The Trouble With Packaged Reading Programs

I know lots of schools use packaged, mandatory reading programs. Here’s a great opinion piece from the Los Angeles Times by a children’s librarian explaining the problems with those types of programs. (Thanks to this parent who alerted me to the piece.)

Reading shouldn’t be a numbers game
Applying numerical ratings to books does nothing to help kids read better.
By Regina Powers
Los Angeles Times

School has started. I can tell because frazzled parents drag their embarrassed children up to the reference desk at my library to ask, “Where are the fifth-grade books? We need a 5.6 level that’s worth at least 7 points.”

I avoid frustrating both parties with an explanation of how the Dewey decimal system works, and ask the child, “What do you like to read?” The response from both adult and child is all too often a blank expression.

Although I am elated that many families are visiting my public library more frequently because schools send them, I am disturbed at how infrequently parents and teachers are allowing young readers to choose what to read.

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Moms (and Dads) On A Mission–Scotland

Sasha Reynolds, the mother of a 7-year-old and a 5-year old, recently wrote me to tell me what she’s doing in her children’s school in Scotland:

I have finally approached the school my children attend with regard to the homework issues as I am on the Parent Council. I have found to my pleasant surprise as soon as I mentioned my home work concerns a number of parents agreed with me. It seems many parents are feeling the same but perhaps feel that its their fault there are homework problems and so accept the situation and don’t talk about it to others. The up shot is there is going to be a working group of staff and parents meeting to review the homework.

England’s Newest (and Largest) School Won’t Have Homework

Nottingham East Academy, slated to open next year, will be England’s largest school with 3570 students, from nursery school to age 19. The school will have no homework, but instead will have an extra lesson a days. According to the principal-to-be, “If you ask most heads what most detentions are for, they will tell you for non-completion of homework. Homework causes an enormous amount of home conflict and parents and the community certainly won’t mind children coming home later. It is often set simply because there is an expectation it should be set. It does not help with education at all.” Read more here.

A High School Student Speaks Out–I Love School, But It’s Killing Me

Today’s letter is from high school student, Sophia Warren, a 10th grader in Brooklyn, New York.

I Love School, But It’s Killing Me
by Sophia Warren

Dear Sara,

My name’s Sophia Warren (we’ve met before a few times now). I’m a sophomore currently at Packer in Brooklyn Heights, NY. Packer is a school that prides itself on the gifted children that attend it and the rigorous academics that they offer. For years I have spent hours on homework. Beginning in the second grade, I sat through standarized tests, I worked on handwriting, and filled out math work book after math work book.

When I was in the fourth grade, each student was assigned an “independent study project.” Most kids were told that they would be working on spelling, logic problems, etc. I was told that I would be writing a novel, working at least a half an hour on it every night plus completing my other homework. At first I was in love with the idea, happy to be exempt from spelling, but it soon took a turn and I found myself miserable and with writer’s block. I was just nine years old and I came home everyday, sat down, stared at my paper, and spent the next hour crying out of frustration. My mom had no idea what to do with me. She finally spoke to my teacher and said that although I had not been writing anything, I had in fact been thinking about the story. He said that my think was not work and that I would not be allowed to go outside the next day during recess and that I would have to work while everyone else had “free time” in the classroom. I spent four months of fourth grade sitting in the classroom at a desk and working while everyone else was permitted to have fun and run around. It did not seem fair to me and it still doesn’t. The finished product kept me up until almost five in the morning. The story was over 160 pages at completion.

I have always wanted to be a writer, but that assignment killed my love of writing for over a year. I figured that if it was that painful to write, I did not want to.

At the present, I spend over six hours on homework a night. It is only just
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Washington Post Reporter Admits that Many Students Study Algebra Before They’re Ready

In a piece called, Recalculating the 8th-Grade Algebra Rush, Washington Post education reporter Jay Mathews admits that he has second thoughts about pushing all math students into algebra by 8th grade. The reason: a new study by the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Brookings Institution, which found that almost 1/3 of the students who scored in the bottom 10th on the National Assessment of Educational Progress eighth-grade test were enrolled in first-year algebra, geometry or second-year algebra. Almost all were grossly misplaced, probably because of the push to get kids into algebra sooner.

This is not the first time that Mathews has changed his mind. Last year, Mathews, who had called himself “Mr. Homework,” wrote a column advocating the abolition of homework in elementary school.

