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posted by erdecker @ 3:07 PM
61 comments
JM AP English Government
A resource for John Marshall's Advanced Placement English and Government class. Woo-hoo!
Wednesday, December 07, 2011
About Me
- Name: erdecker
- Location: Lanesboro, Minnesota, United States
Enchanted April at Roc Rep Jan 2016 (Sound Design). Donnybrook's Dilemma Murder Mystery Jan 10 (Donnybrook actor). Valentine's Murder Mystery at Plummer House Feb 13 (actor). Ole and Lena in Love at Rochester Sons of Norway March 19 (Director).
61 Comments:
http://edudemic.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/gradescartoon.gif
Whose fault are bad grades? Society, the teacher, the parents, the friends, or the student themselves? Can all these forces of potential bad grades be easily defeated?
-Becca Rose
http://www.schoolmusictoday.com/advocacy/studentdevelopment.html
Studies show that music students have higher grade point averages than non-music students in their same school. Does this support the idea of a liberal arts education?
Josh Frei
http://www.artofthestate.co.uk/photos/banksy_no_future_1.jpg
If you put that link in you will see a picture of a young girl holding a balloon with the words "NO FUTURE" The artist, Banksy, is a UK stencil graffiti artist, and no one really knows who he really is, because he hides behind an anonymous source. All of his work is controversial and there are no definite meanings to his works, mainly because he an anonymous artist. So I took this particular tag and applied it to our education conversation. I specifically applied it to my education question: "Is there really a future for a student that is simply "getting through" high school by putting in minimal effort and that is just getting passed by teachers that also do not care? So whose fault is that the students or the teachers?"
-Katie Krull
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/07/nyregion/in-high-rated-new-york-city-public-schools-enrichment-instead-of-recess.html?ref=education
Some high-performing public elementary schools in NYC are holding arts enrichment classes as an alternative to recess, largely because of budget cuts. Are too many beneficial extra classes being demolished to focus on test prep? What will happen if people are forced to choose between the arts and recess, which provides important physical activity?
http://www.gtid.net/acmr_19/pdf/55.pdf
This link leads to a document that talks about an experiment which tests the mental growth of students before and after being exposed to the performing arts. The positive results prove that areas like theatre, dance and music allow students to achieve higher scores academically as well as building teamwork skills and boosting self confidence.
Laura Herbers
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/08/the-uncertain-impact-of-merit-pay-for-teachers/
Should teachers be paid based off of students test scores? Would education eventually evolve into a commercial industry?
Kyle Andrews
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/08/the-uncertain-impact-of-merit-pay-for-teachers/
Should teachers be paid based off of student test scores? Would education eventually evolve into a commercial industry?
Kyle Andrews
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/15/as-girls-become-women-sports-pay-dividends/
Almost forty years ago, the Title IX of the Education Amendments was passed requiring all schools to provide the same opportunities for girls as for boys. This has resulted in a huge jump in the percentage of girls playing team sports, which in turn caused lower teenage pregnancy rates and higher self-esteem. Does playing sports throughout high school also affect a women's education?
Factoid about Education.
Student attitude Find school boring 61%. Second out of the 17 other countries.
SOURCE: OECD
http://www.publicagenda.org/charts/half-americans-say-biggest-problems-facing-education-are-not-about-money-about-lack
This specific study has shown that the biggest problem that education faces is not monetary, instead it has to do with problems at home, and ineffective teachers and administrators.
-Kristi Taraba
http://www.publicagenda.org/blogs/k-12-do-we-need-national-standards
National education standards are sometimes viewed as necessary, but not sufficient to make adequate progress. Others find that English and math, as opposed to history, are the only areas requiring standardization. How much standardization should be sought after in education?
--Shannon Brown
http://www.smartmoney.com/spend/rip-offs/10-things-your-college-student-wont-tell-you-19913/
If you look at this link the first section talks about online sources that students use as essay, homework, or test aids such as Spark Notes. A lot of kids won't consider this cheating because it is simply using resources they are given. It makes you wonder what else is going to come up on the internet to "help" students.
