Blogger Buzz: Updates and Bug Fixes for May 9th

Blogger Buzz: Updates and Bug Fixes for May 9th

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60

Support Social and Emotional Development - Through Play!




In our fast-paced society, playtime can seem like a thing of the past – even a waste of time. Days are often hectic, and it's all too easy to push back children's requests for to play with them until "later." But, especially for parents with preschool-aged children, time spent playing with them can be one of the best investments made in their educational future.

Increasingly, a child's social and emotional development is being recognized as not only an indicator of school readiness, but as an actual predictor of school success down the road. According to the National Center for Children in Poverty (NCCP), "Across a range of studies, the emotional, social, and behavioral competence of young children…predict their academic performance in first grade, over and above their cognitive skills and family backgrounds"

One of the easiest ways parents can help their children develop socially and emotionally is by the simple act of playing with them. "When parents take the time and make the effort to play games with their children, this gives the children a sense that they are important in their parents' lives and that the parents really care about them,” says David Elkind, author of The Power of Play. “This is the basis of solid self esteem."

According to Elkind, time spent playing is directly related to school success. "All of this game playing and social learning makes it easier for children to learn in a school setting where they are interacting with adults and have the basic social skills that are the basis for formal learning,” he says. “These are the ability to listen to an adult and to follow instructions, to start a task and bring it to completion on their own, and to work cooperatively with other children."

As Elkind also points out, children learn a tremendous amount as they play: not only does parent-child playtime strengthen familial bonds, it also gives children a chance to learn about more subtle social nuances, like body language and vocal intonations.

Megan Newcomb, an Early Childhood and Family Education (ECFE) teacher who has taught preschool for 10 years, agrees. "When children have plenty of interaction with adults and other kids, there's no anxiety there; it's really a preparation for school. I can really see a difference in terms of confidence and self-esteem when they get to kindergarten."

Are you stuck for some fun, interactive games to play with your kids? Here are a few tested and kid-approved ideas:

Sing and dance. Turn on some upbeat music and dance together, sing together and play musical games like "ring around the rosy." Besides being great exercise, this develops musical rhythm, coordination and motor skills.
Put on a puppet show: Puppets are easily made by decorating socks or paper bags. Let kids make their own puppets and watch the story line evolve. This is a fun activity that develops creativity and imagination as children make up stories and put on their first performances.
Make 'shape' pictures: Cut some paper into basic shapes of various sizes – circles, squares, rectangles, triangles and ovals – and then make pictures using the shapes. For example, a rabbit can be made by gluing small 'ear,' 'leg', and 'tail' circles onto an oval 'body'. Talk about the characteristics of the shapes – "the square has four sides" - and see if your child can identify them. This is a fun and effective way to work on basic geometry skills.
'Safe Base' Tag: One person is "it" and tries to tag the others, with a designated 'base' (like the fireplace hearth) being the only refuge. Indoors or outdoors, preschoolers love this game with its simple rules and the chance to burn plenty of energy. And in the process they learn about turn-taking and following rules.
While playing, parents also have the chance to observe any trouble spots in their child's development or behavior that may need extra help or guidance - like bossiness or a reluctance to clean up – and to model positive behaviors, like how to respond appropriately to 'winning' or 'losing.'

So don't feel guilty about setting aside time to really play with the kids – it's one of the best – and most enjoyable – ways to help them grow!

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59

Can Music Help Your Child Learn?



Can popping a classical music CD into the player after nap time help Johnnie breeze through his homework? Will Lizzie's piano lessons help her get an A in math?

Research on the effects of music on learning has been in progress for decades. When research on the Mozart Effect - the theory that listening to Mozart's music can temporarily improve performance, and perhaps even IQ - became popularized in the late 1950s, parents everywhere began to try and expose their children to more classical music. The theory became so popular that Georgia's governor even proposed a budget allowing for every baby born in Georgia to receive a classical music CD. Do Georgia's children now have IQs that surpass the national average? Can Mozart really make our children smarter?

As with most theories, critics' verdicts on the Mozart Effect have been controversial. But what is not generally controversial though, and is supported by a strong body of evidence, is the fact that ongoing music education does help children across a wide range of criteria - including overall academic performance. A Canadian research group from McMaster University compared two groups of six children between the ages of 4 and 6; one group took Suzuki music lessons and the other had no musical instruction. The results, which were published in the online journal Brain on September 20, 2006, showed that the children who received musical instruction excelled above their peers in memory skills as well as 'non-musical' abilities such as literacy, mathematics and even IQ.

Brigid Finucane, an Early Childhood Music Instructor at the Merit School of Music in Chicago, has witnessed the positive effects of music instruction first-hand. "Formal music instruction requires focus, discipline and determination – excellent qualities which are often transferred into other areas of the student's life,” she says. “Beat and rhythms are key components in music. Children who can maintain a steady beat have a greater fluency in their reading. The music we sing provides vocabulary enrichment, teaches tenses and plurals, uses poetic language, allows visualization, and encourages good pronunciation. Through music we learn about ourselves, our culture and that of others, science and math, creativity, jobs, the environment, celebration and emotions."

