression of normal adolescent sexual expression? In some states, sexting has been reduced from felony status to that of a misdemeanor. This makes no sense as depending on your state or country, a variety of consensual sexual behaviors are legal for minors depending on their respective ages. Ironically, it is generally illegal for minors to view many sex acts that they can legally engage in such as Internet porn. Amy also believes that criminalization of sexting will have a disproportionate impact on gays, minorities, poor kids, and girls.
- Is there anything more interesting than turning your entire house into a smart home. Yes, this is possible and is happening using one of the newest technologies called IOT (internet of things). Technology is giving us the immense luxury and comfort we couldn’t find anywhere. Don’t risk missing out on such comfort. Make your life more interesting by staying tuned for IT updates every day. In this continuously changing era of technology, keeping you up to date is challenging and at the same time very important too. In this article, I write about tips you should follow to stay relevant to IT and some of the out of the ordinary IT news of this current year.
- Always try to take as much information as you can from the internet. The internet is a huge nest of information and you can find any category of information through it. Learn good searching tactics to get into the legitimate websites and get to know about the changes and developments not only in IT, but in various other industries too.
- Stay connected to job portals, online video classes on technology, meetings, chats, comments, and group discussions on the discussion forums. There is hardly any problem whose solution can’t be found on the internet. Bring into play the internet tools and stay relevant to the budding trends in the IT world.
- Blogs are the way creative people tell you about any news. A lot of people are interested in sharing their knowledge about any topic on the internet. Like any other blogs, there are a lot of websites that publish technology blogs such as upsidedown.com, and others. Read the technology blogs and stay alert to IT in a creative way.
- Along with the news, the most important thing to stay updated in IT is to keep your skills updated. If you work in IT, and you don’t keep your skills updated then your career will never grow. So try to keep in touch with the new technologies and the newer improvements in the technology you are specialized in. Stumble on new technologies on demand such as Big Data Hadoop, and others,. and get well qualified for them. Once you are trained, clear exams and get certifications from renowned companies, try clearing the exams with great scores, because, if you get good grades in your certifications, it will make a huge difference in your resume fulfilling high demands in the market. If you always brush up your skills and stay polished and no one can stop you from shining in the IT world.
- Instead of finding new IT updates on the websites, put an email alert to those websites, so that you get notifications on your email id whenever a new topic or a new content on technology pops up. Sign up for google alert and activate the alerts mainly for news instead of the blogs. Because there will be a lot of blogs and to get notifications for each and every blog now and then will be somewhat irritating. Instead of signing up with your mobile number in the alerts, better sign up with your email id. With this, you will be able to read the news only when you want to read them. Keeping yourself alert with the various technological changes in the industry helps you stand out in the crowd in this challenging competition. Also be sure to unsubscribe from blogs that don’t prove to be helpful.
- Networking gives you notifications and so proper networking allows you to have newer links from IT industries. Get industry insider news and news of upcoming interesting IT projects through online networking. Maintain your updated Linkedin profile always and keep developing connections with the industry folks.
- Start attending IT conferences whenever you are free. Because it is news through which, you will be able to know the whereabouts of the IT industry, the decisions taken by the IT delegates and the stories of those IT employees. By attending conferences, you will be able to meet those IT delegates face to face. It will help you know more about the realities going on in the IT culture. Networking will go to the next level only when you meet up people in real-time.
- Staying notified to IT increases your intelligence on the same. If you go through the notifications of this year’s IT industry, you will be glad to find that technology is evolving and this year has brought various drastic changes in the IT industry. Here are a few of these changes: 1. Virtualization will be added to the software-defined data center used in big enterprises. This virtualization will broadly support the Internet of things, and cloud services. 2. We will have high GB wire speed switches in the market with about thirty-two ports in a one-unit chassis. Along with this, we will be seeing high capacity switches with about five hundred and twelve ports. 3. Colo is a center to allow space for businesses, and the cloud is the technology that connects all the systems with a single network. Many Colo providers have emerged in 2016. 4. In 2016, business intelligence and analytics used in IT will jump to a higher level based on hard facts. The Internet of things has turned to reality in 2016 where every little thing around you will get connected through the Internet. From your cup of coffee to vehicles and buildings, everything will be connected through the internet by embedding electronic devices into them. This allows for efficiency, comfort , and economic benefit.
- Staying updated in your field always provides longevity in your job by upgrading your skills, giving you a better experience. Good luck.
- Vaishnavi loves pursuing excellence through writing and has a passion for technology. She has successfully managed and run personal technology magazines and websites. She currently writes for Intellipaat.com, a global training company that provides e-learning and professional certification training. The courses offered by Intellipaat address the unique needs of working professionals. She is based out of Bangalore, India and has an experience of five years in the field of content writing and blogging. Her work has been published on various sites related to Hadoop, Big Data, Business Intelligence, Cloud Computing, IT, SAP, Project Management and more.
1. Adversity
2. Strategies
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50 Myths & Lies That Threaten America’s Public Schools: The Real Crisis in Education by David C. Berliner, Gene Glass, and Associates
Monday, June 13th, 2016
50 Myths & Lies That Threaten America’s Public Schools: The Real Crisis in Education by David C. Berliner, Gene Glass, and Associates takes on many myths that have support amongst reformers and the media. This is a must read for anyone fighting the madness of our current test-and-punish school reform system. Give a copy to any policy maker you know.
Myths, Hoaxes, and Outright Lies
Myths and Lies About Who’s Best: Charters, Privates, Maybe Finland?
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The Five Best Tools To Wake Up A Creative Kid In You by Veronica Hunt
Saturday, May 28th, 2016The Five Best Tools To Wake Up A Creative Kid In You starts with suggestions for parents and teachers who want to foster creativity in their students, their children, or themselves. It then offers five excellent tools that can support the creative process. Be sure to have five people each check out one tool and report back. Thanks Veronica
Introduction
Stay Passionate About Your Project
Guidelines to Help Foster Creativity in Yourself, Your Students or Children
Raise Your Creativity Kid Via Hot-Shot Tools
Make Your Creativity Progress Long-Term
Veronica Hunt
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Sexting Panic: Rethinking Criminalization, Privacy, and Consent by Amy Adele Hasinoff
Wednesday, May 18th, 2016Sexting Panic: Rethinking Criminalization, Privacy, and Consent by Amy Adele Hasinoff takes on common wisdom and shows how it is harmful to many girls as is lets privacy violators off the hook. It sees sexing as a natural part of the process of developing a normal and healthy sex life and promotes the idea of explicit consent when if comes to distributing private media images. This book belongs in every school and in the hands of every teen parent and policy maker.
Introduction
1. The Criminalization Consensus and the Right to Sext
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Staying relevant to the emerging trends of Information Technology: Is this the year to see drastic changes in IT Service Industry? by Vaishnavi Agrawal
Saturday, April 30th, 2016Staying relevant to the emerging trends of Information Technology: Is this the year to see drastic changes in IT Service Industry? by Vaishnavi Agrawal offers sound advice about how to stay up to date with information technology and offers a view regarding the changes coming this year. Vaishnavi sends this post from her home in Bangalore, India. Thanks for helping Dr.Doug go global.
Introduction
Stay Online and Make it Worthwhile
Brush up Your Skills
Because Daily News Makes Sense
Socialize more
Attend Conferences
Vaishnavi Agrawal
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