Franklin Schargel’s Blog

I am again indebted to my friend and colleague  Bonnie Bracy for making me aware of this article.

Across the Washington, D.C. area, black students are suspended and expelled two to five times as often as white students, creating disparities in discipline that experts say reflect a growing national problem.

An analysis by The Washington Post shows the phenomenon both in the suburbs and in the city, from the far reaches of Southern Maryland to the subdivisions of Fairfax, Prince George’s and Montgomery counties.

Last year, for example, one in seven black students in St. Mary’s County were suspended from school, compared with one in 20 white students. In Alexandria, black students were nearly six times as likely to be suspended as their white peers.

In Fairfax, where the suicide in January of a white high school football player who had been suspended brought an outcry for change, African American students were four times as likely that year to be suspended as white students, and Hispanic students were twice as likely.

The problems extend beyond the Washington area to school districts across the country and are among a host of concerns about school discipline that sparked a joint effort by the U.S. Justice and Education departments in July to look into reforms.

Experts say disparities appear to have complex causes. A disproportionate number of black students live below the poverty line or with a single parent, factors that affect disciplinary patterns. But experts say those factors do not fully explain racial differences in suspensions. Other contributing factors could include unintended bias, unequal access to highly effective teachers and differences in school leadership styles.

Still, she said, much remains to be done. Nearly 6 percent of black students were suspended or expelled from school last year, compared with 1.2 percent of white students. The gap remains even as suspensions are down since 2006 across all racial groups.

She pointed to one unsettling statistic: 71 percent of suspensions for insubordination, a relatively rare offense in the county, were handed out to black students. African Americans make up 21 percent of students in Montgomery’s schools. The goal is to dig deeper into the data, offer more professional development and share best practices, she said.

The Post’s analysis found that in the Washington suburbs alone, more than 35,000 students were suspended or expelled from school at some point last school year “” more than half of them black students.

Suspensions have surged nationally since the 1970s, fueled in part by a zero-tolerance culture. As suspensions ticked up, racial disparities widened between blacks and whites “” and, to a lesser extent, Hispanics and whites.

The most recent national figures, from 2006, show that 5 percent of white students are suspended, compared with 15 percent of their black classmates, 7 percent of Hispanics and 3 percent of Asians.

“We associate getting kicked out of school with something really really bad, but there has been a sea change in recent years in what kids get suspended for and how often we use suspension,” said researcher Daniel J. Losen, who recently authored a report on suspension and disparities for the National Education Policy Center at the University of Colorado.

In Fairfax “” the suspension rate among whites of 1.5 percent and a suspension rate among blacks of 7 percent last year.

The stakes are high for those who get booted out of school.

Out-of-school suspensions mean lost classroom time and, for some, disconnection from school. A recent landmark study of nearly a million Texas children showed that suspension increased the likelihood of repeating a grade that year and landing in the juvenile-justice system the next year. It also was linked to dropping out.

In that research, African American students were more likely to be suspended for discretionary offenses and less likely than whites to be suspended for severe violations, such as selling drugs or bringing a gun to school.

Experts say disparities arise from an array of issues.  They may be driven by unconscious bias or unequal access to teachers who do better engaging students in learning and managing behavior problems when they occur. The leaders of a school system “” or of an individual school “” strongly influence how often suspensions are meted out.

Disparities are common in both suburban and urban districts, although urban schools tend to use suspension more, experts say.  An increasing number of studies have looked into whether poverty, family background or other characteristics explain racial disparities,

It is not just a matter of kids coming from poverty.  Poor kids do get suspended more. But that does not explain why poor black kids get suspended more than poor white kids and why affluent black kids get suspended more than affluent white kids.

According to recent data, 1 out of every  3 students has been suspended in the state of Texas.  Something is wrong when the solution to our school problems is to push out students.  Based on my research, thanks to high stakes testing, No Child and Race for the Top, this is the fastest growing group of “dropouts”. As long as we believe that our educational processes are correct, we will continue to blame individuals when the system doesn’t work.  (“If only we had better students, parents, teachers, administrators, etc.”) 