Scott Cross, the Educator Development Manager for Kindermusik International, also believes that the non-musical benefits of music classes spill over into academic achievement. "Kindermusik [classes help] toddlers as music is used to help them understand concepts like high and low, fast and slow, and start and stop. Reading music notes from left to right reinforces their learning of reading words from left to right in a book. Counting out music (1, 2, 3, 4) and keeping a steady beat reinforces the role of numbers and helps a child better understand their first math concepts."

The benefits of music instruction are not limited to the early years. According to the National Association for Music Education, SAT takers with a background involving musical instruction score significantly higher than their non-musically trained counterparts – a surprising 56 points higher on the verbal portion and 39 points higher on the math portion of the test. Other advocates of music instruction also cite numerous non-musical benefits including the building of greater self-esteem, concentration and coordination. And the longer music instruction lasts, the greater the benefits.

As Finucane puts it, "Teachers at the sites I work at related many stories to me about how the children have progressed more deeply because of having music in the curriculum. Besides all the academic benefits, singing, dancing and moving together can bring great joy."

Make room, math and science - perhaps it's time music finds its place as part of the core curriculum!

Want more information about children's music programs? Check out:

www.Kindermusik.com

The National Association for Music Education

www.childrensmusicworkshop.com

The Children's Music Network

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58

Beyond Books: Getting the Most Out of Your Local Library


As a child, it was both exciting and empowering to have your very own library card. All those books at your disposal and you could check out as many at a time as you wanted! According to several surveys analyzed by the American Library Association(ALA), there are an estimated 117,378 libraries of all kinds in the United States today, and 16,549 of them are public libraries. That’s a lot of books.

As adults, we now understand that a library card is more than a plastic pass to unlimited reading. Libraries offer so much more than tomes on shelves. And just how much more is pleasantly surprising. While it varies from library to library, most public libraries in the country offer an array of materials and programs for all ages. Some offer adult poetry and book clubs, author events, guest speakers, literacy programs for adults, children and parenting workshops, as well as traditional story times. For example, in addition to typical library program offerings, Peter White Library in Marquette, MI, offers a passport application service, a genealogy and local history resource for Michigan, and a helpful Ask-a-Librarian direct email to field questions.

Although you may have easy access to on-line information, don’t hesitate to contact your librarian with questions. Librarians are more than just masters of the Dewey Decimal System. Most librarians have a four-year undergraduate degree and a masters in Library Science, or Information Science, as it is now more commonly called. Librarians often bring database or cross-technology backgrounds into their multi-disciplinary work. Public librarians have an interest in just about everything because they must be able to tap into topics that vary across the board, for all kinds of people. “Never knowing what the next question might cover keeps us excited as we work to connect people with information, materials, programs and resources throughout the community and the world,” says Bobbi Weesen-Baer, Children’s Librarian at Mountain View Public Library in Mountain View, CA.

The Mountain View Public Library hosts workshops and summer reading programs which feature storytelling, music, magicians and wild animals. They offer Montessori-based twos, threes and fours programs, and family story-times in English, Spanish and Mandarin. They are a resource for teachers and schools, providing information on literacy and child development. You can do research using online databases and reserve titles from home to save time. Not all libraries can afford to offer such in-depth service, but Weesen-Baer encourages people to “go in and get to know your library staff, find out what your library has to offer.” She adds, “In these mobile times, public libraries are a good starting place for getting to know a new community or for making friends. If you are a student or parent, adding a librarian as a resource strengthens your education team. Call or stop by, bring us your questions and suggestions. We’re here to help.”

Take a trip to your library. Discover what programs your library offers. You’re likely to find that your local librarian is more than happy to help you. A library is one of the few free resources in today’s pay-as-you-go world. Their mantra is to serve the unserved and underserved -- and that means they’ll meet you wherever you are on your quest for knowledge.

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57

Join the World's Biggest Reading Party!



Serena Williams did it. So did football superstar Tiki Barber and Oscar winners Gwyneth Paltrow and Morgan Freeman. Since the National Education Association (NEA) launched Read Across America in 1997, some pretty famous people have cracked open a book for a cause: the world’s biggest reading party. On March 3rd, your kids can join them!

Learning to read is a rite of passage for kids. But it’s a challenge for almost 40% of them, according to the NEA. That’s why they decided to use Dr. Seuss’s birthday as an excuse to give books a little sizzle. Across the nation, more than 45 million people are expected to take part in the celebration. The mission: make reading fun. Really fun.

