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Not Just About Reading Comprehension Strategies

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Not Just About Reading Comprehension Strategies

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Research from Cognitive Psychologist, Daniel Willingham shows that it is not all about RC Strategies, but also about deep content instruction, reading across genres, and content areas.

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Professor Daniel Willingham explains how to support and develop childrens’ love for reading using explanations rooted in cognitive psychology.

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How should American teens spend their leisure time? I recently asked* American adults this question, after explaining that the typical teen enjoys approximately five hours of leisure time each weekday. ¹ The activity with the highest response, irrespective of race, education, and other demographic factors, was reading. Adults thought teens ought to spend about an hour and 15 minutes reading for pleasure each day.

How much time do teens actually spend reading? On average, six minutes. ²

What prompts a teen to choose reading over a different activity during her leisure time? Several factors would contribute, surely. Reading will hold little appeal if a student has trouble decoding or has problems with comprehension.

But what if a student is a fluent decoder and generally understands texts that she tackles? What if she just doesn't often choose to read? What might be done to motivate her, both at school and at home?

The Science of Rewards

In a nutshell, the problem of motivation is this: we want the student to do something we think is important, but she chooses not to do it. That is, of course, not an unusual problem in classrooms, and a potential motivator is some kind of negative consequence. A student who doesn't do the required work will receive low grades, or perhaps feel guilty for disappointing the teacher, or feel embarrassed should the failure become public. But by the time a student is in middle school, these blades have long lost their edge. Most unmotivated readers have the self-assurance to persuade themselves that reading is not all that important. Teachers and schools are not enthusiastic about punishment in any event, so many turn to rewards as motivators.

We want the student to read, and surely we want reading to be a positive experience. What if I offered a reward? Say I told a fourth-grader, "If you read that book, I'll give you an ice cream sundae!" The student might take me up on the deal, and he'd probably have a positive experience. So won't he then be motivated to read? It sounds so simple that it might be too good to be true.

Rewards do work, at least in the short term. If you find a reward that the student cares about, he will read in order to get it. But what we're really concerned about is his attitude toward reading; we want the student to read even if we're not around to dole out sundaes. Will the reward boost the reading attitude? Research indicates that the answer is probably no. In fact, the reward is likely to make the attitude less positive.

The classic experiment on this phenomenon was conducted in a preschool. ³ A set of attractive markers appeared during free play, and the researchers affirmed that children chose the markers from among many activities. Then the markers disappeared from the classroom. A few weeks later, researchers took children, one at a time, into a separate room. They offered some children a fancy "good player" certificate if they would draw with the markers. Other children were given the opportunity to draw with the markers but were not offered the certificate. After a few more weeks, the markers reappeared during free play in the classroom. The children who got the certificate showed notably less interest in the markers than the children who didn't get the certificate. The reward had backfired: it had made children like the markers less.

The interpretation of the study rests on how children think about their own behavior. The rewarded children likely thought, "I drew with the markers because I was offered a reward to do so. Now here are the markers but no reward. So why would I draw with them?" There have been many studies of rewards in school contexts, and they often backfire in this way. ⁴

We can imagine that rewarding children for reading could work as intended in certain circumstances. What if the child has such a positive experience while reading that it overwhelms his thinking that he's reading only for the reward? In other words, the child thinks, "Gosh, I started this book only to get that ice cream sundae, but actually it's awesome. My teacher was a sucker to offer me a sundae as a reward!" That's great when it does happen-and I think it can-but it means that rewards represent a risk. We're gambling that the book is going to be a big hit.

What about praise instead of a reward? Generally, praise is motivating to children: they will do more of whatever was praised. But praise can go wrong if it's overly controlling ("I'm so glad to see you reading. You really should do that every day.") or if the child thinks it's dishonest ("You are the best reader at school."). But if the praise seems like sincere appreciation, it's motivating. And one of the advantages of praise is that it lacks the downside of rewards. Rewards are usually set up in a bargain before the action: if you read, you'll get ice cream. Praise is generally spontaneous; you don't promise praise contingent on good behavior. That means that the praised child won't think, "I did that only to get the praise," the way the rewarded child thinks, "I did that only to get the reward." The praised child engages in the desired behavior of her own accord, and then the praise comes spontaneously. The problem is that the child must choose to read on her own before you get a chance to praise her.

Rewards in Practice

As I'm sure is clear by now, I'm not a big fan of school-based rewards for reading. That includes classroom displays of reading achievement-for example, posting on a bulletin board the number of books each student has read, or adding a segment of a class bookworm for each book. To my thinking, it puts too much emphasis on having read rather than on reading. Some students (I was one) will pick easy books to boost their "score." And as a way to recognize student achievement, it doesn't account for student differences; for some, getting through a book in a month may be a real accomplishment, yet they will feel inadequate compared with their peers. Some more formal programs, like Accelerated Reader and Pizza Hut's Book It, try to make up for some of the problems inherent in a reward system. Books are allocated different points based on difficulty, for example, or each student is assigned a personal, teacher-set reading target.

All in all, I think it's a mistake to be absolutist and say that rewards should never be used. Instead, I suggest they not be the first thing teachers try, and I want educators to be aware of the research literature on potential drawbacks. I know that some districts adapt Accelerated Reader or another program for their own use, ignoring the point system, for example. The research literature on Accelerated Reader in particular is, in fact, mixed. ⁵ Much appears to depend on how it is implemented.

Such programs bring to mind a conversation I had with a district administrator. Students in her schools come from very poor homes, and she told me that they do not grow up seeing their parents read. A benefactor started a program whereby children earn cash for reading books, and the administrator felt that it was helpful. Children had not been reading, the rewards got them started, and they discovered they really liked to read. I think it would be highhanded and naive to suggest that the district stop the program. In fact, this seems exactly the situation in which to try rewards: when you can't otherwise get a toehold, rewards offer a way to get children to at least try pleasure reading. Children may then discover that they like it, and even when the rewards stop, they keep going.

But if rewards are to be a last resort, what ought to be tried first?

Academic versus Pleasure Reading

Our goal is to encourage children to read so they can feel the pleasure of reading; rewards are meant to be a temporary incentive to start the process.

What if children don't need rewards? What if they already feel the pleasure of reading, but that feeling gets lost in less positive feelings-feelings created by the other demands of schoolwork? We expect students to feel the joy of reading when they get lost in a narrative or feel the pleasure of discovery when reading nonfiction. But as they move through elementary school and on to middle school, we add other purposes to reading. One purpose is learning: the student is expected to read a text and study it so that he can reproduce the information (e.g., on a quiz). A second purpose is to help complete a task-a project, say-which usually entails gathering information. A third purpose is to analyze how a text works-that is, how the author writes to make the reader laugh or cry. I'll use the umbrella term "academic reading" to contrast these purposes with pleasure reading.

My concern is that children might confuse academic reading with reading for pleasure. ⁶ If they do, they will come to think of reading as work, plain and simple. Sure, we'd like to think that academic reading is pleasurable, but in most schools, "pleasure" is not a litmus test. The student who tells the teacher, "I tried reading that photosynthesis stuff, but it was too boring," will not be told to find something else she'd prefer. Academic reading feels like work because it is work. But pleasure ought to be the litmus test for reading for pleasure.

I think it's a good idea for teachers to communicate these distinctions to students-not that "most of the reading we're doing is academic and therefore not fun," but that reading serves different purposes and that there is a distinction between academic reading and pleasure reading.

In some classrooms, pleasure reading is segregated from academic reading: we read because we love reading, and then we also learn how to work with texts. But the way pleasure reading is handled can still send a silent message to students that reading is work. Coercion sends that message. If a teacher makes pleasure reading a requirement (10 minutes per night, say) or demands accountability (by keeping a reading log, for example), she risks sending the message that reading is nothing students would do of their own accord.

Pleasure Reading in Class

Drawing a distinction between academic reading and pleasure reading will probably not be enough to get children actually reading. What else might be tried? Schools and teachers can strive to make reading expected and normal by devoting some proportion of class time to silent pleasure reading. Research shows that many reading programs don't actually allocate much time to reading. ⁷ Successful programs for silent classroom reading tend to have certain elements in common: ⁸

Students have adequate time set aside for reading; they need at least a 20-minute reading period to get into their books. Teachers set the duration dependent on their students' reading stamina (i.e., how long they can sustain attention).

Students freely choose what they read. Choice is enormously important for motivation,⁹ but there must be teacher guidance and teacher-set limits. Given the chance, some students will pick books that entail no reading at all. (As researcher Nell Duke ruefully noted, "independent reading time" too often turns into "independent find Waldo time.")¹⁰ Teachers must not only monitor text difficulty, but also ensure that students are exposed to a variety of genres.

Students have ready access to a good number of books.

Students have some opportunity to feel a sense of community through reading with book discussions, recommendations, and other sorts of activities that avid adult readers practice.

The teacher actively teaches during this time: fielding questions, helping students select books, and conferring with students. The alternative is that the teacher reads her own book at the same time as the students, with the idea that she's modeling what a good reader does. But students can't necessarily appreciate what she's doing. Teachers actually teaching during in-class reading time seems to be essential to student success. Some of the most careful experiments indicate that without this feature, students don't benefit from silent reading time in class.¹¹

Setting aside class time for silent pleasure reading seems to me the best way to engage a student who has no interest in reading. It offers the gentlest pressure that is still likely to work. Everyone else is reading, there's not much else to do, and a sharp-eyed teacher will notice those who are faking it. Freedom of choice also allows the greatest possibility that when the reluctant reader does give a book a try, he'll hit on something that he likes.

Given that I'm recommending this practice, you probably think there must be good research evidence that it's effective. In truth, I'd say the latest data indicate that it probably improves attitudes, vocabulary, and comprehension. ¹² Some studies show a positive effect, but some don't.

I think the squishiness of the findings is attributable to the difficulty of the teaching method. I'm sure classroom pleasure reading is easy to implement poorly: stick some books in the room, allocate some class time, and you're done. But the teacher's responsibilities when it's done well are heavy indeed. She must help students select books that they are likely to enjoy. That means really knowing each child, and a middle school teacher likely has more than 100 students. If a teacher is going to be able to confer with students about what they have read, she needs to have read the book herself. Hence, she needs comprehensive knowledge of the literature appropriate to the grade level. And although I've said that silent pleasure reading is a good way to gently persuade reluctant students to give reading a try, let's not pretend this is easy. A sixth-grader who believes that reading is boring has a pretty firm sense of herself as decidedly not a reader; a teacher must be a skilled psychologist to work around that attitude and help the student be open to reading.

Reading at Home

I've mentioned that students' reading responsibilities change at school in later elementary years. An important change at home is their greater access to and use of digital technologies. What impact do these have on how much children read and their attitudes toward reading?

Most of the parents I talk to are convinced that digital devices are having a profound and mostly negative impact on reading. The research on this issue is more limited than you might guess. We're predicting a long-term consequence of the use of digital technologies, but these technologies haven't been available all that long. That said, I think the digital age is having a negative effect on motivation, but not through the mechanism that most parents fear.

Concentration Lost

Teachers may think that students today are easily bored because of digital devices. ¹³ Why? Some observers-including prominent reading researcher Maryanne Wolf-have suggested that habitual web reading, characterized by bouncing from one topic to another and skimming rather than reading, changes the ability to read deeply. ¹⁴ Nick Carr popularized this sinister possibility with the question: "Is Google Making Us Stupid?" ¹⁵ In that article (and in a follow-up book, The Shallows), Carr argued that something had happened to his brain. ¹⁶ Years of quick pivots in his thinking prompted by web surfing had left him unable to read a serious novel or long article. That does sound similar to the mental change many teachers believe they have seen in their students in the last decade or two; students can't pay attention, and teachers feel they must do a song and dance to engage them.

I doubt that reading on the web renders us unable to concentrate, and although a formal poll has not been taken, I suspect most cognitive psychologists agree. ¹⁷ Yes, video games and surfing the web change the brain. So does reading this article, singing a song, or seeing a stranger smile. The brain is adaptive, so it's always changing.

