Science? What is that?

Since 2004, No Child Left Behind has driven both instruction and assessment across the country. Unfortunately it has also minimalized the instruction time spent on both Science and SS in elementary school because these scores did not affect your NCLB standing. As long as an elementary school was worrying about reading and math it could let Science and SS go and let the middle and high schools worry about it.

All that changed in 2007-2008. It marked the first school year that the federal No Child Left Behind law required school districts to test students in science. And while the scores must be released, there aren't any punishments built into the law like for failures in math and reading. If there were, Metro Nashville's nine years of earning a districtwide D in the subject would be drawing attention. More than 65 percent of individual Metro schools earned a D or F based on spring testing.

This is nothing new, for years teachers have talked about how little attention Science and SS got in the elementary grades and how ill-prepared they were for more difficult subjects in middle and high school. The reasons for this are fairly simple; in our district Science and SS standardized tests scores aren't reported and teachers aren't required to give the Science and SS standardized tests. No requirement= almost no teaching of the subject.

To change this science and SS will have to be a priority in elementary but don't hold your breath.

Webicide or Suicide online, very sad

A 19 year old Florida teen live-streamed his own suicide and according to reports was egged on by others on the site. The picture showed the comments of others on Justin.tv an open network of thousands of live streaming channels.

From ABC News;

"People were egging him on and saying things like 'go ahead and do it, faggot,' said Wendy Crane, an investigator at the Broward County Medical Examiner's office.
Abraham Biggs, 19, of Pembroke Pines, Fla., had been blogging on an online body-building message board and had linked to his page on Justin.tv, a live video streaming Web site, where the camera rolled as he overdosed on prescription pills, according to Crane. Biggs, who had reportedly been discussing his suicide on the forums, also posted a suicide note. "

The bloggers said that Biggs had threatened to kill himself before and had faked it, so at first they didn't believe him," said Crane. "Gradually, as you read the blog further into the day the bloggers start commenting on how Biggs isn't moving."
Crane said comments on the thread included an exchange about whether the image of Biggs' motionless body was a still photograph or a video, and eventually resulted in one of the site's visitors calling the police, who tracked down the teen through his computer IP address.

In the Web stream, Crane said viewers saw a piece of a door frame -- which had splintered from the police kicking in the teen's bedroom door -- hit Biggs, who is curled up on his bed and facing away from the camera.
"Then you see a police officer go in and check on him, and then the EMS pronounced him dead," said Crane.
Biggs was pronounced dead at 3:30 p.m. Nov. 19 -- about 12 hours after he had begun blogging about his suicide.
The official cause of death was suicide combined with drug toxicity. Crane said that benzodiazepines and opiates were found near the body, but a blood toxicology to quantify just how much Biggs consumed is still under way.
Crane said that at least one of the prescription drugs was in Biggs' name."

Kindergarteners talk turkey

Every year one of our kindergarten teachers asks her children how to cook a turkey and writes down their answers for the rest of the staff to read. Here are some of this year's recipes.

Get a 10 pound turkey. Cut the turkey in half and put 5 salts inside. Put 4 regular chickens in the pot. Pour a little bit of soda juice on the chicken. Stir up the chicken. Cut the turkey up and put it with the chicken to cook. Eat the turkey with rice and macaroni&cheese.

Get a 5-ounce turkey. Use water to wash the the crusty stuff off from the zoo. Put number one sauce on it to make it sweet. Cook the turkey for 6 minutes in the oven on 7%. Eat the turkey with corn, beans and a little bit of pork chop and some potatoes.

Get a turkey as big as an egg. Put 7 salts on it. Put it in the oven for 8 minutes on 6 degrees. Wash it with a sponge. Eat the turkey with chicken.

Get a turkey as big as a brick. Put 1 ounces of salt and pepper on it. Put it in the oven for 10 minutes on 7 degrees. Put a tablecloth on the table. Put the plates and cups out. Put chairs at the table. Buy a Hannah Montana cake and some cookies. Eat the dessert with the turkey.

