by Robert Pondiscio
October 1st, 2009
Tags: E. D. Hirsch, The Making of Americans
Posted in Core Knowledge | 1 Comment »
If you’re online (or live in the Northeast and by a radio) at 1pm ET this afternoon, E.D. Hirsch will be on WAMC-FM/Albany the Northeast’s NPR station talking about his new book The Making of Americans. Listen here. There’s also a Hirsch essay on “How Schools Fail Democracy” in the Chronicle of Higher Education:
Too many Americans are in the linguistic shadows now—possibly close to a majority. Despite intense efforts driven by the No Child Left Behind Act, the language abilities of our 17-year-olds have remained stuck at the steeply declined levels of the 1970s, while the language gap between white students on one side and black and Hispanic students on the other remains distressingly and immovably large. This language gap represents more than a civic disability that prevents full participation in a democracy. It also represents a bar to general prosperity and social justice.
by Robert Pondiscio
October 1st, 2009
Tags: reading comprehension, reading strategies
Posted in Assessment and Testing | 22 Comments »
“After failing to move a runner past first base for the entire game, the Giants sent Davis to the plate with the potential tying and winning runs in scoring position. Unfortunately, he hit into a 6-4-3 double play to end the game.”
- How many outs were there when Davis came to bat?
- To whom did he hit the ball?
- Describe the kind ball he hit (pop up? Line drive? etc.)
- What was the final score of the game
- How many runners were on base?
If you are able to answer all five of these questions (#5 is tricky) is it because you have mastered the ”reading skill” of making inferences. Or because your knowledge of baseball fills in the gaps for you?
by Robert Pondiscio
October 1st, 2009
Posted in Parents, Research and Reports, Teaching | 7 Comments »
Most mothers and fathers practice “Pinocchio parenting” — teaching their kids that lying is bad while regularly fibbing to them, according to a pair of new studies in the Journal of Moral Education.
Researchers at the University of Toronto and the University of California found that parents who stress the importance of truth-telling to their little ones quite often tell lies to influence the children’s behaviour or emotions, whether it’s an idle threat to make them eat their peas or boost their confidence by praising their ear-splitting saxophone solo.
“Because it’s easy, we just do it,” Dr. Kang Lee of the University of Toronto tells the Globe and Mail. “Some parents may have been doing it for years and they really have no idea they are actually telling lies.” Lee’s study doesn’t look at the impact of Pinocchio Parenting on kids, but he confesses he’s guilty of it himself.
To quell his son’s habit of fidgeting in his car-seat, the savvy dad renamed the hazard button on his dashboard the “eject” button. If dad presses the button, six-year-old Nathan thinks he’ll be catapulted from the vehicle. “I just put my hand over it” and Nathan behaves, Dr. Lee says.
Teachers in particular are guilty of what the researchers describe as the “confidence boosting lie” — telling students they are excellent writers, for example, when in fact they are average or worse. Teachers in my elementary school trained in the Teacher’s College Writer’s Workshop were expected to give a compliment to every student at the start of each “conference” and required to record it in our conference notes. The intended effect obviously was to boost confidence and inspire additional effort. The danger (equally obvious) was that students might overestimate their ability, slack off, and be set up for disappointment later on.