Boys’ School near London, England Cuts Way Back on Homework

The Tiffin School, ranked as the 2nd best boys’ state school in England, has limited homework to 40 minutes per night–a huge drop from the four hours a night the boys had been doing. After spending two years examining its teaching and learning in class, the school concluded that much of the homework was “mechanistic” and “repetitive.” Read the story here.

Baltimore School Implements Innovative Homework Policy

I came across an article about the Jemicy School in Baltimore, where homework is minimal and tailored to the needs of each student. According to PRNewswire.com,

Parents often assume hours of homework lends better test scores and greater comprehension for their students, but Jemicy School of Owings Mills and Towson takes a much different stance and data shows they may be on to something.

The educational structure and lifestyles of students in the 21st century is different than past generations. With the rise of technology, schedules packed with sports and extra-curricular activities, and significant amounts of homework each night, there is little time for free play or even comprehension of daily activities. The latest research on the brain shows that the brain requires time to relax, absorb, and process information in order for it to register within long term memory.

The Jemicy School has implemented this research into their curriculum and tailors homework to the individual needs of each child, with assignments consisting of skills which have already been mastered versus new concepts. This method prevents children from developing their own,
often detrimental methods of comprehending new concepts.
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Why Is It So Hard to Become a Teacher?

Here’s a great opinion piece by Ellie Herman, a television writer of 20 years who is trying to become an English teacher at an L.A. public high school.

Testing my patience
California needs teachers, so why is it so hard to get a credential?
By Ellie Herman

After nearly 20 years of working as a television writer, I made a radical life decision: to teach English at an L.A. public high school. I felt it was time for me to make a difference, to share my passion for language and literature with the next generation. Sure, I knew that the pay would be abysmal and that the teaching conditions in gang-infested, impoverished communities might be tough. But I really wanted to try, so I braced myself to keep going even if there were times of struggle, of heartbreak, of feeling inadequate and humiliated, even if there were times when I wanted to weep from frustration, even if I sweated through dark nights of the soul overwhelmed by the futility of it all.

And indeed, I have experienced all that. But what’s crazy is that I haven’t even set foot in a classroom yet.

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Guest Blogger: A High School Student Forms a “Stunt the Stress” Club

Alexandra Keehan, a high school senior from Indiana, started off the school year with a mission to put a halt to stress at her high school She formed a “Stunt the Stress” club and encourages other high school students across the country to do the same.

I Have Obscene Amounts of Useless but Nonetheless Time-Consuming Homework
by Alexandra Keehan

To understand the history and reasoning behind my club, Stunt the Stress, I think it’s best that you should be familiar with my academic biography.

I am currently a senior in high school. You may view that as an experienced student or only a beginner. Take it as you will, either way my education has not in that time been confined to one state or region in the US. Nor has it taken place in just public or private schooling. I have attended school in Arizona, New Mexico, and Indiana. In these states I have enrolled in private, charter, and public schools. Let me tell you each has their downfalls. Maybe this will help the reader to understand that my experiences are not native to one particular place or kind of education.

My goals have always been high and so is my motivation but even I have had trouble keeping afloat in the modern day school systems. I have seen many seemingly smart and adaptable students go through this and I wonder how does the mediocre school kid survive?
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New Survey: 43 Percent of Parents Have Done Their Kids’ Homework

In a survey conducted by AskKids and released in late August, 43 percent of parents admitted to having done their kids’ homework. According to the Los Angeles Times, here’s what the survey found:

Forty-three percent of parents queried in a survey this month admit to doing their children’s homework at least once to ease the strain. Almost half the dads, 47%, owned up to doing the homework, while 39% of mothers did so.

Kids who hope to persuade (con?) parents into doing homework have a better shot if mom and dad are older. Of parents 18-24, 33% say they’ve done their children’s homework for them, compared with 45% of 25- to 44-year-old parents.

The survey of 778 parents, conducted for the homework resource website Ask Kids, showed that 84% of parents help with homework — more with math and English than with other subjects.

The survey was conducted by Kelton Research using an e-mail invitation and an online survey. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

If parents stopped helping their kids with homework (or doing it for them), teachers would have to stop giving it, or, at the very least, cut back on the amount. It’s a rare elementary school child who can manage homework without a lot of parental involvement and help. Just imagine what would happen if parents got together and stopped asking their children whether they had homework, stopped helping them do it, and stopped making sure that the homework made its way back to school. A little homework disobedience anyone?