Katie Johnson
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/07/dining/at-johnson-wales-students-mix-drinks-for-credit.html?ref=education
Mix a drink earn a college credit. Seems like a win, win at a culinary institute. Some people ask why, but really why not? This returns to the all too common questions about what really classifies as an education and what a student actually want to learn for the money their paying. Who gets to decide what is beneficial to a student? Etc. Etc.
http://i476.photobucket.com/albums/rr126/catastrophi/adhd-1.png
This picture totally encompasses our current education system for me. One extreme idea brought up is the fact that ADHD is purely the product of our focus on a standard education rather than creativity.
Education expert Sir Ken Robinson gave a talk at the RSA saying, "The diagnosis of ADHD has risen in parrellel to the growth in standradised testing. ...The arts have been the victim of this mentality. The arts resonate the idea of aesthetic experience- one in which your senses are operating at their peak. Subversly, an anaesthetic experience is one in which you shut your senses off and deaden yourself to what is happening; and a lot of these drugs we're using are that. We are getting our children through education by anaesthetising them." He goes on to further say "I think we should be doing the exact opposite, we should be waking them up to what they have inside of themselves."
Also an interesting fact, ADHD increases as you travel east of the country.
http://chronicle.augusta.com/news/education/2011-07-19/augusta-school-library-use-test-results-related
How does the availability to libraries affect students now with the digital resources students have? If at all.
-Kelsey Hansen
9.Approximately one-fifth of schools have less than adequate conditions for life safety features, roofs and electrical power. are schools recieving adequet funds to teach effectively?
http://www.dosomething.org/tipsandtools/11-facts-about-education-america
Liz Rime
http://www.cartoonstock.com/directory/d/decline_of_the_education_system.asp
(cartoon on the page)
How much will budget cuts interfere with students education? Art department cuts, less electives, less teachers, and larger classes are all being results of budget cuts. Are budget cuts affecting the nation's education as a whole? Are there steps that communities can do to fight back against the cuts?
alyssa alward
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/revealed-school-board-member-who-took-standardized-test/2011/12/06/gIQAbIcxZO_blog.html
This article is about a school board member who took the Florida standardized test (similar to our MCAs) and failed it. He states "There’s a concept called reverse design that is critical. We are violating that with our test. Instead of connecting what we learn in school with being successful in the real world, we are doing it in reverse." If standardized tests do nothing but confirm a arbitrary checkpoint, do they really help? I believe that all kids should be at a similar base-level, but if that benchmark is flawed than it is pointless to implement. How do we set up a system to make sure all students are successful later in life and have had a good education?
http://teachersunionexposed.com/protecting.cfm
Is it fair that bad teachers who have been tenured cannot be fired even though they are doing a poor job at teaching? Statistics have shown that bad student arise from bad teachers that were put in front of them due to the system that School Boards have setup that protect (bad) teachers.
Alvin Chanhthee
http://triquarterly.org/views/liberal-arts-majors-need-not-apply-declining-value-liberal-arts-education-twenty-first-century
In this article it is talking about the declining majors of liberal arts. Many more students are taking majors that deal with math or science and not focusing on anything else. Shouldnt students try to be well rounded and take liberal arts classes that would allow them to think more creativly about various problems they encounter later on?
Brennan Arendt
Corporal punishment is banned in most juvenile correction facilities in the U.S., and yet it continues in public schools. Is corporal punishment effective?
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1915820,00.html#ixzz1fyjRVwdr
http://www.schools4teachers.com/tag/education-pays/
This is a graph that shows the correlation between and educator's level of education and average weekly earnings. This answers the monetary part of how valuable an education is but in what other ways can we measure the value of an education?
