One education researcher calls it “the academic death penalty”: A grade of zero on a 100-point scale, a mark that spells disaster for a student’s class average. “It’s such an extreme score in a percentage grading system” says Thomas R. Guskey, a professor of educational psychology at the University of Kentucky. “To recover from that […]
Educators know that most dyslexic students will need interventions and accommodations throughout school, but best practices continue to evolve as more is learned about this reading disability.
The damage to teaching and learning caused by over-reliance on standardized tests is widely acknowledged. It includes narrowed curricula, teaching to the test, and one-size-fits-all instruction. The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) offers a significant opportunity for states and districts to revamp their assessment systems. Unfortunately, few states plan to replace standardized tests with educationally […]
K12 STEM programs are evolving, incorporating new tools and technologies to better prepare students for rapidly changing college and career environments. Makerspaces, drones, coding and robotics are all part of this next generation of STEM learning that is just beginning to have an impact in districts. This web seminar focused on incorporating these new tools. […]
Little Falls City School District’s standards-based Engineering by Design program strives to build students’ resilience while developing their real-life problem-solving skills. Little Falls City School District’s standards-based Engineering by Design program strives to build students’ resilience while developing their real-life problem-solving skills. “Instead of asking students what they want to be when they grow up, […]
IBM’s Watson computing system—perhaps the world’s most well-known artificial intelligence technology—now provides K5 educators with a database of open educational math resources. Teacher Advisor With Watson 1.0, powered by Watson Discovery Service’s artificial intelligence technology and hosted on IBM Cloud at www.TeacherAdvisor.org, can rapidly analyze content for relevant concepts based on a teacher’s search query. […]
In the Ventura USD in California, one low-achieving middle school at risk of closure was instead transformed into the De Anza Academy of Technology and the Arts (DATA), a high-achieving magnet school. A significant component in DATA’s dramatic turnaround has been its innovative project-based and collaborative learning environments and makerspaces, which employ technology as a […]
Illinois has revamped state education funding to provide extra support to economically challenged K12 districts. Evidence-based funding, which goes into effect in 2018, considers each district’s needs and local funding resources when allocating state aid, with extra emphasis placed on high-poverty districts. Previously, nearly two-thirds of funding for each district—compared to a national average of […]
De Anza Academy of Technology and the Arts is a high-achieving magnet school with project-based and collaborative-learning environments and makerspaces. A few years ago, however, De Anza, part of Ventura USD in California, was a low-achieving middle school with declining enrollment and at risk of closure. De Anza decided to become a 1-to-1 technology school […]
Teaching religion in public schools has been illegal for decades. Teaching about religion, however, is not only permissible, but is gaining traction as a way to promote greater understanding in a world of conflicting dogmas. The National Council for the Social Studies in June published guidelines on how to study religion “in ways that are […]