 

 

In a survey of nearly 5,000 teenage girls in 19 states who gave birth after unplanned pregnancies, half of the girls said they were not using any birth control when they got pregnant.  About a third said they didn’t believe they could get pregnant because it was the first time they had sex or because it was not that time of the month or because they thought they were sterile.  The survey, conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, found that nearly 20 percent said they had used the pill or a birth control patch.  Another 24 percent said they used a condom.  Thirteen percent said they didn’t use contraception because they had difficulty getting it.  Nearly one quarter of the moms didn’t use any protection because their partner didn’t want them to.

While the overall teen birthrate has fallen, we still have a significant number of children with unintended pregnancies.  While there is pressure from outside sources, as a country, we need to determine whether we want children having children or whether we need to include sex education in our curriculum.

I have long been a fan of IAN JUKES and I am a subscriber to his blogs, Your Committed Sardine Blog.  You can also subscribe to his website and get the most interesting information.  Either Google IAN JUKES or the Committed Sardine.  The following was posted by Andrew Charles.

Simple Physics

Here you are required to build structures for a specific task. In the image below, its a bomb shelter. The task is to build a shelter that withstands the explosion and remains within budget. The lower the cost, the more points. To build it you must consider angles and strength, direction, and force. It’s fun and engaging. But its more than a bomb shelter””you build dams, cranes, tree houses, submarines, and staircases, too.

URL: https://itunes.apple.com/nz/app/simplephysics/id408233979?mt=8

Tinkerbox

This is a similar physics game to Simple Physics. Here you use logic, force, motion, and mechanics to solve a series of problems. The game is supported by tutorials (see below) that assist you in developing your solution. They are not easy, either””there is considerable challenge involved in this game!

URL: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/tinkerbox-hd/id415722219?mt=8

Rush Hour

This is a change of style and genre, but is an excellent learning and thinking game. This is a computer simulation of the real game of the same name. The objective is to move the cars in a sequence that allows you to release the red car from the grid lock it is in. The number of cars and the complexity of the sequence varies from easy to hard. It’s a great game for developing logic and process.

URL: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/rush-hour/id336542036?mt=8

W.E.L.D.E.R.

This stands for Word Examination Laboratory for Dynamic Extraction and Reassessment. Yeah, its a trifle ostentatious, but behind this mouthful lies a great game for the english student. Simply rearrange the letters and add in a few to create words (they have over 15,000 loaded in the dictionary). Spell the word correctly, score the points, and the letters are removed. It is a very addictive game.

URL: https://itunes.apple.com/nz/app/w.e.l.d.e.r./id471056941?mt=8

It’s easy to overlook the potential of games for learning. Find a game that matches your learning objectives, that reinforces a concept, or that provides a different mode of understanding, and you can unlock a world of engagement and fun.

 

 

 

 

Sorry that should read, ” Revising No Child Left Behind”.  The following editorial appeared in the New York Times; October 26, 2011.

“The revised No Child Left Behind Act that passed out of the Senate education committee last week goes too far in relaxing state accountability and federal oversight of student achievement. The business community, civil rights groups and advocates of disabled children are rightly worried that the rewrite of the law would particularly hurt underprivileged children.”

The bill’s main sponsors “” Senator Tom Harkin, a Democrat of Iowa, and Senator Mike Enzi, a Republican of Wyoming “” should take the criticism to heart and go back to the drawing board.

The original No Child Left Behind Act of 2002 is far from perfect. The Obama administration recognized that in September when it said that it would waive some of the law’s requirements for states that agree to several reforms, like creating new programs to overhaul the worst schools and comprehensive teacher evaluation systems.

The waiver plan would allow states to be rated on student growth on math and reading tests instead of simply counting up the percentages of students who reach proficiency on those tests. It would also require states to set goals for all schools and plan for closing achievement gaps and end the pass-fail system under which high-performing schools are rated as needing improvement if one racial or economic subgroup fails to reach the achievement target.

The plan encourages states to embrace data-driven systems and teacher-evaluation systems that take student achievement into account. But it has not been well received in the Senate, where some lawmakers seem to feel as if it usurps legislative power.