Jacob Brewer
" A high school dropout will earn about $260,000 less than high school graduates and $800,000 less than college graduates in their lifetime." Which seems like it should be a determining factor in how far to continue with schooling until you think about the fact that we need people in all kinds of jobs. So I think the following fact should be pushed more in schools: " A one-year increase in average years of schooling for dropouts would reduce murder and assault rates by almost 30%, motor vehicle theft by 20%, arson by 13%, and burglary and larceny by about 6%."
http://www.dosomething.org/tipsandtools/11-facts-about-education-america
--Trisha DeWeerdt
http://www.bc.edu/research/nbetpp/publications/v1n3.html
The link above contains information on standardized tests and their effect on dropout rates. In the states that had fewer standardized tests, the dropout rate was much lower than the states with standardized tests. Also, graduation in these states did not depend on these tests. My question is, if standardized tests are the reason for some people dropping out of high school, are they as valuable as they are made to be?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/14/us-science-education-reth_n_1093167.html
Recent studies show that states like China, Singapore, and Finland have surpassed our test scores. Obama is trying to implement some new programs to help raise it, but will it work?
http://euwelfarestates.blogspot.com/2011/05/determinants-of-happiness.html
The more educated someone is, the happier they are, and the less unemployment is seen in their country. Could happiness lead to a better education, and then using that education, lead to a better life?
Alex Skrukrud
IF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ THIS JUST SKIP TO THE LAST PARAGRAPH.
Asians are smart. Especially Koreans. South Korea has world beating test scores and have students working around the clock, even for years after graduating high school, to gain admission to the nation's top universities. I don't have an internet link, so I'll give a little summary. I recently came across an article in the Dec. 5th issue of Time Magazine by Amanda Ripley called "Teachers, Leave Those Kids Alone." Basically, kids in South Korea (and their crazy competitive parents) are so obsessed with studying and making grades that 74% of ALL students in South Korea in 2010 were involved in some kind of after school tutoring or night school type thing in addition to regular school. They spend 14 hours days studying studying studying. But the problem is that the government and education officials say that the system is inefficient. They are worried about the time and money spent on education when other countries like Finland are catching up in academics with only 13% of students with tutoring and far less spending per student.
The time and effort and money students spend on education in South Korea has literally gotten to the point where the government is using physical squads of officials to comb cities and raid buildings, sending students found studying after 10 pm home. Yes, it has become a legal offence to study after 10 pm in South Korea. Many Asian schools are trying to Americanize to try and increase efficiency. Just makes me wonder if we as Americans will get anywhere trying to Asianize, to get more funding and bigger education programs or if we'll simply fall victim to inefficiency and wasted spending.
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/144135.aspx
When I think of home schooling, I think of being trapped in a box. But research shows how actually home schoolers actually have a better socialization with volunteering and paying jobs than public education kids have. Along with one on one teaching makes home schoolers much more ahead of the game than public kids. The downfall to being home schooled is social interaction with other kids, everyday peer pressure, and exposure to drugs just like in the real world. Should people start home schooling their kids or no?
Matt Broman
http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/education/ed0033.html
Facts two and three caught my eye. If you do the math, you'll see that in about that 30 year period, about one percent of the world's population dropped out of America's high schools. How many more will drop out in the next 30 years?
Sorry, .1 percent. Still quite a lot of people.
Dinham, Stephen. "How Schools Get Moving And Keep Improving: Leadership For Teacher Learning, Student Success And School Renewal."
Until the 1960s it was widely believed that schools made little difference to student achievement, which was believed to be largely predetermined by family, heredity, and socioeconomic context. Now studies show that it is the individual teacher who has the most influence on student success, with the acception of what each student brings to the table. How much of a student's success depends on the teacher's level of involvement, excitment and interest? Does this mean some students are automatically at a disadvantage in "bad" teacher's classrooms?
~Miriam Hanson
According to the federal government, 35% of students that enter college have to take remedial classes. Is it the high school's fault that the student wasn't prepared for college? Or is it the students fault for not taking challenging courses during their high school career? The student has to pay for these classes when they could have gotten the education for free back in high school.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/05/opinion/where-schools-fall-short.html?scp=8&sq=public%20education&st=cse
http://712educators.about.com/cs/reformtime/a/yearrounded.htm
Should school go year round? I think this website has some very good arguments for both sides and shows how inconclusive the subject is. There do seem to be more arguments against it though.