If the brain is adaptive, couldn't that mean that it would adapt to the need for constant shifts in attention and so maybe lose the ability to sustain attention to one thing? I don't think so, because the basic architecture of the mind probably can't be completely reshaped. Cognitive systems (vision, attention, memory, problem solving) are too interdependent for that. If one system changed in a fundamental way-such as losing the ability to stay focused on one thing-that change would cascade through the entire cognitive system, affecting most or all aspects of thought. A shorter attention span would not only affect reading, it would affect our ability to reason or solve problems, for example. The brain is probably too conservative in its adaptability for that to happen.

More important, I don't know of any good evidence that young people are worse at sustaining attention than their parents were at their age. Teens can sustain attention through a three-hour movie like The Hobbit. They are capable of reading a novel they enjoy, like The Perks of Being a Wallflower. So I doubt that they can't sustain attention. But being able to sustain attention is no guarantee that they'll do so. They must deem something worthy of their attention, and that is where digital technologies may have their impact: they change expectations.

"I'm Bored. Fix It."

Despite the diversity of activities that digital technologies afford, many share two characteristics. First, whatever experience the technology offers, you get it immediately. Second, producing this experience requires minimal effort. For example, if you don't like the YouTube video you're watching, you can switch to another. In fact, the website makes it simple by displaying a list of suggestions. If you get tired of videos, you can check Facebook. If that's boring, look for something funny on TheOnion.com.

Watching television offers the same feature: channels abound on cable, but if nothing appeals, pick something from Netflix. If you have a smartphone-and about 80 percent of teens do-then all these amusements are with you all the time. ¹⁸

The consequence of long-term experience with digital technologies is not an inability to sustain attention. It's impatience with boredom. It's an expectation that I should always have something interesting to watch, read, or listen to, and that creating an interesting experience should require little effort. The mind-boggling availability of experiences afforded by digital technologies means there is always something right at hand that one might do. Unless we're really engrossed, we have the continuous, nagging suspicion that "there must be a better way to spend my time than this." That's why, when a friend sends a link to a video titled "Dog goes crazy over sprinkler-FUNNY!" I find myself impatient if it's not funny within the first 10 seconds.

In other words, we're not distractible. We just have a very low threshold for boredom.

And this low threshold is not due to long-term changes in the brain. It's due to beliefs-beliefs about what is worthy of sustained attention and what brings rewarding experiences. Beliefs are difficult to change, but they can be changed.

The Displacements

There's no time for reading! This idea is not new. It's called the displacement hypothesis, and though it comes in several varieties, the basic idea is that when a new activity (like browsing the web) becomes available, it takes the place of something else we have typically done (like reading). Evaluating whether that's true is tricky because lots of factors go into our choices. For example, if you simply ask, "Does television displace reading?" you're expecting a negative correlation: people who watch more TV read less, and people who watch less TV read more. But research shows that the wealthier you are, the more leisure time you have. So even if television does bite into reading time, we may not see the data pattern we expect because both activities are facilitated by free time.

So has reading been displaced by digital technologies? On balance, the answer seems to be no, although most of the research in this country has focused on adults, not children. ¹⁹ Researchers have examined correlations between time spent on the Internet and time spent reading, statistically controlling for other variables like overall amount of leisure time. The correlation in most studies seems to be nil or slightly positive (in the direction opposite that predicted by the displacement hypothesis). Research on television viewing does indicate that heavy viewing (more than four hours each day) is associated with less reading. ²⁰

Given the enormous amount of time devoted to digital technologies, how is it possible that children don't shove reading aside? One answer is that most people read so little, there isn't much to be shoved aside. In 1999, when they had virtually no access to digital technologies (outside of gaming), children (ages 8 to 18) spent an average of just 21 minutes per day reading books. In 2009, when access was much greater, they averaged 25 minutes. ²¹ These data are a little deceptive, however, because they are averages. It's not that every child in 1999 read for about 21 minutes. Rather, some read quite a bit and some (about 50 percent) didn't read at all. So for half of kids, there was no chance for digital technologies to displace reading.

For the kids in 1999 who did read, it may be that reading provided a sort of pleasure that digital technologies didn't replace. They liked the fun that digital technologies provide, but it was a different sort of fun than they got from reading. Notably, magazine and newspaper reading did drop during the decade that followed, arguably because that sort of reading can be done on the Internet.

I'm offering a mixed message. Good news: I doubt digital activities are "changing children's brains" in a scary way, and I don't think they soak up reading time. Bad news: they are leading children to expect full-time amusement, and for some, reading time isn't soaked up only because there's little to soak up. It's already dry as a sun-bleached saltine.

Which leads to a rather glum conclusion: most children don't read, and even if digital devices aren't directly absorbing time that might otherwise be devoted to reading, they might be making children expect instant gratification from leisure activities. But don't despair. Parents and teachers can take positive steps that might even tempt a sulky teen to read.

How Parents Can Help

A lot of students mistakenly believe that reading means books written by dead people who have nothing to say that would be relevant to a teen's life. Nevertheless, students are expected to pore over these authors' words, study them, summarize them, analyze them for hidden meaning, and then write a five-page paper about them. To children, that's reading. It's not contemporary. It doesn't have characters a student can identify with. It's not nonfiction. It's not magazines or graphic novels.

If a student hates reading, what might tempt her to give it a try? One entry point is a book with a story she already knows, for example, a novelization of a movie she loved. Or perhaps a book of trivia and backstage gossip about a television show she enjoys. Or you might branch out by seeking a book with less familiar content but related to her interests. For example, my niece (along with millions of other teens) got interested in forensic science through the television show CSI.

Parents should consider books that look fun. A thick book with small print looks intimidating to less-than-confident readers. Go for books that have short chapters or go for graphic novels, which look easy because of the pictures. (But be advised, many are challenging.) Children in their mid-to-late elementary school years might appreciate a collection of a comic strip they enjoy. And older kids may be interested in manga (pronounced mayn-ga), a variety of comic from Japan. Manga are published in just about every genre you can think of: adventure, mystery, horror, fantasy, and comedy, but note that mature themes (sexuality, violence) are not rare.

Another source to consider: websites like Wattpad and Figment. These operate a bit like social networking sites in that users "follow" people who post content. Users can also upvote (or "like") content and comment on it. On these sites, the content is fiction. Amateur writers post stories, hoping to gain an audience. Much of the content is aimed at teens and preteens, and people often serialize their content; they don't post an entire novel, but rather post a chapter at a time. These bite-size portions might appeal to a reluctant reader-3,000 words can be read on your phone during a bus ride.

Parents may object that this sort of reading material is poorly written and glorifies aspects of popular culture that they find distasteful. That's a judgment call, of course. I would not let my children read material that is misogynistic, racist, or the like. But if my teen avoided all reading, I would be fine with him reading "junk." Before he can develop taste, he must experience hunger. The first step is to open his mind to the idea that printed material is worth his time. I believe parents will further their own goals by showing curiosity about their children's interests rather than disdain. Taking your child seriously as a reader-by, for example, taking a reading recommendation from him-might make him take himself more seriously as a reader.

Use social connections. How do students learn about movies they want to see or video games they want to play? Through media advertising and their friends. Save a few highly successful series, there is no advertising for print material. It's all word of mouth, and most kids don't read.

Parents can try to correct this knowledge deficit directly by telling their children about content they think they'd like, but it would likely be more effective for students to hear these things from peers. For adults, reading is often social. Part of the success of Oprah Winfrey's book club is the feeling of being part of a group. Teens are hypersocial, so reading ought to be social for them as well.

Technology can help. There are countless book groups on the web-boards where kids discuss books, trade recommendations, post fan fiction, and the like. Booksellers offer online book reviews and discussions that are heavily populated (see www.amazon.com/forum/book and www.barnesandnoble.com/bookclubs). Social cataloging sites, such as www.goodreads.com/genres/young-adult, www.shelfari.com, and www.librarything.com, allow users to comment on other people's posts, let others know what they read or plan to read, get recommendations, offer commentary, engage in discussions, and so on. Goodreads also allows the posting of pictures and animated GIFs, which teens do in abundance. And for serious readers, several websites offer reviews, blogs, author interviews, and other information that might provide a welcome home for teens who like reading but don't have friends who do. For example, see www.readergirlz.com, www.guyslitwire.com, and www.teenreads.com.

A child is not likely to dive into one of these communities. The most probable entry point would be through that rare book that does capture her imagination; that's the moment parents should make sure she knows that there are websites where other enthusiasts are discussing the book.

Make it easy to access books. Will an electronic reader help motivation? There are a few scattered studies on this question, showing mixed results. ²² Honestly, I'd be surprised if an e-reader made books appealing to a child who hates reading. Pleasure reading is just not that different on an e-reader, and when asked, students say they actually prefer paper; 80 percent who have experience with e-books say they still read print more often. ²³

Yet these same students say they think they would read more if they had access to e-books, and I tend to believe them. I don't think e-readers make reading more fun, once the device has lost its gee-whiz luster, but an e-reader improves access. Being able to download virtually any book you want as soon as you want it (barring cost considerations) is a great advantage. If a child has just finished book two of a trilogy and is eager to read the final book, or he has just heard from a friend about a fantastic new title, that's when he's most excited to get it. But if he has to wait a few days to get to a bookstore or library, his interest may have moved on to something new. Older students can download an e-reader for their phones. It's free, and that way they can always have a book with them.

What Teachers Can Do

A friend of mine works for a program that provides information and services to low-income parents. My friend told me of a young mother saying that she appreciated the books the group had provided for read-alouds and wondered if she could have more. My friend was pleased but surprised, as the mother had already received a large number of books. As they chatted, it became clear that the mother had been discarding each book after her child had heard it once. She didn't know it was permissible (let alone desirable) for her child to hear the same book more than once.

You may have students in your class who have parents like this mother: they want to do the right thing but need a lot of help, down to details of execution that others take for granted. Teachers also tell me of parents who are less open to the idea of a central place for reading in their homes. They did not grow up in reading homes, and they feel that they turned out just fine. Or they like the idea in principle but are not confident about their own reading. What can teachers do to promote reading in children with parents who don't know how to support it or perhaps aren't eager to do so? I can offer three suggestions.

Offer parent workshops. Research shows that telling parents about research-based practices in reading does lead to improvement in children's reading. ²⁴ A team of teachers might develop workshops that:

Offer information about the impact of parents' attitudes on children's success. Even though literacy is important to a child's success in school, reading at home should focus on pleasure. Teachers should teach; parents don't need to. Parents should support reading as a gateway to pleasure. Research shows that parents who view reading as fun actually have kids who read better than parents who view reading as an academic skill.²⁵

Offer information about how to read to a young child: how to fit it into one's day, what to do when the child is fidgety, how to find interesting books, and so on. For parents of older kids, provide information about how to support the emergent reader: when to offer support and of what sort, how long the child should read, and what sort of material he should read.

Offer information about how to include more reading in daily life-for example, encouraging the child to bring a book for the ride to school-and suggestions for ways to reduce television watching and video gaming.

If workshops are to have an impact, parents must attend, so organizers might consider ways to make it as easy as possible for parents to do so. In addition to good publicity, strategies might include providing childcare, holding the workshop on the first floor so parents with strollers aren't thwarted, and scheduling with sensitivity to working hours (or better, scheduling the same workshop at different times). Organizers might also consider an initial parent-child event that has nothing to do with reading at all but is meant only to establish the school as a welcoming place. I visited a school that held a mother-daughter nail-art night for this purpose.

Provide books. Suppose you simply gave kids free books? Would they read them, and would their reading improve? Research on the impact of free-book programs has typically focused on the summer months because that's when kids who don't read really fall behind those who do. ²⁶ It's a special problem for low-income kids, ²⁷ as they don't have the access to books (either at home or at libraries) that wealthier children do. ²⁸ Summer school programs meant to encourage kids to read at home are known to be effective, ²⁹ but they are expensive.