The Harkin-Enzi bill lowers the bar for reform and reduces federal pressure on the states. It focuses only on the bottom 5 percent of schools, essentially allowing states to do as they please with the rest. It backs away from requiring states to have clear student achievement targets for all schools, and does not require most schools to evaluate teachers rigorously.

Lawmakers are right that No Child Left Behind needs to be overhauled. But Congress needs to do this carefully, without retreating from core provisions that require states to do better by children in return for federal aid.”

The New York Times has gotten it wrong.   The testing process in NO Child virtually guarantees that all schools will be low performing by 2014.  The US Secretary of Education, Arnie Duncan has said as much.  I am not opposed to testing – school teachers use them all of the time. What I am opposed to is a single test, given to all students to measure achievement.  All students, special education as well as foreign students are expected to reach the same bar as more advantaged students.  The results have been pre-ordained. We know that low-income, minority students will perform less well than students with the advantages of two-parent, suburban education.  Schools, not students or their parents are held accountable.  Besides the tests measure change and not improvement.  If we wanted to measure improvement, we would give the same test given in the 4th to the 5th grade students and measure their growth or lack of growth.  Instead, we give a different test, to different students with different parents.  We are really measuring apples and oranges.

Do you recall when the theme of American education was “No Child Left Behind?  According to a new report from The Education Trust, many children are being left behind.

When people talk about the “dropout problem”, I believe that they are focusing on the wrong thing.  It is not just that the nation’s dropout rate must be lowered but that the “achievement gap” must be narrowed.  One of the positive things that No Child Left Behind requires is that graduation rates must be disaggregated. 

The performance gap between minority and white high school students continues to expand across the United States, with minority teenagers performing at academic levels equal to or lower than those of 30 years ago according to a report from the Education Trust.  While achievement levels have improved considerably for Latino and African-American elementary and middle school students, educators say their academic performance drops during high school years. On average, African-American and Latino high school seniors perform math and read at the same level as 13-year-old white students.

The Education Trust says African-American and Latino students have made little to no progress in 12th-grade reading scores since 1994, continuing to lag behind white students. Math achievement has also remained flat, with the gap between white students and those of color widening.

Educators cite these causes for the disparity in performance:

• Lowered expectations for students of color
• Growing income inequality and lack of resources in low-income school districts
• Unequal access to experienced teachers
• An increased number of “out of field” teachers instructing minority students in subjects outside their area of expertise
• These factors, experts say, produce an opportunity gap for students of color.

• Students of color are also less likely to be given advanced-level coursework.

School advocates say students of color, regardless of class, are frequently met with lowered expectations from teachers and administrators. With such expectations come lowered requirements in the classroom, they say. Students in low-income schools are more likely to be given an “A” for work that would receive a “C” in a more affluent school, according to “Raising Achievement and Closing Gaps Between Groups: Lessons from Schools and Districts on the Performance Frontier,” an Education Trust study released last November.

Research from the Education Trust study indicates that more white high school graduates were enrolled in college prep courses than were their African-American, Latino and Native American counterparts. Often, schools attended by those minorities do not offer advanced classes.

Many middle-class black youngsters are placed in less competitive classes, and a black child with high fifth-grade math scores is less likely to be enrolled in algebra in eighth grade, according to the Education Trust study.

Another obstacle for poor and minority students is that they are more likely than white students to have inexperienced and “out of field” teachers. Minorities at high-poverty schools are twice as likely to be taught by “out of field” teachers “” for instance, a math instructor teaching English or a science instructor teaching history.

Low-income minority students are also more likely to have newly minted teachers, many of who aren’t equipped to help underperforming students get on track. According to the Education Trust, low-performing students are more likely to be assigned to ineffective teachers.

Poverty also hampers minority student achievement. Blacks and Latinos have been disproportionately affected by the economy, with more and more children falling into poverty.

Minority students typically attend schools that lack resources. They are also more likely to attend schools where the student-teacher ratio is high, books and computers are outdated and teacher aides aren’t available to provide extra help for those who need it most.

The sluggish economy has forced many school districts to slash budgets, eliminating after-school programs and arts instruction. Many schools are underfunded, even in more affluent districts.  Poor parents working two and three jobs often don’t have the wherewithal to advocate for their children, education experts say. Often, the parents themselves received a substandard education. This creates a dynamic in which generations of families are stuck in a cycle of underachievement.

