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THE VERMONT EDUCATION REPORT
June 18, 2007 Vol.
7, No. 07
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In
this issue:
1. K-12
Online Learning
2. When Should
a Kid Start Kindergarten?
3. Editorial:
Got Math?
4. Battle Over
Math
Synopsis of a Sloan Consortium survey
called K-12 Online Learning: A Survey of U.S. School District Administrators
“Online Learning, Distance
Learning, Blended Learning, Distance Education, Asynchronous Learning”
These are all keywords from
a survey of online learning in K-12 education published by the Sloan Consortium
in 2007. It explores the nature of online learning in K-12 schools. There
are many reasons why a student might take an online course, which range
from extra help, to advanced courses to extended course offerings.
There is very little data
collection about this type of learning and no guidelines for collecting
such data. Second, what exactly is online learning? Defining it has been
confusing. There are other methods such as vidoconferencing, televised,
VHS/DVD courses, and distance learning. Further more, within the method
of online learning there are varying degrees of access. A course or class
can be fully online, or a hybrid, or simply facilitate a face-to-face course.
The Sloan Consortium (Sloan-C)
defined online learning into three general types in order to keep collection
of date consistent from year to year. Online learning must be 80%-100%
online. Blended or hybrid learning is between 30%-79% online. Web-facilitated
learning is less than 29% online. These three categories will begin to
create a picture of what is happening with K-12 online learning.
While it is difficult for
K-12 schools to know the extent of online learning within their systems,
it is more difficult to find out about the extent that homeschoolers use
this type of learning. Therefore, this survey focused on the K-12 schools
for data collection.
The Sloan-C survey refers
to data taken from a report called, “Distance Education Courses for Public
Elementary and Secondary School Students: 2002–03.” This report states
that there were more students enrolled in distance learning in larger districts
compared with smaller districts and rural districts seemed to have more
students enrolled than urban districts. The percentages of students enrolled
in distant learning were significantly higher in the later grades.
Sloan-C surveyed another
study conducted by Cavanaugh, Gillan, Kromey, Hess, & Blomeyer, which
talks about outcomes of students in online learning. Conclusion, online
learning is just as effective as face-to-face/classroom learning.
Further study is needed to
see exactly how online learning is used as a viable option for delivering
learning to kids especially in secondary education.
This survey is just scratching
the surface in online learning. The availability of online course offerings
can help to improve the educational quality for students. This type of
learning is used within the Vermont State College system. In addition to
the traditional face-to-face classroom setting, Community College of Vermont
offers some courses completely online or hybrid courses as defined by the
Sloan-C survey.
A study done by the California
Department of Motor Vehicles in 2003 called “The Effectiveness of Home-Study
Driver Education Compared to Classroom Instruction” supports the conclusion
found within the Sloan-C survey that students do just as well with online
learning as with face-to-face classes. They tracked kids who were taking
a driver education course in a classroom setting as well as those that
took a complete driver education computer-based program delivered to the
student via CD-ROM or Internet. The study makes two conclusions:
“…students who completed
the courses involving computer-based and Internet instruction performed
better on the study exit examination than did students in the workbook
and classroom courses, the findings in this regard suggest that using interactive
technology to teach driver education resulted in superior learning…”
This survey is not about
using technology in the classroom. It is about the technology becoming
the classroom. Online learning has become a viable educational alternative
that should be encouraged.
When Should a Kid Start Kindergarten?
By Elizabeth Weil, June
3, 2007
At what age should kids start
Kindergarten? I found this article to be interesting because I started
kindergarten at age 4 and first grade at age 5. Across the country kids
are being “redshirted” or sent to kindergarten a year late. This puts them
‘ahead’ of some of the other kids in the class. The differences between
the absolute age (how many days since birth) between kids do not seem to
matter as much in the later years. However, the the relative age (age in
comparison to classmates) between kids can have a lasting effect that begins
in the early years.
It used to be that Kindergarten
was to get kids reading for school and now preK is becoming more and more
front and center in getting kids ready for school. Would not some of these
same concerns happen in the preK years? Although this article is not entirely
against early education programs such as preK, it is thought provoking
in considering later schooling as better for kids.