The less expensive alternative is to provide books and hope for the best, and there is some indication that doing so does prompt reading and, in turn, boosts reading skills. ³⁰ As you might guess, free-book programs seem to have a bigger impact on low-income kids than middle-income kids. ³¹

A number of organizations provide free books to children in need (see the "Resources" box on the right). A small team of teachers might take on the task of contacting these organizations to procure books that can be distributed directly to students.

Plant a seed. Even if parents won't come for a workshop, you can still use the brief snippets of time you have with them to try to plant a literacy seed: if they come for a parent-teacher conference, great, but if not, perhaps it's an opportune moment at pickup when the child is struggling into his jacket. What might such a seed be? If parents seem very reluctant to accord a larger role for literacy, a greater emphasis on conversation at home may lay the groundwork for literacy later.

Much has been written about the importance of talking to children, but the dictate "talk to your kids" says nothing about the quality of the speech. Child-directed talk composed mostly of directions (e.g., "Go get me the milk") or prohibitions (e.g., "Stop that") is not what we have in mind, but that may be what the child receives if a parent sees conversation with children as frivolous. A way around this is to suggest that parents share with their children stories of their own childhood. Stories provide structure for extended talk that is social, family-oriented, and not directive. From about age 5 until pubescence (and sometimes into the teen years), children often enjoy hearing stories that verify the remarkable fact that their parents were once young.

Another option is to suggest that parents ask their child questions. Hearing adult speech is a useful model, but the child also needs practice in formulating and expressing her ideas. In addition, asking questions sends an important implicit message about the nature of speech. The parent who uses speech mostly to tell his child what to do silently communicates to the child that the purpose of language is to make one's wishes known to others. The parent who asks questions shows that another purpose of language is to gain new information, to learn things from others. ³² It's a way to model curiosity.

A natural topic for questions is what happened during the school day. Teachers can help by letting parents know when a student was particularly excited about some work during the day, and suggesting that the parent ask about it. For willing parents, a teacher could even arrange to make such communications regular, for example, by sending a text message every few days that tells parents something about classroom life that they could ask their children about: which book was read aloud, for example, or what the writing prompt was that day.

* * *

What parents and teachers really want for children is to experience reading pleasure. What sort of reading pleasure? For me, reading affords a pleasure of understanding. Food writer Ruth Reichl, for example, can snare in words the elusive subtleties in the flavor of toro. Other writers make me understand things about myself, not always appealing things. After reading the memoir Clear Pictures, I remember reflecting on how lucky Reynolds Price was to have grown up among such wise and interesting people, only to realize that it was Price's acumen and sensitivity that made them so; had I known them, I would likely have missed their finest qualities. As an adult, I get great satisfaction from, at long last, coming to a better understanding of ideas that I've often encountered but only dimly comprehended; most recently, it's been the tensions among the founders of the United States.

An altogether different sort of pleasure comes from being carried to distant times and places when I read. How better to see the French Riviera during the 1920s than through the debauched, exhausted eyes of Dick Diver in Tender Is the Night? How could I enter the alternately solemn and boisterous world of New York's Hasidim if Chaim Potok did not take me there? And then too sometimes the pleasure lies not in the charms of a new world but in escape from my own. During graduate school, I read Herman Wouk's two-volume World War II epic The Winds of War and War and Remembrance nearly daily at lunch; I used it like worry beads to manage the anxiety consequent to my demanding academic program.

I maintain that these joys cannot be experienced through television or other media. Only reading elicits your contribution to the experience by demanding that you mentally create the world described. Only fiction demands that you live with the characters as long or as deeply. And with few exceptions, prose stylists show greater love of language than artists in other media.

I want my children-and yours-to experience those joys, or ones like them. And that's the goal you must keep in the forefront of your mind. As someone who has spent all of his professional life around 18- to 22-year-olds, I'll offer my impression as to what causes the greatest conflict between parents and teens: Parents are under the impression that they want their children to be happy. Children are under the impression that their parents want them to be happy the way their parents think they ought to be happy.

The danger lies in children feeling pressured and unhappy about reading. Remember that your goal is that they enjoy reading, not that they enjoy reading as you do.

Daniel T. Willingham is a professor of cognitive psychology at the University of Virginia. He is the author of When Can You Trust the Experts? How to Tell Good Science from Bad in Education and Why Don't Students Like School? For his articles on education, go to www.danielwillingham.com. This article is adapted with permission of the publisher from his most recent book, Raising Kids Who Read: What Parents and Teachers Can Do. Copyright 2015 Jossey-Bass/Wiley. All rights reserved.

*The survey was conducted on MTurk, a website where volunteers can perform brief computer tasks for pay. We paid each of our 313 participants (53.4 percent female, mean age = 35.2 years) 35 cents. All were Americans at least 18 years old. The instructions said, "The average American teenager between the ages of 15 and 19 has 5.1 hours of leisure time on a typical weekday. How would you hope that your child would allocate his or her 5.1 hours (that's 306 minutes) among the following activities? Enter the number of minutes in the box next to each activity." The wording varied so that respondents without a teenage child were asked to answer as if they did. ( back to the article)

†For more on the effectiveness of rewards, see " Should Learning Be Its Own Reward?" in the Winter 2007-2008 issue of American Educator. ( back to the article)

‡For more on the effects of praising students, see " How Praise Can Motivate-or Stifle" in the Winter 2005-2006 issue of American Educator. ( back to the article)

§For more about the word gap between low-income and more-affluent children, see " The Early Catastrophe" in the Spring 2003 issue of American Educator. ( back to the article)

Endnotes

1. Bureau of Labor Statistics, "American Time Use Survey-2013 Results," news release, June 18, 2014, www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/atus.pdf.

2. Bureau of Labor Statistics, "American Time Use Survey."

3. Mark R. Lepper, David Greene, and Richard E. Nisbett, "Undermining Children's Intrinsic Interest with Extrinsic Reward: A Test of the 'Overjustification Hypothesis,'" Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 28, no. 1 (1973): 129-137.

4. For a review, see Edward L. Deci, Richard Koestner, and Richard M. Ryan, "A Meta-Analytic Review of Experiments Examining the Effects of Extrinsic Rewards on Intrinsic Motivation," Psychological Bulletin 125 (1999): 627-668.

5. Laurie E. Hansen, Penny Collins, and Mark Warschauer, "Reading Management Programs: A Review of the Research," Journal of Literacy and Technology 10, no. 3 (2009): 55-80.

6. Kelly Gallagher, Readicide: How Schools Are Killing Reading and What You Can Do about It (Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers, 2009).

7. Devon Brenner, Elfrieda H. Hiebert, and Renarta Tompkins, "How Much and What Are Third Graders Reading?," in Reading More, Reading Better, ed. Elfrieda. H. Hiebert (New York: Guilford Press, 2009), 118-140.

8. Emily A. Swan, Cassandra S. Coddington, and John T. Guthrie, "Engaged Silent Reading," in Revisiting Silent Reading: New Directions for Teachers and Researchers, ed. Elfrieda H. Hiebert and D. Ray Reutzel (Newark, DE: International Reading Association, 2010), 95-111.

9. John T. Guthrie and Allan Wigfield, "Engagement and Motivation in Reading," in Handbook of Reading Research, ed. Michael L. Kamil, Peter B. Mosenthal, P. David Pearson, and Rebecca Barr, vol. 3 (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2000), 403-422; and Gay Ivey and Karen Broaddus, "'Just Plain Reading': A Survey of What Makes Students Want to Read in Middle School Classrooms," Reading Research Quarterly 36 (2001): 350-377.

10. Debbie Miller and Barbara Moss, No More Independent Reading without Support (Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2013).

11. Michael L. Kamil, "How to Get Recreational Reading to Increase Reading Achievement," in 57th Yearbook of the National Reading Conference, ed. Youb Kim et al. (Oak Creek, WI: National Reading Conference, 2008), 31-40.

12. Maryann Manning and Marta Lewis, "Sustained Silent Reading: An Update of the Research," in Hiebert and Reutzel, Revisiting Silent Reading, 112-128; D. Ray Reutzel, Yaacov Petscher, and Alexandra N. Spichtig, "Exploring the Value Added of a Guided, Silent Reading Intervention: Effects on Struggling Third-Grade Readers' Achievement," Journal of Educational Research 105 (2012): 404-415; Jun-Chae Yoon, "Three Decades of Sustained Silent Reading: A Meta-Analytic Review of the Effects of SSR on Attitude toward Reading," Reading Improvement 39, no. 4 (2002): 186-195; and National Reading Panel, Teaching Children to Read: An Evidence-Based Assessment of the Scientific Research Literature on Reading and Its Implications for Reading Instruction; Reports of the Subgroups (Bethesda, MD: National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2000).

13. Matt Richtel, "Technology Changing How Students Learn, Teachers Say," New York Times, November 1, 2012.

14. Michael S. Rosenwald, "Serious Reading Takes a Hit from Online Scanning and Skimming, Researchers Say," Washington Post, April 6, 2014.

15. Nicholas Carr, "Is Google Making Us Stupid?," Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education 107, no. 2 (2008): 89-94.

16. Nicholas Carr, The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2011).

17. Kathryn L. Mills, "Effects of Internet Use on the Adolescent Brain: Despite Popular Claims, Experimental Evidence Remains Scarce," Trends in Cognitive Sciences 18 (2014): 385-387; Steven Pinker, "Mind over Mass Media," New York Times, June 10, 2010; and Roger Schank, "The Thinking Process Hasn't Changed in 50,000 Years," Edge.org, 2010, http://edge.org/responses/how-is-the-internet-changing-the-way-you-think.

18. "The Mobile Device Path to Purchase: Parents & Children," Communicus, accessed November 14, 2014, www.communicus.com/2014/08/22/mobile-device-path-purchase-parents-child....

19. Kouider Mokhtari, Carla A. Reichard, and Anne Gardner, "The Impact of Internet and Television Use on the Reading Habits and Practices of College Students," Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy 52 (2009): 609-619; John P. Robinson, "Arts and Leisure Participation among IT Users: Further Evidence of Time Enhancement over Time Displacement," Social Science Computer Review 29 (2011): 470-480; John P. Robinson and Steven Martin, "IT and Activity Displacement: Behavioral Evidence from the U.S. General Social Survey (GSS)," Social Indicators Research 91 (2009): 115-139.

20. Cees M. Koolstra and Tom H. A. van der Voort, "Longitudinal Effects of Television on Children's Leisure-Time Reading: A Test of Three Explanatory Models," Human Communication Research 23 (1996): 4-35.

21. Victoria J. Rideout, Ulla G. Foehr, and Donald F. Roberts, Generation M2: Media in the Lives of 8- to 18-Year-Olds (Menlo Park, CA: Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010).

22. Tricia A. Zucker, Amelia K. Moody, and Michael C. McKenna, "The Effects of Electronic Books on Pre-Kindergarten-to-Grade 5 Students' Literacy and Language Outcomes: A Research Synthesis," Journal of Educational Computing Research 40 (2009): 47-87.

23. Scholastic, Kids & Family Reading Report, 4th ed. (New York: Scholastic, 2013).

24. Jennifer Sloan McCombs, Catherine H. Augustine, Heather L. Schwartz, Susan J. Bodilly, Brian McInnis, Dahlia S. Lichter, and Amanda Brown Cross, Making Summer Count: How Summer Programs Can Boost Children's Learning (Santa Monica, CA: Rand Corporation, 2011).

25. Linda Baker, "The Role of Parents in Motivating Struggling Readers," Reading and Writing Quarterly 19 (2003): 87-106.

26. James S. Kim and Thomas G. White, "Scaffolding Voluntary Summer Reading for Children in Grades 3 to 5: An Experimental Study," Scientific Studies of Reading 12 (2008): 1-23; and Joshua Fahey Lawrence, "Summer Reading: Predicting Adolescent Word Learning from Aptitude, Time Spent Reading, and Text Type," Reading Psychology 30 (2009): 445-465.