Teachers, principals, parents, and librarians are doing some crazy things to get kids excited about reading—from eating fried worms, to parachuting out of airplanes to congratulate a group of kids who completed a reading challenge. They’ve kissed yaks, canonballed into gigantic vats of green jello, and velcroed themselves to gym walls. Seattle’s Pike Place fishmongers painted their daily catch red, blue, and yellow after the Seuss classic One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish. 106 meteorologists traded in their weather hats for “reading hats”.

Why all the fuss? Well for one, kids who read for fun, do better in school and better on standardized tests, according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress, also known as the nation’s report card. Reading often and early to young children also affects their ability to count and write their names. But more than that, reading is just plain magic. “When children open the pages of a good book, reading can ignite their imaginations,” says NEA President Reg Weaver.

With so many entertainment choices at their fingertips, kids don’t always think to crack open a book. The point of Read Across America, is to urge them to consider it. “Although children have many distractions like TV, video games and high-tech gadgets, nothing rivals the power of reading the written word,” says Weaver. “The challenge is cutting through the competitive clutter to get children energized about reading.”

On March 3rd, there will be teachers cooking up plates of green eggs and ham, principals duct-taped to a wall, traveling Cat-a-Vans zooming across the country on a 1,200 mile, 18-city tour, books in hand. (12,000 of them!) There will be “Read Across Spring Training”, designed to bring books to ballparks, with Major League baseball stars hosting read-ins for local kids—from Baltimore’s Orioles to LA’s Dodgers.

So get thee to a library! And figure out your own way to make reading come alive. Not just on March 3rd, but every day.

Click here to jump to our "Learning to Read" area:
www.education.com/reference/learningread/

Or find great books for every grade level, by jumping from the homepage, to our cheat sheets for each grade: www.education.com

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56

Beyond AYP: Evaluating Your Child's School



When you imagine the ideal classroom, you probably see sun streams through large windows, lighting up the kids sitting at tables, busy illustrating story books that they created. The classroom hums, and a teacher moves from one raised hand to the next. But though you know the class you want for your child, quality is subjective, even in an era of school accountability.

"No Child Left Behind doesn’t evaluate the quality of schools,” argues William Mathis, Superintendent of the Rutland Northeast Supervisory Union in Brandon, VT, instead, “it evaluates the socio-economic status of schools.” Mathis and others in the field of education say that Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), the No Child Left Behind marker of a school’s success based on student test scores, isn’t a mark of school quality. “Tests are an easy way to evaluate anything,” says Teri Battaglieri, Director of the Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice, in East Lansing, MI, “but there are a lot of problems with high-stakes testing.” Some of those problems include the fact that test scores are absolute, they don’t measure growth, and there are a lot of outside factors that affect test scores. High test achievement doesn’t always indicate quality, says Barbara Radner, executive director for the Center for Urban Education at DePaul University, “because there is such a correlation between income level and achievement.”

Even if No Child Left Behind doesn’t provide all the answers, however, it does provide a place to start, as you decide where your child should be when the first bell rings.

Get the Data

Learn the basics about your child’s school at the National Center for Education Statistics with the school search tool for basic demographics or the Public School Search feature that includes student-to-teacher ratios and enrollment by grade, gender, and race.

School Data Direct from the U.S. Department of Education searches school testing data and compares individual schools with district and state test averages. Or, use our School Finder to search schools for Adequate Yearly Progress, teacher credentials, and school ratings on everything from curriculum and facilities to accommodation of special needs and gifted students.

These sites will give you an overview of the hard data. They won’t answer questions about whether or not the school fits your child. For those answers, it’s time for a school visit.

The School Visit

The Office. Your first impression of a school should be one of orderliness and organization. Ask for information about school policy and procedures.
School Environment. “A more stable school environment is better for kids,” says Battaglieri, “if teachers are transferring regularly, there’s a problem.” However, if there’s a new principal, some turnover might be a good thing, says Radner, if they’re shaking things up.
The Classroom. Classrooms should be welcoming and organized, with student work, not prefab posters, on display. When it comes to class size, there’s no magic number, but smaller is better.
Student Assessment. Tests shouldn’t be the only way that the teachers measure student success, look for student portfolios and teacher evaluations as well. If a school’s test scores are high, delve deeper. What is that school doing to keep the scores high?
Extracurriculars. “A focus on the arts is very good in terms of reading comprehension,” says Battaglieri. Make sure that they offer lots of extracurricular classes that fit your child’s interests.
Individual Instruction. Information about programs for kids with special needs, or who are gifted, will give you an idea of how well the school meets individual student needs.
Teacher Quality.“The classroom teacher is the absolute determinant of what happens for your kids in a year,” says Radner. How does the school handle professional development for teachers? And are any of their teachers National Board Certified? If they do have certified teachers, says Radner, “it shows that the school is attracting and keeping good teachers.”
Regardless of test scores and board certification, the number one way to determine whether a school will work for your child is how you feel when you visit. Think back to when you were a student: would you want to go to school here?

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