Buy a one gobble turkey. Kill the head. Put 5 chickens on it. Put another turkey with it. Pour 2 brown sauces on it. Put a Ninja Turtle on it. Put it on a plate. Cook the turkey in the oven for 5 minutes on "too hot". Eat the turkey with chicken and different colors of lollipops. Also eat a Mickey Mouse lollipop.

Buy a giant turkey. Crack 4 eggs and put them in the turkey nest to save them. Put the turkey in the fridge for 6 minutes. Take it out and cook it on the stove for one minute on hot. Take it out and eat the turkey with chicken, broccoli with noodles and drink a tea.

Get a number 5 turkey. Put one red sauce on it. Cook the turkey in the oven on 3 degrees for 5 times. Put 1 catsup on it. Wait for it to get done& then put a little bit of mustard on it. Eat the turkey with green beans, peas and corn.

Get a turkey with a tail and a head. Put a beak on it. Put eyes on it. Put some purple sprinkles on it. Put 3 strawberries on it. Drop 4 oranges on the turkey. Cook the turkey in the oven for 2 minutes on a little bit hot. Take the turkey out & eat it with grapes.

You can't read TTYL in Round Rock, TX.

Round Rock, TX is a lovely town just north of Austin and home of Dell. Unfortunately, they too are under the watch of parents who are scared of what their children will or might read but will allow them to watch anything on TV, DVD or play any video game. Thank goodness one parent complaint can determine what other children read.
From the Austin American Statesman:

" A teen novel that stirred controversy when the parent of a Round Rock student complained that it is obscene was removed from the district’s middle school libraries today.
The novel entitled “TTYL” by Lauren Myracle is a narrative in the format of instant messages exchanged among a group of teenage girls.

Round Rock Superintendent Jesus Chavez sent a letter to Wes and Sherry Jennings on Tuesday saying he had determined that “while the book may be appropriate for some students, it is not appropriate for all of our students in the middle school and should not be made generally available in a middle school library open to all middle school students.”
“If parents wish their individual students to have access to the book, there are ample alternatives for the book to be made available to students at parent discretion,” the superintendent said in his letter.
Sherry Jennings, mother of a Ridgeview Middle School student, filed a complaint at the beginning of this school year after her daughter checked the novel out of the Ridgeview library.
Jennings said Tuesday, “We are extremely pleased that the superintendent is interested in quality education for our children and that he realizes that maturity-wise they are not ready for these types of books.”
Jennings said she objected not only to vulgar language in the book “but also to the sexual content of the entire book.”
Jennings said she and her husband are satisfied with Chavez’s response and plan no further action. She added that she appreciated the help of parents and others who supported her complaint about TTYL.
“We had 1,600 people sign a petition backing us, and about 10 people were very helpful in supporting us through this situation,” Jennings said."

Reviews of the book from Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/ttyl-Talk-You-Later-Internet-Girls/dp/0810987880/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1227111086&sr=1-1

Pre-K in Tennessee may get cut

Tennessee is facing a budget shortfall of over 780 million dollars and Governor Phil Bredesen has told all state agencies to expect at least a 10% budget cut. One of the programs that will probably be cut will be Tennessee's well-regarded Pre-K program. Tennessee is one of a handful of states that require all Pre-K teachers hold a bachelor's degree in early childhood education, the state has standards for Pre-K and that class sizes be limited to 20 students for each teacher and assisstant.
The demand for pre-K statewide has been growing year over year. This spring alone, school districts across the state requested more than 300 additional classrooms for the 2008-09 school year.
Bredesen's plan to funnel $25 million to create 250 new classrooms was put on hold months ago. Scores of disappointed parents, who were initially told that their kids had gotten into the program, were turned away. Sharika Watson, whose son goes to state-funded pre-K Ross Elementary, was among the lucky ones.
"It helps him get the school experience started at an early age," she said. "He comes home, he remembers the colors and everything else verbatim. He's just excited. I'd recommend it to anyone."
The research on the effectiveness of Pre-K education is mixed, some claim little or no gain is made for students who attend Pre-K classes while others view the experience of Pre-K as beneficial as students enter elementary school. Studies have shown that two groups that benefit greatly from Pre-K are ESL students and free and reduced lunch students. Studies have shown these students make considerable gains in language and cognitive ability.