Studies have shown that students who lead an active lifestyle of sports are more likely to receive higher grades and go to college and less likely to drop out: "In a survey of 14,249 high school students, students who participated in athletics were an estimated 1.7 times less likely to drop out than were those who did not participate"
Should the federal law be changed so that schools are to require students to play in athletic sports so that there is a better posterity?
http://www.teamupforyouth.org/dynamic/attachables/media_filename_93.pdf
http://oecdeducationtoday.blogspot.com/2011/11/parent-factor-in-student-performance.html
Having parent involvement with children's education can really impact the children's education greatly. When parents read to children who are in elementary school, parents help them increase reading scores. Parents do not need to have the background in order to teach a specific subject. Just discussinng political, social news, discussing books, movies, or just simply talking to thier own children will help children's performance in school.
~Lekha Somashekar
Interactivity is an easy way to facilitate learning in any environment. What are some ways that interactivity and immersion can be used to give a deeper educational experience? Can we use the same techniques that are used to keep us playing Facebook games all night to educate? Is it ethical to use such Pavlovian techniques in learning?
http://en.proverbia.net/citastema.asp?tematica=377
"Do not train a child to learn by force or harshness; but direct them to it by what amuses their minds, so that you may be better able to discover with accuracy the peculiar bent of the genius of each."
-Plato
This goes off of one our discussions in class i believe that someone must be inspred to learn or the learning is useless
http://www.capenet.org/benefits.html
-Private school students generally perform higher than their public school counterparts on standardized achievement tests.
-Private high schools typically have more demanding graduation requirements than do public high schools.
-Private school graduates are more likely than their peers from public schools to have completed advanced-level courses in three academic subject areas.
-Private school students are more likely than public school students to complete a bachelor's or advanced degree by their mid-20s.
Are private schools really that much better than public schools, or does it depend on the area. Personally I think that in Rochester the public HIGH schools offer more rigorous courses than the private one in town, but if I lived in Redwood, California, I would most definitely be in a private school because their public schools are some of the worst in the country.
One thing I thought was interesting with the examples Mr. Decker gave us in class was the difference in the power of religion between the judicial and executive branch. The examples given for the judicial branch made religion seem like tradition, but with the president's bible verses there was a variety on which verse inspired them the most.
http://degreesearch.org/blog/infographics/staggering_education_facts/
http://www.psk12.com/rating/USthreeRsphp/STATE_MN_level_High_CountyID_0.html
Mayo High School is ranked 13th in the state, Century is 33rd, and John Marshall is 89th.
Is this an accurate ranking of the schools? How would the order change if ACT, SAT, and AP scores were used to determine the rankings?
Marissa Angus
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/feb/26/health/la-he-bilingual-brain-20110227
Contrary to prior beliefs, neurologists are now merging to a consensus that being bilingual has outstanding benefits. Some of these include increased ability to multitask, prioritizing tasks as well as information and even the possibility to delay the Alzheimer's disease. With these benefits, should all schools require students to graduate school with fluency in another language?
-Amy C.
Among common majors, education experienced the biggest drop in interest among undergrads. In a 10-year period, the number of students earning an education degree declined 5 percent. In contrast, one of the fastest growing degrees is in park, recreation, leisure, and fitness studies. During a 10-year period, the number of students earning degrees in this major jumped 92 percent. If this trend continues, who will teach the young generations?
http://www.usnews.com/education/blogs/the-college-solution/2011/09/06/20-surprising-higher-education-facts
http://ecologyofeducation.net/wsite/?p=2256
Joe Bower makes an argument that using grades to track a student's success is simply making learning a competition for the students and that teacher grade on a curve more than they think they do due to the fact that a class average of A's is viewed as the teacher being too easy on the student, but once one has a few students doing poorly, (s)he is challenging his/her students adequately. So, the question remains, is using grades the most effective method to tracking learning?