27. David T. Burkam, Douglas D. Ready, Valerie E. Lee, and Laura F. LoGerfo, "Social-Class Differences in Summer Learning Between Kindergarten and First Grade: Model Specification and Estimation," Sociology of Education 77 (2004): 1-31.

28. Susan B. Neuman and Donna Celano, "Access to Print in Low-Income and Middle-Income Communities: An Ecological Study of Four Neighborhoods," Reading Research Quarterly 36 (2001): 8-26.

29. Harris Cooper, Kelly Charlton, Jeff C. Valentine, and Laura Muhlenbruck, "Making the Most of Summer School: A Meta-Analytic and Narrative Review," Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development 65, no. 1 (2000): 1-118.

30. Richard L. Allington, Anne McGill-Franzen, Gregory Camilli, Lunetta Williams, Jennifer Graff, Jacqueline Zeig, Courtney Zmach, and Rhonda Nowak, "Addressing Summer Reading Setback among Economically Disadvantaged Elementary Students," Reading Psychology 31 (2010): 411-427; James S. Kim, "Effects of a Voluntary Summer Reading Intervention on Reading Achievement: Results from a Randomized Field Trial," Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis 28 (2006): 335-355; and Susan B. Neuman, "Books Make a Difference: A Study of Access to Literacy," Reading Research Quarterly 34 (1999): 286-311.

31. James S. Kim and David M. Quinn, "The Effects of Summer Reading on Low-Income Children's Literacy Achievement from Kindergarten to Grade 8: A Meta-Analysis of Classroom and Home Interventions," Review of Educational Research 83 (2013): 386-431.

32. Barbara Tizard and Martin Hughes, Young Children Learning (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984).

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How should American teens spend their leisure time? I recently asked* American adults this question, after explaining that the typical teen enjoys approximately five hours of leisure time each weekday.1 The activity with the highest response, irrespective of race, education, and other demographic factors, was reading. Adults thought teens ought to spend about an hour and 15 minutes reading for pleasure each day. How much time do teens actually spend reading? On average, six minutes.2

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Setting up the first weeks of school properly makes a difference for the rest of the year.

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This school year, more than ever, teachers have been labeled by many as superheroes. According to Wikipedia, "a superhero or superheroine is a stock character that possesses abilities beyond those of ordinary people, who typically uses his or her powers to help the world become a better place, or is dedicated to protecting the public, Read More "
Continue Reading

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First Weeks of School Archives | Responsive Classroom

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This school year, more than ever, teachers have been labeled by many as superheroes.

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Resources from P21
http://www.p21.org/about-us/p21-framework/264

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Ed Sheeran's acceptance speech at the American Institute for Stuttering. (Contains Adult Language at a few points)

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Being Weird is a Wonderful Thing - Ed Sheeran | Goalcast

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"95% of the people reported a bullied Whopper Jr. Only 12% of customers stood up to a HS Jr. being bullied."

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* Analyze & Take Responsible Action

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Teaching Grammar in Context.

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Best Ways to Study (2013) from Scientific American

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Best Ways to Study (2013) from Scientific American

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“Research shows practice tests and engaging in distributed practice work the best”.

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See Inside

Some study techniques accelerate learning, whereas others are just a waste of time-but which ones are which? An unprecedented review maps out the best pathways to knowledge

Image: CELIA JOHNSON

Education generally focuses on what you study, such as algebra, the elements of the periodic table or how to conjugate verbs. But learning how to study can be just as important, with lifelong benefits. It can teach you to pick up knowledge faster and more efficiently and allow you to retain information for years rather than days.

Cognitive and educational psychologists have developed and evaluated numerous techniques, ranging from rereading to summarizing to self-testing, for more than 100 years. Some common strategies markedly improve student achievement, whereas others are time-consuming and ineffective. Yet this information is not making its way into the classroom. Teachers today are not being told which learning techniques are supported by experimental evidence, and students are not being taught how to use the ones that work well. In fact, the two study aids that students rely on the most are not effective. One of them may even undermine success.

One potential reason is that the huge amount of research is overwhelming, making it difficult for educators and learners to identify the most practical and advantageous ways to study. To meet this challenge, we reviewed more than 700 scientific articles on 10 commonly used learning techniques. We focused on strategies that seem to be easy to use and broadly effective. We also took a closer look at a couple of methods that are very popular with students.

To receive our recommendation, a technique must be useful in a range of learning conditions, such as whether a student works alone or in a group. It must assist learners of various ages, abilities and levels of prior knowledge-and have been tested in a classroom or other real-world situation. Learners should be able to use the method to master a variety of subjects, and their performance should benefit no matter what kind of test is used to measure it. The best approaches also result in long-lasting improvements in knowledge and comprehension.

Using these criteria, we identified two clear winners. They produced robust, durable results and were relevant in many situations. Three more are recommended with reservations, and five-including two popular learning aids-are not advised, either because they are useful only in limited circumstances or because not enough evidence supports a higher rating. We encourage researchers to further explore some of the untested techniques, but students and teachers should be cautious about relying on them.

1. Self-Testing: Quizzing Yourself Gets High Marks

How it works: Unlike a test that evaluates knowledge, practice tests are done by students on their own, outside of class. Methods might include using flashcards (physical or digital) to test recall or answering the sample questions at the end of a textbook chapter. Although most students prefer to take as few tests as possible, hundreds of experiments show that self-testing improves learning and retention.

In one study, undergraduates were asked to memorize word pairs, half of which were then included on a recall test. One week later the students remembered 35 percent of the word pairs they had been tested on, compared with only 4 percent of those they had not. In another demonstration, undergraduates were presented with Swahili-English translations, followed by either practice testing or review. Recall for items they had been repeatedly tested on was 80 percent, compared with only 36 percent for items they had restudied. One theory is that practice testing triggers a mental search of long-term memory that activates related information, forming multiple memory pathways that make the information easier to access.

When does it work? Anyone from preschoolers to fourth-year medical students to middle-age adults can benefit from practice testing. It can be used for all kinds of factual information, including learning words in foreign languages, making spelling lists and memorizing the parts of flowers. It even improves retention for people with Alzheimer's disease. Short, frequent exams are most effective, especially when test takers receive feedback on the correct answers.

Practice testing works even when its format is different from that of the real test. The beneficial effects may last for months to years-great news, given that durable learning is so important.

Is it practical? Yes. It requires modest amounts of time and little to no training.

How can I do it? Students can self-test with flashcards or by using the Cornell system: During in-class note taking, make a column on one edge of the page where you enter key terms or questions. You can test yourself later by covering the notes and answering the questions (or explaining the keywords) on the other side.

Rating: High utility. Practice testing works across an impressive range of formats, content, learner ages and retention intervals.

2. Distributed Practice: For Best Results, Spread Your Study over Time

How it works: Students often "mass" their study-in other words, they cram. But distributing learning over time is much more effective. In one classic experiment, students learned the English equivalents of Spanish words then reviewed the material in six sessions. One group did the review sessions back to back, another had them one day apart and a third did the reviews 30 days apart. The students in the 30-day group remembered the translations the best. In an analysis of 254 studies involving more than 14,000 participants, students recalled more after spaced study (scoring 47 percent overall) than after massed study (37 percent).

When does it work? Children as young as age three benefit, as do undergraduates and older adults. Distributed practice is effective for learning foreign vocabulary, word definitions, and even skills such as mathematics, music and surgery.

Is it practical? Yes. Although textbooks usually group problems together by topic, you can intersperse them on your own. You will have to plan ahead and overcome the common student tendency to procrastinate.

How can I do it? Longer intervals are generally more effective. In one study, 30-day delays improved performance more than lags of just one day. In an Internet-based study of trivia learning, peak performance came when sessions were spaced at about 10 to 20 percent of the retention interval. To remember something for one week, learning episodes should be 12 to 24 hours apart; to remember something for five years, they should be spaced six to 12 months apart. Although it may not seem like it, you actually do retain information even during these long intervals, and you quickly relearn what you have forgotten. Long delays are ideal to retain fundamental concepts that form the basis for advanced knowledge.

Rating: High utility. Distributed practice is effective for learners of different ages studying a wide variety of materials and over long delays. It is easy to do and has been used successfully in a number of real-world classroom studies.

Despite their promise, the following learning techniques fell short, in many cases because not enough evidence has been amassed to support their use. Some techniques, such as elaborative interrogation and self-explanation, have not been evaluated in real-world educational contexts. Another emerging method called interleaved practice has just begun to be systematically explored. Nevertheless, these techniques show enough potential for us to recommend their use in the situations described briefly here.

3. Elaborative Interrogation: Channel Your Inner Four-Year-Old

How it works: Inquisitive by nature, we are always looking for explanations for the world around us. A sizable body of evidence suggests that prompting students to answer "Why?" questions also facilitates learning.

With this technique, called elaborative interrogation, learners produce explanations for facts, such as "Why does it make sense that...?" or "Why is this true?" In one experiment, for example, students read sentences such as "the hungry man got into the car." Participants in an elaborative-interrogation group were asked to explain why, whereas others were provided with an explanation, such as "the hungry man got into the car to go to the restaurant." A third group simply read each sentence. When asked to recall which man performed what action ("Who got in the car?"), the elaborative-interrogation group answered about 72 percent correctly, compared with about 37 percent for the others.

When should I use it? When you are learning factual information-particularly if you already know something about the subject. Its power increases with prior knowledge; German students benefitted from elaborative interrogation more when they were learning about German states than about Canadian provinces, for example. It may be that prior knowledge permits students to generate more appropriate explanations for why a fact is true.

The effects of this technique appear to be robust across ages, from fourth graders through undergraduates. Elaborative interrogation clearly improves memory for facts, but whether it also might enhance comprehension is less certain, and there is no conclusive information about how long the gains in learning persist.

Is it practical? Yes. It requires minimal training and makes reasonable time demands. In one study, an elaborative-interrogation group required 32 minutes to do a task that took 28 minutes for a reading-only group.

Rating: Moderate utility. The technique works for a broad range of topics but may not be useful for material more complex than a factual list. Benefits for learners without prior knowledge may be limited. More research will be needed to establish whether elaborative-interrogation generalizes to various situations and different types of information.

4. Self-Explanation: How Do I Know?

How it works: Students generate explanations of what they learn, reviewing their mental processing with questions such as "What new information does the sentence provide for you?" "How does it relate to what you already know?" Similar to elaborative interrogation, self-explanation may help integrate new information with prior knowledge.

When should I use it? It benefits kindergartners to college students and helps in solving math problems and logical reasoning puzzles, learning from narrative texts and even mastering endgame strategies in chess. In younger children, self-explanation can help with basic ideas such as learning numbers or patterns. The technique improves memory, comprehension and problem solving-an impressive range of outcomes. Most studies, however, have measured effects within only a few minutes, and it is not known whether the technique is more lasting in people of high or low knowledge.

Is it practical? Unclear. On the one hand, most students need minimal instruction and little to no practice, although one test of ninth graders showed that students without training tended to paraphrase rather than generate explanations. On the other, a few studies report that this technique is time-consuming, increasing time demands by 30 to 100 percent.

Rating: Moderate utility. Self-explanation works across different subjects and an impressive age range. Further research must establish whether these effects are durable and whether the time demands make it worthwhile.

5. Interleaved Practice: Mixing Apples and Oranges

How it works: Intuitively, students tend to study in blocks, finishing one topic or type of problem before moving on to the next. But recent research has shown benefits for interleaved practice, in which students alternate a variety types of information or problems. In one study, for example, college students learned to compute the volumes of four different geometric shapes. In a so-called blocked-practice condition, they finished all the problems for one shape before moving on to the next. In interleaved practice, the problems were intermixed. When tested one week later, the interleaved practice group was 43 percent more accurate. Interleaving allows students to practice selecting the correct method and encourages them to compare different kinds of problems.

When should I use it? When the types of problems are similar, perhaps because juxtaposing them makes it easier to see what is different about them. Blocked practice-doing all the items from one category in a row-may be more effective when the examples are not very much alike, because it highlights what they have in common.