Obama checking private schools in DC

President-elect and his wife are doing what all good politicians and their families do, send their children to private school. Race and party affiliation are irrelevant, all that matters is their children do not attend the same kind of school as the majority of people who voted for them. They can use any excuse they want but the bottom line is the same, the schools that we work in and send our children to are not good enough for their children to attend. They want to fix the schools but what do they know about them except what they hear from others, there is no way to know what is going on in public schools unless you are involved in them.

From the AP:
"Michelle Obama visited at least two well-known private schools in Washington on Monday as she and President-elect Obama prepare to move their two young daughters to the White House in January.
The soon-to-be first lady toured Georgetown Day School in the morning and Sidwell Friends School, which Chelsea Clinton attended, in the afternoon. In between, she spent about two hours visiting the residential portion of the White House with first lady Laura Bush. Their husbands met privately in the Oval Office.
Michelle Obama flew from Chicago to Washington and back separately from her husband, who did not visit the schools. It was not clear whether the Obamas will look at other schools, and their staff provided no details.
The Obamas' children, 10-year-old Malia and 7-year-old Sasha, now attend a private school in Chicago. There are some public schools in the District of Columbia that the Obamas could consider, including a few in affluent northwest Washington that have been recognized nationally as Blue Ribbon Schools. "

Change indeed...

A true athlete and scholar

Florida State's Myron Rolle may have to miss FSU November 22nd game with Maryland; for an interview. No not an interview at the Tallahassee police department like so many Seminoles before him but rather an interview for one of 32 spots as a Rhodes Scholar.

Rolle, a 3.75 pre-med student who finished his undergrad degree in two-and-a-half years, received an e-mail notifying him that he'd been named a Rhodes finalist. Finishing pre-med in 2 and half years is impressive enough but the fact that he is also one of FSU's best players is incredible.

Quotes from SI.com:
"I was disappointed about losing the [Georgia Tech] game," said Rolle, "but the news about the Rhodes Scholarship lifted my spirits."

Rolle, who had not yet been made aware of the conflict, said at the time: "I definitely couldn't miss that game. I wouldn't do that to my teammates."
"I'm definitely going to Birmingham.
"The more I do mock interviews here at school and think about what I want to say [to the committee], I have grown to really want to be a Rhodes Scholar," said Rolle. "If it takes missing a game, that's what it takes."

Rolle, the youngest of five brothers from Galloway, N.J., and the son of two academic-minded Bahamian immigrants, has had his sights set on a career in medicine since middle school.
Were he fortunate enough to attend Oxford, his goal is to "study medical anthropology with some of the greatest minds in the world." The knowledge he'd gain from that field, which examines the social and cultural aspects of medicine, would go a long way toward his ultimate goal of building clinics in the Bahamas and around the world.
Again, this is a football player we're talking about.
"I always talked about being a Rhodes Scholar, but it was just so distant at the time. I didn't think of the magnitude of the award," said Rolle. "Now that it's possibly three weeks away, it has hit me."

Will the NCAA promote this student as much as they can? No, fans aren't real interested in stories about athletes who achieve something with their opportunity at a free education. If he has been arrested it would been on ESPN as soon as it was confiremed but this, not a word.

Reading, Writing and Curious George

I have taught either 3rd or 4th grade ESL or ELL for the past several years and every year we have gotten a new way to teach reading. Wait, it's not a brand new way every year, but it's a revision of the way we did it the year before. I have tried to implement the new method every year, some years I don't try very hard but I always end up back where I started, using real literature instead of textbooks or leveled readers or whatever else they have for us.

Why?