~K.J. Savage
http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/politicalcartoons/ig/Education-Cartoons/No-Child-Left-Behind.htm
Is this proof that the no child left behind idea was possibly bad? Could one child be holding back a whole class because they cannot keep up?
Nicole Kraushaar
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2009/05/04/urban-schools-need-better-teachers-not-excuses-to-close-the-education-gap?PageNr=2
The education gap has become a concern for America. Could charter schools be the solution to close that gap?
-Tram Nguyen
http://www.intoon.com/toons/2011/KeefeM20110406A.jpg
http://www.cuindependent.com/2011/02/11/cu-teaching-around-the-world/23289/
In this article, the author says that in China, the " student-teacher relationship is really important". Which is very true, but some students in the US have very bad relationships with their teachers which stops them from learning well, but if teachers sometimes just reached out to those students, we could all learn more about each other. Also, in the article, there is a statement that says, "an international teaching experience can be valuable, even to non-teachers." Which is also true, because people need to look through different perspectives to explore more ways of teaching than just one.
http://sundial.csun.edu/2011/10/battling-depression-as-a-college-student/
In short, Center for Disease Control and Prevention found that the national percentage of those with depression is around 10%. An American Psychological Association (APA) study shows that 53 percent of college students have experienced some form of depression. Over two-thirds of young people do not talk about or seek help for mental health problems, according to Psych Central.
Is schooling becoming too tough to handle? Or is there another underlying issue here?
http://www.yrdsb.edu.on.ca/pdfs/w/innovation/quest/journals/QuestJournal_RajeshSingh.pdf
This article is a proposal that suggests a positive correlation between athleticism and academic achievement. Many studies have been done on the subject but the results are inconclusive. Some studies suggest a positive correlation and some suggest a negative correlation. The main problem with the research is the number of other factors that could be influencing the student's success. The article has a great deal of valid reasoning as to why physical activity could result in greater academic success (as well as benefiting in terms of school involvement, self-esteem, and social skills). Should schools increase their focus on the fitness of the students in an effort to aid their success in academics?
Hannah Church
http://www.thecharlotteweekly.com/news/2011/12/teacher-morale-gets-most-attention-at-superintendent-forum/
The article above names teacher morale and district size as the biggest issues in Charlotte schools. Are we undervaluing teachers to the point that those who chose the profession can't even be made to care about their jobs anymore? Are teachers THAT badly underpaid? And what about the school size factor? Should school districts be more focused on lowering class sizes or is it just another thing to take attention to take the focus away from the real problem: the students?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEyvTrOhSIs
These college statistics were from 2010, but they're close to accurate for today. How much will these statistics change? Will college eventually cost so much that only the high class will be able to afford it?
-Jonah Mueller
Does technology really help students learn better? This article from the Times Of India shows that there is a limit, too much technology is not good.
"Today, a teacher's job is to focus on concepts rather than content. He should be able to teach more than what Google has to offer."
Very interesting!
"A new study finds that certain brain functions of some low-income 9- and 10-year-olds pale in comparison with those of wealthy children and that the difference is almost equivalent to the damage from a stroke."
Knowing this, how can teachers and the education system work around problems that get in the way of education? How can teachers help students succeed when the struggles in their home lives are affecting their learning?
- Noelle Bellows
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2008-12-07-childrens-brains_N.htm
- that's the source for my post above.
- Noelle Bellows
http://www.caricom.org/jsp/community_organs/physedpolicy_lc.jsp?menu=cob
physical education-has a major role to play in the development of young people. It is an integral part of the total education of any child and is closely linked to other creative and learning experiences and skill acquisition. It makes a significant contribution to the all - round harmonious development of the mind and body.
-omar mohamed
http://www.susanohanian.org/nclb_cartoons/test_cartoon.jpg
Testing does not end after senior year or college.
http://www.susanohanian.org/nclb_cartoons/test_cartoon.jpg
Testing does not end after senior year or college.
Caitlin O'Connor
They say that funding is a big reason for declines in our school system. But simply dumping money into a crippled system is not going to solve any problems. I think you need to first address other things and then allocate the money where it will be most beneficial.
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