It is possible that interleaved practice benefits only those who are already reasonably competent. Outcomes are also mixed for different types of content. It improves performance on algebra problems and was effective in a study that trained medical students to interpret electrical recordings to diagnose cardiac disorders. Yet two studies of foreign-vocabulary learning showed no effect for interleaved practice. Nevertheless, given how much difficulty many students have in mathematics, it may still be a worthwhile strategy for specifically that subject.

Is it practical? It seems to be. A motivated student could easily use interleaving without any instruction. Teachers could also use the technique in the classroom: After one kind of problem (or topic) is introduced, practice first focuses on that problem. Once the next kind of problem is introduced, it is mixed in with examples of earlier subjects. It may take a little more time than blocking practice, but such slowing most likely is be worthwhile, reflecting cognitive processes that boost performance.

Rating: Moderate utility. Interleaved practice improves learning and retention of mathematical knowledge and boosts other cognitive skills. The literature on interleaved practice is small, however, and includes enough negative results to raise concern. It may be that the technique does not consistently work well, or perhaps it is not always used appropriately-topics for future research.

Why don't students use more effective study techniques? It seems they are not being taught the best strategies, perhaps because teachers themselves are not schooled in them. In our survey of six educational-psychology textbooks, only one technique-"keyword mnemonics"-was covered in every book. None offered much guidance on the use, effectiveness or limitations of different ways of studying.

A second problem may be that in the educational system, the emphasis is on teaching students critical-thinking skills and content. Less time is spent on teaching them how to learn. The result can be that students who do well in their early years, when learning is closely supervised, may struggle once they are expected to regulate their own learning in high school or college.

Some questions, such as the best age for students to start using a technique and how often they will need to be retrained or reminded, still require further research. But even now teachers can incorporate the most successful approaches into lesson plans so that students could adopt them on their own. For instance, when moving to a new section, a teacher can start by asking students to do a practice test that covers important ideas from the previous section and provide immediate feedback. Students can interleave new problems with related ones from preceding units. Teachers can harness distributed practice by reintroducing major concepts during the course of several classes. They can engage students in explanatory questioning by prompting them to consider how the information is new to them or why it might be true.

These learning techniques are no panacea. They benefit only those who are motivated and capable of using them. Nevertheless, we expect that students will make meaningful gains in classroom performance, on achievement tests and during their lifetime.

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Psychologists Identify the Best Ways to Study

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See Inside Some study techniques accelerate learning, whereas others are just a waste of time-but which ones are which? An unprecedented review maps out the best pathways to knowledge Image: CELIA JOHNSON Education generally focuses on what you study, such as algebra, the elements of the periodic table or how to conjugate verbs.

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* Importance of balancing different aspects of our lives to achieve well-being for ourselves and others
* Interdependence

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* Appreciate our own cultures & personal histories.
* Willingness to grow from the experience

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A video on visual note taking.

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A visual guide to taking notes.

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My name is Doug Neill, and here's a bit of my background:

April 1st, 2017 - Here's an update on the early stage development of this resource kit in which I outline the specific components that I'm building:

June 22nd, 2017 - Check out the first sample video lesson! It focuses on how students can start incorporating arrows into the note-taking process. If you sign up you'll get to share feedback on this lesson style to make the next ones even better!

August 1st, 2017 - I've added follow-up practice activities to each of the video lessons! You'll be able to download a PDF with all of them so that you can print, copy, and use them in your class. Here are a few examples:

August 14th, 2017 - Lessons currently available: Handwritten Fonts, Icons, Faces, Arrows, Stick Figures, Color, Scenes, Containers, Lists, Dividers, Empathy Maps, Filtering, and Synthesizing. In the queue: lessons on the six different sketchnoting processes mentioned in the first update video. After that, all of the others described here!

Why might you join this pilot program? Here are a few reasons:

Any questions or concerns? Send an email my way: doug@verbaltovisual.com.

Think you might want to use these resources in future school years? No need to buy them again - you'll have full and lifetime access to all past (and future) Sketchnoting In The Classroom resources.

I want you to be able to dig into this resource kit to see whether or not it's a good fit for you and your classroom. With that in mind, if you're not satisfied with what you see after your first 30 days, I'd be happy to return your money.

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Sketchnoting In The Classroom - Verbal To Visual

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My name is Doug Neill, and here's a bit of my background: April 1st, 2017 - Here's an update on the early stage development of this resource kit in which I outline the specific components that I'm building: June 22nd, 2017 - Check out the first sample video lesson!

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The journey of Julius Yego and the power of self-directed learning & self belief.

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Students take action and stops bullying at a school in Minnesota.

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Boys' reaction to bullying will melt your heart

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An article from The Child Mind Institute in NYC about the myths of multitasking and the benefits of a distraction free HW routine for teens.

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How Phones Ruin Concentration - Child Mind Institute

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Multitasking with phones leads to shallower thinking and more time spent working, especially for kids who have ADHD or struggle with attention.

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Be the change you want to see.
Be the person to turn people around.

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Nick Vujicic   Hey Kids   Please Dont Tease

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Pernille Ripp is an inspiring teacher and speaker who has valuable resources about developing readers and writers.

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I have been trying to share as many of our favorite books as possible in different ways. Here is an overview of all of the lists so far. Picture Book lists can be found at the bottom. Happy reading! Chapter Books: The Best Books for Middle School According to My Students: The Favorite Reads of...

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A short film about character education.
"If you can be a better version of yourself, who would you be?"

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"I believe each of my students must craft an individual reading life of challenge, whim, curiosity, and hunger. I believe in the collecting, noticing, living work of designing lessons to empower writers. I believe teachers provide vision for students; we live a belief in their success every day we teach."

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Drive Brand Studio - Branding, Advertising, Marketing, Websites

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Penny Kittle - Teacher, Author, Advocate - Home

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"I believe each of my students must craft an individual reading life of challenge, whim, curiosity, and hunger. I believe in the collecting, noticing, living work of designing lessons to empower writers. I believe teachers provide vision for students; we live a belief in their success every day we teach."

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This is a great website from the Southern Poverty Law Center. It has lessons and resources on digital citizenship, bullying, gender bias, etc.

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For young white students, explorations of fair and unfair, just and unjust, can go a long way in advancing anti-racist white identity. Purposeful use of literature and basic study of white anti-racists are among the key ways educators can advance such aims.Teaching Tolerance presents four short biographies for early grades classrooms, with activity ideas.

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These robust, ready-to-use classroom lessons offer breadth and depth, spanning essential social justice topics and reinforcing critical social emotional learning skills.

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An inspiring TED talk by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.
"...when we realize that there is never a single story about any place, we regain a kind of paradise." https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story?utm_campaign=tedspread&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=tedcomshare

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Tell someone "Thank You".

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An Experiment in Gratitude | The Science of Happiness

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1. Journal - People, Place, Thing
2. Express Gratitude Out loud

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Ten ideas for the first day of class to work on critical thinking and collaboration.

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by TeachThought Staff

One of education's primary goals is to groom the next generation of little humans to succeed in the 'real world.'

Yes, there are mounds of curricula they must master in a wide breadth of subjects, but education does not begin and end with a textbook or test.

Other skills must be honed, too, not the least of which is how to get along with their peers and work well with others. This is not something that can be cultivated through rote memorization or with strategically placed posters.

Students must be engaged and cooperation must be practiced, and often. The following team-building games can promote cooperation and communication, help establish a positive classroom environment and - most importantly - provide a fun, much-needed reprieve from routine.

See also Team-Building Games For The First Day Of School
10 Team-Building Games That Promote Collaborative Critical Thinking
You can purchase a classroom-ready version of team-building games that promote critical thinking here.
1. If You Build it...
This team-building game is flexible. First, divide students into teams and give them equal amounts of a certain material, like pipe cleaners, blocks, or even dried spaghetti and marshmallows.

Then, give them something to construct. The challenge can be variable (think: Which team can build the tallest, structurally-sound castle? Which team can build a castle the fastest?). You can recycle this activity throughout the year by adapting the challenge or materials to specific content areas.
Skills: Communication; problem-solving
This activity can get messy and may be suitable for older children who can follow safety guidelines when working with raw eggs. Teams must work together to find a way to 'save' the egg (Humpty Dumpty for elementary school students?) - in this case, an egg dropped from a specific height. That could involve finding the perfect soft landing, or creating a device that guides the egg safely to the ground.

Let their creativity work here.
Skills: Problem-solving, creative collaboration 3. Zoom
Zoom is a classic classroom cooperative game that never seems to go out of style. Simply form students into a circle and give each a unique picture of an object, animal, or whatever else suits your fancy. You begin a story that incorporates whatever happens to be on your assigned photo. The next student continues the story, incorporating their photo, and so on.
Skills: Communication; creative collaboration 4. Minefield
Another classic team-building game. Arrange some sort of obstacle course and divide students into teams. Students take turns navigating the 'minefield' while blindfolded, with only their teammates to guide them. You can also require students to only use certain words or clues to make it challenging or content-area specific.
Skills: Communication; trust
See also 10 Team-Building Games For A Friendlier Classroom
5. The Worst-Case Scenario
Fabricate a scenario in which students would need to work together and solve problems to succeed, like being stranded on a deserted island or getting lost at sea. Ask them to work together to concoct a solution that ensures everyone arrives safely. You might ask them to come up with a list of 10 must-have items that would help them most, or a creative passage to safety. Encourage them to vote - everyone must agree to the final solution.
Skills: Communication, problem-solving 6. A Shrinking Vessel
This game requires a good deal of strategy in addition to teamwork. Its rules are deceptively simple: The entire group must find a way to occupy a space that shrinks over time until they are packed creatively like sardines. You can form the boundary with a rope, a tarp or blanket being folded over, or small traffic cones. (Skills: Problem-solving; teamwork)
7. Go for Gold
This game is similar to the 'If you build it' game: Teams have a common objective but instead of each one having the same materials, they have access to a whole cache of materials. For instance, the goal might be to create a contraption with pipes, rubber tubing, and pieces of cardboard that can carry a marble from point A to point B in a certain number of steps, using only gravity.
Creative collaboration; communication; problem-solving 8. It's a Mystery
Many children (and grown-ups) enjoy a good mystery, so why not design one that must be solved cooperatively? Give each student a numbered clue. In order to solve the mystery - say, the case of the missing mascot - children must work together to solve the clues in order. The 'case' might require them to move from one area of the room to the next, uncovering more clues.
Skills: Problem-solving, communication
That playground classic is still a hit - not to mention inexpensive and simple to execute. For a unique variation, set up a multi-directional game by tying ropes in such a way that three or four teams tug at once. Some teams might choose to work together to eliminate the other groups before going head-to-head.
Skills: Teamwork; sportsmanship 10. Keep it Real
This open-ended concept is simple and serves as an excellent segue into problem-based learning. Challenge students to identify and cooperatively solve a real problem in their schools or communities. You may set the parameters, including a time limit, materials, and physical boundaries.
Skills: Problem-solving; communication
While education technology is a basic and crucial component of the 21st-century classroom, educators must still ensure that students are engaging with each other in meaningful ways. Team-building exercises are a great way to do this, and because of this, they will never go out of style.
Aimee Hosler is a writer and mother of two living in Virginia. She specializes in a number of topics, but is particularly passionate about education and workplace news and trends. She holds a B.S. in Journalism from California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo and is a contributor to several websites including OnlineSchools.com; 10 Team-Building Games For Kids, Teenagers, or Adults

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10 Team-Building Games That Promote Critical Thinking

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These team-building games can promote cooperation, help establish a positive classroom environment, and provide a fun reprieve from routine.

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More ideas for team building.

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by TeachThought Staff

Team-building activities are great-especially for the first day of school or early in the school year,

Not only can they help establish routines, tone, and expectations, they're also fun, and can help learners feel comfortable. Though many older students in high school and college may groan at their thought, they're usually fun, and great ways to help students feel at ease. Before you dismiss them as too juvenile, try one. You might be surprised.