The Federal Government has with its support of No Child and Race for the Top has endorsed narrowing of the achievement gap.  Yet state governors who would like to eliminate tenure and put less experienced teachers into minority classrooms are feeding into the enlarging of the achievement gap.

No child has risen to low expectations. All students should be thrown into vigorous classes and be given proper academic support to ensure their success. If they don’t have access to those classes, they won’t be adequately prepared for college.

Public education represents the best chance of escaping from poverty.  Yet many in America seem to have forgotten this.

 

 

 

 

Mind mapping. concept mapping, or brainstorming are three different names with almost the same meaning: collecting, organizing, and representing ideas, tasks, words, or other items linked to and arranged around a central key word or idea into a mind map diagram. Whichever kind of mapping you want to label it, web 2.0 has some free tools for you to help you perform it. I have meticulously compiled a list of some of the best free mapping tools for teachers and students to use.

Some pluses of using mind mapping tools in education:

The following are some of the advantages of using mind-mapping tools in education:

• Mind mapping enables teachers to manipulate ideas and concepts with great ease and flexibility
• It helps present information in a visually attracting and comprehensive way
• Its organizational structure helps students understand and communicate their knowledge effectively
• Teachers can use it to manage their classes and activities
• It helps teachers summarize, organize, and present lecture information
• It can be used by both teachers and students to create tutorials and explain difficult concepts
• Visual maps gets students attention and focus
• It promotes active note taking, thinking, and learning skills
• It fosters inquiry and problem solving

Here is a list of free mind mapping tools for teachers:

1- SpiderScribe

This is a great mind-mapping tool that allows users to easily visualize their ideas by connecting various pieces of information together and create free style maps. It also combines elements like text, images, files, calendar events and geographic locations.

2- Edistorm

Edistorm is a great web2.0 tool for educators. It allows you to work on your ideas during a structured brainstorming and organize them into sticky notes for others to see. It has two plans one is free and limited and the other is paid.

3- Wridea

Wridea is an idea management service and a brainstorming tool. It allows its users to Create new idea entries in seconds, update details, discuss in depth with your friends and organize your data under different categories. Wridea can be a very useful tool for teachers and students.

4- Bubbl.us

Bubbl.us is another great mind mapping and brainstorming web2.0 tool. It allows its users to create concept maps in such an easy way with the minimum tools possible .You can create your project and invite your colleagues to join you in editing its content and when done you can share it with others via a generated link.

5- Wise Mapping

Wise Mapping is a free online mind maps editor that allows you to create and share your mind maps with others. It also lets its users   create and edit colorful and complex mind maps using just mouse and keyword.

6- Lucid Chart
Lucid Chart is a flowcharts and mind map making tool. It uses simple drag and drop technique to draw charts and even lets users upload their images into diagrams. It has both free and pro plans. Free as you know is always limited.

7- Text 2 Mind Map

Text 2 Mind Map is a cool website. It is an application that converts texts to mind maps.

8-Spicynodes

 

It allows its users to create a visually attractive nodes for their blogs, websites or wikis. Nodes are visually displayed pieces of information that helps visitors easily navigate the content of your site so that they find what they are looking for with the minimum time possible. Check out this example of a Spicynode I created for this blog.

9- Mind42

This is a browser-based online mind mapping application that allows you to keep track of all your ideas and create easy mind maps. It does not require any download or installation software, just log to your browser and launch the application.

10- Popplet

It is one of the best applications for visual ideas. It combines presentations, mindmapping and online bulletins. It also allows users to integrate text, image, video, and Google maps and use it as a bulletin board to use it to record thoughts and many more.

11- ChartTool

ChartTool is a great tool from Google. This is basically a free service that allows users to create awesome charts and graphics. It has a rich gallery of charts of varying formats. Users can choose from Line charts, Bar charts, Pie charts, Map charts, Scatter charts, Venn charts, QR codes, and Google-O-Meter charts. Once you select a chart you can then customize it the way you want.