Snips from the article:
“According to the apple-or-coin
test, used in the Middle Ages, children should start school when they are
mature enough for the delayed gratification and abstract reasoning involved
in choosing money over fruit. In 15th- and 16th-century Germany, parents
were told to send their children to school when the children started to
act “rational.” And in contemporary America, children are deemed eligible
to enter kindergarten according to an arbitrary date on the calendar known
as the birthday cutoff…”
* * *
“Before the school year started,
Andersen, who is 54, taped up on the wall behind her desk a poster of a
dog holding a bouquet of 12 balloons. In each balloon Andersen wrote the
name of a month; under each month, the birthdays of the children in her
class. Like most teachers, she understands that the small fluctuations
among birth dates aren’t nearly as important as the vast range in children’s
experiences at preschool and at home. But one day as we sat in her classroom,
Andersen told me, “Every year I have two or three young ones in that August-to-October
range, and they just struggle a little.” She used to encourage parents
to send their children to kindergarten as soon as they were eligible, but
she is now a strong proponent of older kindergartners, after teaching one
child with a birthday just a few days before the cutoff. “She was always
a step behind. It wasn’t effort and it wasn’t ability. She worked hard,
her mom worked with her and she still was behind.” Andersen followed the
girl’s progress through second grade (after that, she moved to a different
school) and noticed that she didn’t catch up. Other teachers at Glen Arden
Elementary and elsewhere have noticed a similar phenomenon: not always,
but too often, the little ones stay behind.”
* * *
“After crunching the math and
science test scores for nearly a quarter-million students across 19 countries,
Bedard found that relatively younger students perform 4 to 12 percentiles
less well in third and fourth grade and 2 to 9 percentiles worse in seventh
and eighth; and, as she notes, “by eighth grade it’s fairly safe to say
we’re looking at long-term effects.”
* * *
“Bedard found that different
education systems produce varying age effects. For instance, Finland, whose
students recently came out on top in an Organization for Economic Cooperation
and Development study of math, reading and science skills, experiences
smaller age effects; Finnish children also start school later, at age 7,
and even then the first few years are largely devoted to social development
and play.”
Original
article here
Editorial: Got Math?
Over two years ago, I learned
that the statewide tests used in Vermont were based on an essay format,
and to my surprise, this included math. It was explained to me that a student
could provide an answer of “5” to the equation of “2+2.” As long as they
could explain the process by which the correct answer could be derived
(essay), the incorrect answer to the equation would not hurt their score.
I asked about subjectivity within the grading process. A representative
of the Superintendent’s office assured me that teachers were highly trained
to grade these “essay” math tests with 95% consistency. What kind of math
gets kids ready for this kind of testing?
Constructivist Math, Everyday
Math, New New Math, or fuzzy math, as some refer to it, are based on teaching
mathematical concepts with much less emphasis on computational skills.
Everyday Math can be found Vermont public schools. A national debate is
taking place between many parents and schools over the teaching of math
to kids.
I have heard from several
Vermont parents over the past few years that they are not happy with the
teaching of math in their child’s school. Vermont parents are not alone.
Parents from all over the country are having the same kind of concerns.
When parents from different localities, who do not know each other, and
from different time frames begin to have the same kind of complaints about
the education of their children, someone needs to pay attention. The debate
over Everyday Math only takes a Google search to show the depth of the
debate. College professors and Ph.D.s are also on the list of critics.
With Vermont students testing
near the top of the list on the National Assessment of Educational Progress
(NAEP), it has been said, “We are doing fine.” Are we, really? It all depends
on what is actually taught in the classroom and then how the kids are assessed
on what is taught in the classroom. If what is taught in the classroom
has raised questions and concerns, then does that not throw the testing
mechanism into question as well?
Parents from Reading,
MA, and Ridgewood,
NJ have formed parents groups to address the concerns they have
over the teaching of math. If you would like to read about their journeys,
click the links to visit their web sites. This “new” way of teaching math
has many names. Reading is dealing with the University of Chicago School
Math Program (UCSMP) and Ridgewood is dealing with Reformed Math. The focus
is on mathematical concepts to the near exclusion of computational skills.
What the parents want is balance.
If the teaching of math
has become about “getting close” to the correct answer and this is good
enough, then banks, businesses, and other financial institutions should
be understanding of this new way of doing math. It should not matter if
my check book register is off by $3.10 as long as I can explain the how
the concepts of addition and subtraction work.
This is not how the real
world works. Is not the purpose of schooling to prepare kids for the real
world? On the other hand, is the purpose of schooling to try out educational
theories on kids for years before it is decide enough is enough?
Battle Over Math in New Jersey Drives
Off a New Schools Chief
By Winnie Hu, New York Times,
June 14, 2007
Quotes from the article:
“But parents like Linda
Moran, a former math teacher, say the approach has left their children
lacking. Mrs. Moran said she became upset last year when one daughter,
10 at the time, had no idea how much she was owed after shoveling snow
for an hour and 15 minutes, at $7.50 per hour, and the other, at 13, asked
for a calculator option on her cellphone to figure out restaurant tips.
“She had started to view
herself as a non-math person, and I was not going to allow that,” said
Mrs. Moran, who, along with her husband, an engineer, now spends seven
hours a week tutoring three of their four children in math.”
Original
article here
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