Note that which game you choose, your rules for the game, and any revisions to the rules depend on the nature of the class you're using them with. Certain students may feel overly liberated-especially in middle school-with the idea of a 'game,' and so expectations must be carefully given to younger K-8 learners-and even 9-12-to ensure that every student is set up for success.

10 Team-Building Games For The First Day Of School

1. Me Too!

Ideal Grade Levels: K-20

The first student gives a fact about themselves-I love basketball, I have two sisters, etc. If that statement or fact is true about another student, they stand up and say "Me too!" They can also stay seated, but simply raise their hand and say "Me too!"

2. Park Bench

Ideal Grade Levels: 6-20

Two chairs are placed together to resemble a park bench. Two students volunteer-or are selected-to act out 'what happened' in a fictional news story. They are given one minute to prepare a scene where they discuss the 'event' without ever actually saying what happened. After given time period (1-5 minutes), peers guess 'what happened,' but they must give up all four important details: Who, What, Where, and When, e.g.:

What: College Basketball game

Who: Kentucky and Kansas

When: Early April

Where: New Orleans

3. Fact or Fiction

Ideal Grade Levels: 3-12

In a circle, the first student offers two facts and one piece of fiction about themselves. Others raise their hand or are called on to identify which were facts, and which were fiction. The correct guesser goes next. Play is completed when all students have gone.

4. Green Door

Ideal Grade Levels: 5-20

A leader chooses a topic, but keeps it quiet, only saying that "You can bring a ____ through the green door." Students are then forced to deduce the topic by asking if other things can be brought through the green door as well, e.g., "Can I bring a _____ through the green door?"

The leader can only reply yes or no. When a topic is identified, topic resets. Topics can be content-related, such as parts of speech, colors, geometric figures, historical figures, etc.

5. One Minute Talk

Ideal Grade Levels: 5-20

Students are chosen to give 60-second talks on anything, from self-selected topics they are passionate about, have specific expertise in, etc., to topics given from teacher. Classmates can then follow-up with one thing-no matter how innocuous-that they can 'connect' to or is somehow related to their life.

6. Count to Ten

Ideal Grade Levels: 3-20

All students stand in a circle. The first student says '1,' or '1, 2.' The next student picks up where that student left off and can say a maximum number of 2 numbers. The movement continues clockwise until it gets to 10, where that student has to sit, and the game starts back over at 1 at the next student.

Note that there can be no pausing or silent counting-any pauses or indications the student is counting/calculating forces them to sit. Also, pouting or talking during counting results in elimination from future rounds. The big idea is to count strategically so that you can keep from saying '10.'

You can read more about How To Play The Count To Ten Team-Building Game.

7. I Never

Ideal Grade Levels: K-20

Students form a circle. The first student says something they've never done. Each student that has done the thing the other student has not steps briefly into the center. The game continues until every person has stated something they've done.

8. Magic Ball

Ideal Grade Levels: K-20

Students form a circle. The first student is 'given' an imaginary magic ball. The student sculpts an imaginary ball into a new shape, handing it to the person to their right. The activity is silent. Any talking/noise results in student sitting. After the game, guessing may be done to predict what 'sculpture' was.

9. Silent Line

Ideal Grade Levels: K-8

Students are given criteria, and must silently put themselves in a line as quickly as possible, to meet a goal, compete against other classes, or receive some reward (free reading time, no homework, etc.) The criteria can simple (birthdays), or slightly more complicated (alphabetical order of college or career ambition).

10. Inside-Outside Circle

Ideal Grade Levels: 3-20

Students form a circle within a circle with (ideally) an equal number of students in both circles. Inside circle members pair with outside circle members. Activity leader (usually teacher, but can be a student) presents a topic, prompt, or question.

Partners share for 10 seconds (or less), the leader asks inside the circle to move clockwise a certain number of spaces to collaborate with new partners directly across from them. This is usually content focuses and helps spur quick discussion on content-related topics, or even current events.
10 Team-Building Games For The First Day Of School; Source 'The Advisory Book' by Linda Crawford

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10 Team-Building Games For The First Day Of Class

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by TeachThought Staff Team-building activities are great-especially for the first day of school or early in the school year, Not only can they help establish routines, tone, and expectations, they're also fun, and can help learners feel comfortable.

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Prompts for journal entries

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Are you keeping a gratitude journal for the month of November?

Here's 30 journal gratitude journal prompts to help meet that goal! Happy journaling!

1. What smell are you grateful for today?

2. What technology are you grateful for?

3. What color are you grateful for?

4. What food are you most grateful for?

5. What sound are you grateful for today?

6. What in nature are you grateful for?

7. What memory are you grateful for?

8. What book are you most grateful for?

9. What place are you most grateful for?

10. What taste are you grateful for today?

11. What holiday are you grateful for?

12. What texture are you grateful for?

13. What abilities are you grateful for?

14. What sight are you grateful for today?

15. What season are you grateful for?

16. What about your body are you grateful for?

17. What knowledge are you grateful for?

18. What piece of art are you grateful for?

19. What touch are you grateful for today?

20. Who in your life are you grateful for?

21. What song are you most grateful for?

22. What story are you grateful for?

23. What tradition are you grateful for?

24. What challenge are you grateful for?

25. What moment this week are you most grateful for?

26. What form of expression are you most grateful for?

27. What small thing that you use daily are you grateful for?

28. What small thing that happened today are you grateful for?

29. What friend/family member are you grateful for today?

30. What talent or skill do you have that you are grateful for?

We've added these prompts to TextMyJournal, too! Have you signed up for your free trial yet? Do it now!

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Gratitude Journal Prompts | TextMyJournal

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Here's 30 journal gratitude journal prompts to help meet that goal! Happy journaling! What smell are you grateful for today? What technology are you grateful for? What color are you grateful for? What food are you most grateful for? What sound are you grateful for today? What in nature are you grateful for?

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K-8 Activities from the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley

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MS/HS Lessons from the Greater Good Science Center at UC Berkeley

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Goodreads will recommend books based on your ratings and the books you have read.

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Find and read more books you'll love, and keep track of the books you want to read. Be part of the world's largest community of book lovers on Goodreads.

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Information literacy affects society.

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Vaccines: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

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Using notecards & flashcards are a great way to retain information.

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Flashcards, and the Leitner system, is a fantastic tool for memorising and drilling facts. Anything that can be studied in a quick "question and answer" format can be turned into flashcards - things like short definitions, foreign vocabulary, scientific symbols, historical dates, traffic signs, world capitals and other fast facts.

Flashcards have no age limit. Adults can use them to learn foreign languages, high school students can use them to memorise exam work and, while there is some controversy around using flashcards to teach very young kids to read and count, they have been very effective in teaching children with disabilities, specifically Down syndrome, to speak and read.

A flashcard is a piece of card with a cue on the front, and the answer on the back. The cue can be a question, a single word or a picture. Electronic flashcards can also have sound or video cues. When you review your flashcards, you will take one card at a time, look at the cue and try to answer it as quickly as possible before checking the answer and moving on to the next card.

Flashcards work well because they help you to not only memorise facts quickly, but to process and store the information over the long-term. Your brain can more easily retain the information, because when you use flashcards, your brain is triggered to use the following skills:

Active recall

Can you remember every single fact you've read in a text book? Probably not! That's because when we read through something passively, our brains are not forced to think. But when we have to answer questions, our brains are triggered to take action. By using flashcards, our brains are constantly stimulated to actively recall information, and so that information is stored in our memories more effectively and for a longer time.

Metacognition

When you make and use flashcards, you take control of your own learning. You have to decide what to put on each card, how often you're going to use them, then evaluate how well you know the information on each card. By doing all these things, you are using " metacognitive processes", which have been proven to enhance long-term learning.

Drilling

Flashcards help you to practise the same information over and over again - and as we know, practice makes perfect!

Use index cards, or cut a larger piece of cardboard into smaller pieces. (Paper isn't ideal, as it's see-through. You shouldn't be able to see the answer from the front.)

Keep it as short as possible. For example, if you're studying world capitals, you don't have to write "What is the capital of Russia?" on the front. Simply write the country's name.

Write clearly. You should be able to read what you wrote at a very quick glance.

Although some people do use flashcards to study essay-type questions, they're usually more effective if they have only one question and one answer per card.

Use different coloured cards or pens to categorise your flashcards. For example, use a different colour for each subject or topic. This can help your brain to categorise information better.

Electronic flashcards: There are countless flashcard apps out there, many of which are free. These can be a great tool if you have to make hundreds of cards but don't want to use pen and cardboard. Some apps will allow you to add video and soundclips, and you can also share flashcards with others. We like Brainscape (desktop and mobile, free or paid options) and Kids Flashcardmaker (iPhone and iPad, R59.99)

Researchers have been studying the best methods to use flashcards for decades. Here's what they've found:

Flashcards are not an effective method for last-minute cramming! So whatever method you choose, start at least 3-5 days before your test. Better yet, make your flashcards as soon as you've learnt the topic in class.

It may seem ideal to carry your flashcards with you wherever you go and to study a few of them whenever you get a chance. But believe it or not, this may not be such an effective method. Studies have found that it's more effective to review a whole stack of cards in one sitting, using spaced repetition, than to study a couple here and there.

Spaced repetition is one of the most effective ways of using flashcards. This is when you review your cards at specific, increasing intervals: for example on Day 1, Day 2, Day 4, Day 8 and so on. Spaced repetition works because it activates your long-term memory, while leaving small breaks in-between studying uses your short-term memory. You can read more about spaced repetition here.

Use the Leitner system of learning with flashcards.

The Leitner system is a well-known and very effective method of using flashcards. It's a form of spaced repetition that help you study the cards you don't know more often than the cards you already know well.

Here's a simple example using three boxes (though some people use as many as seven).

1. You'll need: your stack of flashcards and three boxes.

2. Label each box with a number and the frequency you'll study each one. For example:

Box 1: Every day

Box 2: Every 2 days

Box 3: Every 3 days

3. Review your cards according to your schedule of spaced repetition.

Watch the video here or scroll down to print out:

Here's you do it:

Day 1:

Put all your cards in Box 1 and review them. If you get a card right, move it to Box 2. If you get it wrong, it stays in Box 1.

Day 2:

Review Box 1 (as on Day 1: move correct cards up to Box 2, but keep incorrect cards in Box 1).

Day 3:

Review Box 1.

Review Box 2. If you get a card right, move it up to Box 3. If you get it wrong, move it back to Box 1.

Day 4:

Review Box 1.

Review Box 3. If you get a card right, it can leave the box and you don't have to study it again. If you get it wrong, it goes all the way back to Box 1.

Day 5:

Review Box 1 and Box 2.

Day 6:

Review Box 1.

Day 7:

Review Box 1, Box 2 and Box 3.

Day 8-13:

Repeat Days 2-7.

Once all your cards have left Box 1, you're studying is done. Time for your exam!
Does your child use flashcards when he or she studies? Do they use a technique we haven't mentioned here? Have you found the Leitner system useful? Send your comments to chatback@parent24.com.

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Flashcards and the Leitner system: Here's how to memorise facts for exams

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Flashcards, and the Leitner system, is a fantastic tool for memorising and drilling facts. Anything that can be studied in a quick "question and answer" format can be turned into flashcards - things like short definitions, foreign vocabulary, scientific symbols, historical dates, traffic signs, world capitals and other fast facts.

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A great start for positive actions spreading happiness.

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This is where it all starts! Small things can cause big positive changes, so choose an action and make it happen.

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A great video from Crash Course on Study Skills.

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Taking Notes: Crash Course Study Skills #1

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A short essay about allowing students to choose books and becoming independent readers. Found on Penny Kittle's website: http://pennykittle.net/

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A short essay by Rainbow Rowell about developing the love of reading. Found on Penny Kittle's website: http://pennykittle.net/

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Making expectations clear at the beginning of the year (from ASCD).