It's certainly not easier than using the reading textbook, I don't have the lessons laid out and I don't have worksheets to evaluate what they know and don't know. Not every child can effectively read the story so we spend time reading and rereading the book to practice vocabulary. Despite the trouble and the extra time needed to prepare lessons reading real literature is the best way to teach to children to read and more importantly to help them to like to read.

"Curous George ...this George he lived in Africa he is a little monkey and he likes to eat bananas one day there is a man had a big yellow hat he saw George and he put his hat under then George see it he likes it he put it on his head but the hat is very big than George head. When he put his it in his head he couldn't and go quickly to catch him after that the man who has a big yellow hat.

The only editing he did was to read what he wrote to one of his peers and they decided if it sounded like something you would like to read. His classmate helped him with his grammer and sentince structure. Is it a great piece of writing, probably not but it's a great piece of writing for someone who has been in the US less than 6 months.

kids and medication

Some scary numbers from McPaper (USA Today) about children being prescribed medications for all kinds of illnessess and diseases. Want to see how many kids take meds, go to the school office at lunchtime, you'll see a steady stream of kids coming to the office or to the clinic taking medication.

The most interesting point of the article is in the last paragraph, "Most of the increase in drugs for diabetes, attention deficit/hyperactivity and depression was seen in girls. The gender gap was most striking in diabetes: While the number of boys taking medication grew by 39%, the number of girls using them climbed by 147%"

Scary.

The number of children who take medication for chronic diseases has jumped dramatically, another troubling sign that many of the youngest Americans are struggling with obesity, doctors say.
The number of children who take pills for type 2 diabetes — the kind that's closely linked to obesity — more than doubled from 2002 to 2005, to a rate of six out of 10,000 children. That suggests that at least 23,000 privately insured children in the USA are now taking diabetes medications, according to authors of the new study in today's Pediatrics.
Doctors also saw big increases in prescriptions for high cholesterol, asthma and attention deficit and hyperactivity. There was smaller growth for drugs for depression and high blood pressure.
"We've got a lot of sick children," says author Emily Cox, senior director of research with Express Scripts, which administers drug benefit programs for private insurance plans. "What we've been seeing in adults, we're also now seeing in kids."
Type 2 diabetes was once known as adult-onset. But Cox says her records show kids as young as 5 being treated with prescription diabetes drugs.

Cox based her study on prescription records of nearly 4 million children a year, ages 5 to 19, covered by Express Scripts. She says her findings may not apply to the 40% of children who are uninsured or covered by government health plans.
Unless these children make major changes — such as eating healthier and exercising more — they could be facing a lifetime of illness, Cox says.
"These are not antibiotics that they take for seven to 10 days," Cox says. "These are drugs that many are taking for the rest of their lives."

Life without Halloween parties

One of my fondest memories from elementary school was the Halloween Party, we got to dress up and get candy, at school. We didn't have to do something good to get the candy, we didn't have to turn in all our work, or be quiet in the halls; we just had to show up.

We got to wear our costumes more than once and it didn't matter if Halloween fell on a Monday we had our party at school that day and went trick-or-treating that night, not another night that wasn't a school night. I also enjoyed the fact that most of the teachers also dressed up, it was great to see them as someone besides themselves. The funniest costume I remember was one of my teachers dressed in a navy suit with Monopoly money pinned all over him. When asked what he was; a Republican of course. The next year he went as a Democrat and spent the day giving out Monopoly money, the worse your grade the more you got. But those days are gone.

We teachers now are not allowed to dress up for Halloween, we can't have the kids dress up and no Halloween parties. We can vote as a faculty to have two of the following; a Fall Celebration, Winter Celebration or Spring Celebration, or what used to be called Halloween, Christmas and Valentine's Day. We inevitably vote for the Winter and Spring Celebrations leaving Halloween as an after thought.

School isn't a place for anything but learning standards anymore and that's a damn shame.

pictures are from: http://www.ics.uci.edu/~eppstein/pix/hw06/index.html