12- Chartle

Chartle is a great web tool that allows users to easily and instantly create interactive charts. These charts can be used on your classroom blog or website and can also be printed out. Chartle has some very interesting features and is very easy to use. The only thing you will need to start using Chartle is to have Java activated on your browser.

13- Slatebox

Slatebox is another great presentation and online mind mapping tool. It allows its users the freedom to create as many nodes and maps as possible. It has both free and pro accounts

14- Gliffy
Gliffy is a diagram making web2.0 tool. It allows you to create great looking diagrams and drawings in a snap. It is similar to Bubbl.us.

15- Creately

Creately is an online diagraming and design application that is very easy to use. It offers a great way of working with teams in multiple locations and on several projects .It has both a free and premium version and of course the paid version has always more features to work with.

16- Diagram.ly

Diagram.ly is a free product of Jgraph, a company devoted to developing graph visualization software and web services. Diagram.ly is a very handy and useful tool for creating diagrams using clip arts and pre drawn shapes.

17- Mindomo

This one here has several other features such as including a clipart library, importing images from Google images or Flickr, and using video straight from YouTube. It has both free and pro accounts.

18- Mindmeister

This is also a great mind-mapping tool that allows users to include icons, notes, links, attachment, and images into their diagrams. The free version has several ads and allows only for three maps.

 

I was asked for my impression of President Obama’s desire to raise the dropout age to age 18.  This has been posted on the Huffington Post website where I am a blogger.

 I have mixed feelings about this proposal.  I believe all students should stay in school until they graduate. I understand the reasons for the President’s concern.  If America is to be globally competitive, it must have a high performing, highly trained, highly-technologically prepared workforce.  And today’s demands for a highly skilled workforce require, at minimum, a high school diploma.

 There is little data to indicate that raising the age of graduation will result in lower dropout rates.  According to a report by the Rennie Center for Education Research & Policy, Raise the Age, Lower the Dropout Rate?  Considerations for Policymakers, “our review revealed that there is little research to support the effectiveness of compulsory attendance laws in achieving these goals [of lowering the dropout rate].” (p.12)

 Education is primarily a state and local responsibility in the United States. It is states and communities, as well as public and private organizations of all kinds, that establish schools and colleges, develop curricula, and determine requirements for enrollment and graduation.  The Federal Government presently provides only 10.8 percent of educational financing.

 Twenty-one states require students to attend high school until they graduate or turn 18.  Some of those states include:  Nebraska (87.8 percent graduation rate) and Wisconsin (86.7 percent graduation rate) which are high performing states.  Other states that are high performing have a compulsory school age of 16 including: Maryland (76 percent graduation rate), Massachusetts (76 percent graduation rate), Iowa (86.6 percent graduation rate), Vermont (86.5 percent graduation rate), North Dakota (86.3 percent graduation rate).   Some other states with an 18-year-old requirement have high dropout rates including New Mexico, and the District of Columbia.  (Source: ww.all4ed.org)  So it is not the age of mandatory attendance which determines the dropout rate but other factors.  Simply mandating that young people remain in school without addressing the causes for their leaving will accomplish little.

 Why children leave school prior to graduation:

·      The Silent Epidemic:  Perceptions of High School Dropouts, a report issued by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation indicated that one of the primary reasons that children leave school is because they are bored.  How will holding a student where they do not want to be until age 18 lessen the boredom?

·      Others leave because they feel that the curriculum has no relevance in the real world.

·      Students dropout because of teenage pregnancy.

·      Some students leave school because there are trying to meet their family’s financial obligations.

 Expecting states to add additional costs during this recession is foolhardy especially when so many have made cuts into the marrow of education.  There will be added costs include adding more classrooms, providing additional teachers, providing additional support personnel such as counselors and paying for alternative on-line courses.  Finally, add in the additional costs of enforcing the law.

 The President, in his well-intentioned proposal, has provided a sound-bite, simplistic solution to this highly complex problem.

Eye On Education Radio and my podcast are now in the iTunes Store! You can check it out here:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/eye-on-education-radio/id494923065. Or, you can search for Franklin Schargel in the iTunes store and looking under Podcasts.

There isn’t a charge.