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by Mark Boynton and Christine Boynton

Establishing and teaching clearly defined parameters of acceptable behaviors is a critical part of classroom discipline, making up approximately 25 percent of the overall picture (see Figure S1). In a summary of the research on classroom management, Marzano (2003) found that "across the various grade levels the average number of disruptions in classes where rules and procedures were effectively implemented was 28 percentile points lower than the average number of disruptions in classes where that was not the case" (p. 14).

Every teacher should formally take the time to teach and enforce clearly defined parameters of acceptable student behaviors. Unfortunately, many teachers make the mistake of announcing rather than teaching parameters to their students. The truth is that students do not learn what's announced; they learn what they are taught. It makes no more sense to announce rules regarding acceptable student behaviors than it does to announce-rather than teach-math facts. It is critical that you formally teach and enforce both a discipline plan and rules of conduct from the very first day of school.

What are the differences between the discipline plan and rules of conduct? Canter and Canter (1997) describe a discipline plan as an umbrella policy that specifies rules that apply to all students, at all times, in all locations. A discipline plan also specifies how you will respond when students comply or fail to comply with the rules.

Canter and Canter (1997) also describe rules of conduct as the policies and rules that apply to specific classroom and buildingwide locations and events, such as attending assemblies, working with substitutes, getting drinks, and using the pencil sharpener. In the category that we call "rules of conduct," Marzano (2003) includes how to begin and end the class day or period; make transitions to bathrooms; conduct fire drills; use the library; go to a specialist; distribute, use, and store special equipment; conduct group work; and behave when doing seat work and during teacher-led activities, including what to do when work is finished. He states that clearly defined and taught procedures decrease disciplinary problems at all grade levels.

You must take whatever time is needed to teach both the discipline plan and the rules of conduct as they apply to your class. If you do not formally teach these concepts, students will be confused as they attempt to determine what the acceptable policies and procedures are for the classroom. Also, students who have not been taught rules for acceptable behaviors may test the waters to find out how far they can push the envelope. Investing time in communicating and teaching your classroom discipline plan and rules of conduct is extremely worthwhile, as it ultimately yields increased learning time for all students.

Discipline Plan

Your discipline plan should encompass all rules for all students in all locations. The list should not be too long; that is, five or six rules should be the maximum. Following these six steps will help you to implement an effective discipline plan in your classroom:

1. Select rules that are meaningful, specific, and enforceable. Rules such as "Students are to be good at all times" and "Students are to act responsibly at all times" are inappropriate because they are too vague and open to misinterpretation.

2. Establish consequences for students who fail to comply with the discipline plan.

3. Teach the discipline plan to the students.

4. Post the discipline plan in an easily seen classroom location.

5. Communicate the discipline plan to parents and the principal.

6. Enforce the discipline plan fairly, consistently, and equitably.

Be sure that the rules outlined in your discipline plan are appropriate, as in Step 1 above. Take a look at the following rules and consider how difficult they would be to enforce:

Be good at all times.

Act maturely.

Act appropriately.

Be kind.

While these rules apply to all students in all locations, they are stated in such a general manner that they can be interpreted differently by different students. In contrast, the rules in the next list not only apply to all students in all locations, but are also specific enough to be understood by all students:

Follow teacher directives.

Follow all rules of conduct.

Speak quietly.

Keep your hands to yourselves.

Even though these rules are more specific, there still may need to be some clarification of terms. For example, what you mean by "speaking quietly" may need to be taught and demonstrated so that your students are clear on what that means to you. Model what "quietly" is and is not, and have students demonstrate their understanding. This is especially important at the elementary grade levels. The point is to use words that have as little variability in interpretation as possible and, when necessary, to teach exactly what is meant by the rules so that everyone is clear about classroom expectations.
Rules of Conduct

Your rules of conduct should clearly let students know what the specific behavior standards are for various classroom and building locations and activities. Canter and Canter (1997) recommend that there be three categories of rules of conduct: academic, classroom, and special situation.

Academic rules of conduct prescribe specific behaviors that are expected during academics. These may include rules regarding the following:

Expectations for participating in class discussions

Expectations for seat work activities

What students should bring to class to be prepared

How to seek the teacher's assistance

When, where, and how to turn in completed work

Rather than simply post academic rules of conduct, you should teach them to your students in the context of specific academic situations. For example, when conducting class discussions, you could teach students that you expect them to raise their hands and be called on to take part in discussions, you expect everyone to participate, and you expect students to be respectful by listening attentively to the thoughts and opinions of others.

When teaching expectations for seat work activities, you could instruct the students on how to get help if needed, when and how to get necessary materials, when and how to sharpen their pencils, and what to do after their work is completed. In training students how to come to class prepared to work, you could teach your students to bring the books needed for the specific subject, pencils or pens, paper or a notebook, and any special equipment, such as calculators. Each teacher needs to determine what items students require to be prepared in his or her class and must teach the students to bring their supplies on a consistent basis so that they can be ready to learn with the fewest disruptions to instruction.

Another element you should teach students under your academic rules of conduct is how to seek your assistance. This may vary depending on the grouping status of your classroom; the rules for seeking assistance will probably be different if you are working with small student groups than if all students are doing independent work or working in cooperative groups. In some situations, you may expect them to ask another student before coming to you for help. You may require that they use other strategies, such as seeking help from the dictionary or just making their best guesses without assistance. Different situations may call for students coming up to your desk, raising their hands, or using a "help" card to signal that they need help. The point is that you should clearly teach your expectations in the context of various academic situations, depending on the special academic setting and what you determine will help an individual student and not interfere with other students' learning.

When, where, and how to turn in completed work is another academic rule of conduct that you should teach to your students. If you want students to turn in homework assignments by placing them in the homework basket at the beginning of the class period before they are seated, it is important that you teach that and consistently reinforce students for doing it correctly. If students are doing independent seat work and you want them to wait until the bell rings to turn in their work to you on their way out the door, you need to teach that. What you want them to do with completed work is not as important as your teaching what you want within the context of the specific situation. Again, we stress that students learn what is taught, not what is simply announced.

Figure 2.1 is an example of academic rules of conduct you may want to include in your classroom.

Figure 2.1. Academic Rules of Conduct

Class discussions:

Raise your hand

Wait to be called on

Listen attentively and respectfully

Everyone is to participate

Seat work activities:

Hold up "help" card for help

Clear your desk of unneeded supplies

Sharpen pencils when you enter the classroom

Read a book when work is completed

Coming to class prepared:

Bring books needed for the subject

Bring pencils or pens

Bring paper, a notebook, and a calculator

How to seek assistance:

Hold up "help" card during independent work

Ask your neighbor during reading groups for help

Completed work:
Place in designated baskets at the teacher's direction
Homework:
Place in designated baskets when entering classroom at the start of class

Classroom rules of conduct prescribe specific behaviors that are expected while students are in the classroom and procedures that students are to follow. They include expectations about the following kinds of activities:

When to use the pencil sharpener

How, when, and where to get drinks

How to enter and exit the classroom

How to respond to the teacher's signal

What constitutes a tardy

Once again, rather than simply posting these rules, you should teach them on the first day of school and reteach as necessary. It is critical that your instruction be specific regarding your expectations and that you consistently hold students accountable to these expectations.

You may allow students to use the pencil sharpener only at the beginning of the school day or during independent seat work so as not to interfere with instruction. The same may apply to when you want students to get drinks. Some teachers expect and teach their students specific ways to enter the classroom, such as lining up at the door before being given permission to enter. When students do come in, you may expect them to go directly to their seats and work on the assignment on the board. Many teachers insist that at the end of class, the bell does not excuse the students, the teacher does. In order for this to be done in an orderly fashion, students may be excused one row at a time, with the teacher waiting until the entire row of students is ready and quiet before excusing them.

Regarding the teacher's signal, it is essential that the students know what the signal is, that they give the teacher their attention immediately when the signal is given, and that the teacher wait until every student has complied before continuing. And finally, teachers must teach what they mean by "tardy," whether it commences immediately after the bell rings or up to a minute after the bell rings.

Again, we are advocating not that you adopt these specific procedures for your classroom rules of conduct but that you decide what your rules are and then teach and reinforce them for your students. Figure 2.2 lists examples of classroom rules of conduct.

Figure 2.2. Classroom Rules of Conduct

Pencil sharpener:

Use before the tardy bell
Drinks:
Get before the tardy bell
Entering the classroom:
Line up at the door, and wait for the teacher to admit you to the classroom
Exiting the classroom:

Clear desks

Sit quietly

Keep eyes on the teacher

Wait for dismissal by the teacher

Response to teacher's signal:

Keep hands folded

Sit quietly

Keep eyes on the teacher

Arrival to class:
Be in your seat before the tardy bell rings

Special situation rules of conduct prescribe behaviors that are expected when students participate in special activities. They include rules about the following procedures:

How to go to the library or gym

How to work with substitutes

How to respond to fire drills

Students going to the library or gym may be expected to follow dismissal procedures similar to those at the end of the day, with students waiting for the teacher to line them up rather than running to the door when the bell rings. Many teachers teach their students that whatever rules apply when the teacher is there also remain in effect when there is a substitute teacher in the classroom. As additional support, they may make consequences for student misbehaviors harsher when a substitute is in charge. When you teach your students how to respond to fire drills, you may have them immediately stop whatever they are doing, quickly and quietly walk to and line up in the designated area, and silently wait for instructions.

Figure 2.3 shows examples of special situation rules of conduct that you may have for your classroom.

Figure 2.3. Special Situation Rules of Conduct

Wait to be dismissed by the teacher

Walk quietly and quickly to line up

Wait silently

Substitutes:
All building and classroom rules apply with substitutes
Fire drills:

Stop what you are doing immediately

Be silent

Walk quietly and quickly to the designated area

Wait for the teacher's instructions

Whatever you decide on for your rules of conduct, there are five steps you should follow in establishing these rules:

1. Determine the rules of conduct for each category.

2. Teach the rules of conduct.

3. Post the rules of conduct.

4. Communicate the rules of conduct to parents and the principal.

5. Enforce the rules of conduct by implementing the consequences that are specified in your discipline plan.

Joanna is a 1st grade teacher. She firmly believes that students need to follow clearly defined parameters of acceptable classroom behaviors. On the first day of school, she taught students her signal and how to respond to it, what supplies to bring to class every day, how to be dismissed from class, where to put their work, when to sharpen their pencils, and how to get help from the teacher. Not only did she teach these rules to the students, but throughout the day they practiced the rules and she posted them clearly and visibly on the walls of the classroom. She knew that she would spend at least the first couple of weeks of school teaching these rules and practicing them with her students until the students' compliance became automatic. In addition, she had communicated all of her classroom rules to the principal and to the parents in a letter that she sent home before the first day of school. In that letter, she included her classroom phone number and the best times for parents to call if they had any questions. She also reviewed the consequences that would ensue if students failed to follow the classroom rules and the positive rewards for following the rules.

Teaching Your Discipline Plan and Rules of Conduct

Remember, the time you spend teaching both your discipline plan and your rules of conduct is an investment that pays huge dividends in increased learning, on-task student behavior, and increased job satisfaction for you. This is a very important concept, one that many teachers fail to spend adequate time addressing. This could be due to the following misconceptions many teachers have regarding teaching a discipline plan, as Jones (1987) points out:

Kids should just know the rules.

Rules only need to be announced.

Rules only need to be taught at the beginning of the year.

Kids resent time spent teaching and enforcing rules.

The truth is that if you don't teach the rules, your students won't know what the rules are and they will test you. Also, as we stated earlier, students learn what they are taught, not what is announced. This needs to be an ongoing process, with the rules taught and retaught as needed, not just at the beginning of the year. Finally, students don't resent the time spent on this process. They want structure, and structure is needed in order to provide good instruction.

You should follow these six steps when teaching your discipline plan and rules of conduct:

1. Begin with a set. Begin the lesson by clearly communicating to the students what they are about to learn and why it is important.

2. Explain the logic and rationale for each rule. Students tend to support policies that are logical and make sense. Don't assume the students understand the logic behind each rule. Instead, explain the rationale for each rule and why it's important.

3. Model the behavior that is expected. The best lessons incorporate specific examples of the concepts being taught. When teaching your discipline plan and rules of conduct, you should model exactly what is expected.

4. Allow for questions and answers. Encourage your students to ask questions to be certain they understand the concepts being taught.

5. Direct students to demonstrate their understanding. After you teach both your discipline plan and rules of conduct, you should require the students to demonstrate their understanding of the concepts. The students should be required to repeatedly practice the rules until it is clear they grasp them.

6. Reteach the discipline plan and rules of conduct. If at any time it becomes apparent that the students are not abiding by your discipline plan or rules of conduct, you should not hesitate to reteach each of the concepts.

Thomas is a new 5th grade teacher. He understands that he needs to be very clear with his students regarding what he expects and to explain the rationale for his expectations. One of the rules he has for his students is that they walk very quietly and respectfully in the hallways when transitioning from the classroom to other parts of the school, such as for lunch, for assemblies, or to go to the library. On the first day of school, he explains that the class will receive instruction not only in the classroom but also in many different parts of the school building. He goes on to make clear to the class that as the oldest grade level in the building, they are responsible for modeling appropriate behavior for other students. In addition, he tells them that he has confidence in them, is proud of them, and knows that they will be a shining example for the entire school. He goes on to explain that when they are moving from one place to another, there is a potential for other classrooms to be interrupted and disturbed if students walking in the hallways are loud or inconsiderate. He expects his students to walk in a straight line on the right side of the hallway, be absolutely silent when they walk, and keep their hands to themselves. He demonstrates what he means with a couple of students he has "pretaught," and he then has the class practice several times during the day.

An excellent way to see how well the students understand your discipline plan and rules of conduct is to give them a written test. Thompson (1998) encourages teachers to give students a test that requires them to answer questions regarding the classroom and building discipline plan and rules of conduct. Figure 2.4 shows some questions teachers might want to put on the test.

Figure 2.4. Discipline Plan Test

List four things you are to do when you hear, "Give me your attention, please."

List the procedures you must follow before using the bathroom.

List two things you must do to avoid being tardy.

What are the four items you are to bring to class always?

List the two times you are allowed to go to your locker.

Setting and teaching clearly established parameters for acceptable student behaviors is an important component of a discipline plan. When they are done effectively and monitored closely, consequences rarely need to be used.

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Establishing Clearly Defined Parameters of Acceptable Classroom Behaviors

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by Mark Boynton and Christine Boynton Establishing and teaching clearly defined parameters of acceptable behaviors is a critical part of classroom discipline, making up approximately 25 percent of the overall picture (see Figure S1).

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A short clip from UNESCO - "My mother tongue language is..." in various languages.

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The importance of Mother Tongue Language

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The importance of Mother Tongue Language

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A TEDx talk by a student at the International School of Bangkok explaining the benefits and importance of maintaining Mother Tongue Language.

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The Importance Of Your Mother Tongue | Hantz Hessouh | TEDxYouth@ISBangkok

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UN website

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International Mother Language Day 21 February

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To foster sustainable development, learners must have access to education in their mother tongue and in other languages. It is through the mastery of the first language or mother tongue that the basic skills of reading, writing and numeracy are acquired.

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A TED Ed video on the effects of bilingual education on the brain.

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The benefits of a bilingual brain - Mia Nacamulli

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BBC covers the IMLD from the early history to endangered languages.

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BBC World News "Impact": World Mother Language Day and Endangered Languages

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EdWeek captures the importance of SEL in a classroom, using SEL standards.

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Social-Emotional Learning: Goal-Setting and Relationships Are Part of District’s Academic Core

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Learning is About Meaning (Learning Styles Do Not Exist)

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Learning is About Meaning (Learning Styles Do Not Exist)

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A quick explanation by Dr. Daniel Willingham, a cognitive psychology professor from UVa.

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Create your own online flashcards and games to help you study!

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Take action and be a One Girl Ambassador. Educate girls in Africa. https://www.onegirl.org.au/get-involved-2/ambassador

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"The Akanksha Foundation is a non-profit organisation with a mission to provide children from low-income communities with a high-quality education, enabling them to maximize their potential and transform their lives."
- https://www.akanksha.org/

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The best kind of homework.

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September 2010 | Volume 68 | Number 1
Giving Students Meaningful Work Pages 10-15

Cathy Vatterott

The best homework tasks exhibit five characteristics. First, the task has a clear academic purpose, such as practice, checking for understanding, or applying knowledge or skills. Second, the task efficiently demonstrates student learning. Third, the task promotes owner ship by offering choices and being personally relevant. Fourth, the task instills a sense of competence-the student can success fully complete it without help. Last, the task is aesthetically pleasing-it appears enjoyable and interesting (Vatterott, 2009).

Hallmark 1: Purpose

Let's start by examining how purposeful tonight's homework assignments are and whether there are better alternatives.

The purpose of the spelling homework-"Write the 10 spelling words 3 times each"-might be to practice spelling words correctly-a rote memory task. Many teachers believe that writing is a good method, especially if they learned well that way when they were students. But not all students remember by writing. Our goal is to give students methods that are purposeful for them, methods that work for their learning styles.

A better way might be to allow students to design their own task:

Create your own method to practice spelling words or choose one of the following: Write or type the words three times, spell them out loud, use Scrabble tiles to spell them, trace them with your finger, or create a puzzle using the words.

The teacher could also make the task more meaningful by having students connect the spellings to a spelling rule (such as " i before e, except after c").

The second assignment is to "Write definitions of the 15 science vocabulary words." Although the words may have been discussed in class, they're probably new; students are often expected to learn new words to prepare for reading or a class discussion.

But does writing definitions really help us learn what words mean? Writing definitions is a low-level rote task-students best learn the meanings of new words by using them in context. A better task might be one of the following:

Show that you know the meaning of the science vocabulary words by using them in sentences or in a story.

For each vocabulary word, read the three sentences below it. Choose the sentence that uses the word correctly.

A more thoughtful way to understand and remember what words mean is to assign the vocabulary words as an application task after the lesson. For instance, one middle school teacher has students build and launch rockets. After they launch their rockets, the students add the definitions of such words as force, speed, acceleration, and momentum to their notebooks. At that point, the definitions have meaning and connect to the students' experience (Vatterott, 2007).

The third homework assignment- "Do the math problems on page 27"-is more complicated because we don't know whether the purpose of the assignment is to check for understanding of dividing fractions or to practice dividing fractions.

Let's assume the purpose is to practice dividing fractions. The math teacher demonstrates how to divide fractions and monitors the students while they do practice problems in class. Because students can successfully complete the problems immediately after instruction, the teacher assumes that the students understand the concept. The teacher then assigns 20 problems as practice for homework. However, when some of the students get home, they realize that they did not fully understand how to do the problems- and what the teacher thought was practice turns out to be new learning. The students struggle or, worse, do the 20 problems the wrong way.

Ideally, homework should provide feedback to teachers about student understanding, enabling teachers to adjust instruction and, when necessary, reteach concepts before assigning practice. Assigning practice prematurely can cause student frustration and confusion.

Practice is more effective when distributed in small doses over several days or weeks (Marzano, Pickering, & Pollock, 2001). That is, distributed practice is more effective than mass practice. A student may need to practice a math operation 50 times to master it-but not all in one night! Instead of the traditional 20-30 problems each night, a better math assignment is two-tiered- for example, three questions or problems to check for understanding of today's lesson and 10 questions or problems to practice previous learning.

Hallmark 2: Efficiency

Some traditional tasks may be inefficient-either because they show no evidence of learning or because they take an inordinate amount of time to complete but yield little "bang for the buck." Both students and parents tend to view tasks that don't appear to require thinking as busywork.

Projects that require nonacademic skills (such as cutting, gluing, or drawing) are often inefficient. Teachers assign projects like dioramas, models, and poster displays with all the best intentions-they see them as a fun, creative way for students to show what they have learned. But unless a rubric clearly spells out the content requirements, projects may reveal little about students' content knowledge and much more about their artistic talents (Bennett & Kalish, 2006). Even content-rich projects can be inefficient in terms of time spent. Teachers often don't realize how many hours these projects take and how tedious they may be for both student and parent.

There are more efficient ways to accomplish the same goal and better demonstrate student learning. Instead of creating a diorama of life during the Reconstruction after the U.S. Civil War, students could write a diary entry as though they were living in the time, discussing daily life, race relations, and laws that affected them. Instead of building a model of the solar system, students could create a poster to show the planets' temperature extremes, periods of rotation in Earth time, and the importance of inertia and gravity to the motion of the planets. Students could create a video that they post on YouTube or a game to demonstrate their knowledge of the steps in a process, such as how the digestive system works, how a bill becomes a law, or how to solve an algebra problem (Vatterott, 2007).

Hallmark 3: Ownership

As a teacher once said, "I never heard of a student not doing his work; it's our work he's not doing." When we customize tasks to fit student learning styles and interests, the task becomes theirs, not ours. The goal of ownership is to create a personal relationship between the student and the content (Vatterott, 2009).

One of the easiest ways to promote ownership is through individual research. For instance, if the class is studying the history of Europe, students could write a report about the country of their choice. They could choose a topic they want to learn more about. Even though for all reports students would use the same rubric-which would focus on facts about government, economy, culture, or geography-students could write a traditional research paper, create a PowerPoint presentation, or design a travel brochure.

Instead of having students write out multiplication tables, a more meaningful assignment would ask, "What is the best way for you to practice your multiplication tables?" Some students may learn better by reciting them, creating a table, or setting them to music. Thinking about how they learn best makes the learning more relevant.

When students practice reading (and grow to enjoy reading for pleasure), choice of what, when, and how much to read is especially important. Typical assignments dictate what as well as how much: "Twenty minutes each night, two chapters from the novel each night, or 30 pages from your textbook each night." Forcing students into those requirements may have the adverse effect of students actually reading less than they would if they were not "on the clock" (Kohn, 2006).

When teachers tell students how much to read, students often just read to an assigned page number and stop. A California mother wrote,

Our children are now expected to read 20 minutes a night and record such on their homework sheet. What parents are discovering (surprise) is that those kids who used to sit down and read for pleasure ... are now setting the timer, choosing the easiest books, and stopping when the timer dings. ... Reading has become a chore, like brushing your teeth. (Kohn, 2006, pp. 176-177)

Then comes the tedious task of judging whether the students met the requirement. The reading log is the typical proof: "Each night, write down the author, title, and number of pages you read, how much time you spent reading, and the date. Have your parent sign the log each night." Whew! Not only are reading logs time-consuming, but also focusing on documenting takes a lot of the joy out of reading (Bennett & Kalish, 2006).

This might be a better approach:

Try to read an average of 30 minutes each night. Once a week, estimate how much time you've spent reading. Write a short paragraph about what you've been reading.

If we want to promote ownership and encourage students to enjoy reading, we must go beyond the assigned reading list. One student who usually enjoyed reading lamented, "I just want to read something that I want to read!" We should broaden what "counts" as reading to include such nontraditional sources as blogs, websites, and magazines. Instead of worrying about whether students did the reading, we should be focusing on whether the reading did them any good.

Hallmark 4: Competence

If all students are to feel competent in completing homework, we must abandon a one-size-fits-all approach. Homework that students can't do without help is not good homework; students are discouraged when they are unable to complete homework on their own (Darling-Hammond & Ifill-Lynch, 2006; Stiggins, 2007). To ensure homework is doable, teachers must differentiate assignments so they are at the appropriate level of difficulty for individual students (Tomlinson, 2008).

Struggling students may require fewer questions, less complex problems with fewer steps, or less reading. Some students may be given abbreviated reading assignments, adapted reading packets, or simplified directions. One of the simplest ways to help struggling students is to require less writing, with fewer blanks to fill in, or answers that the student can circle instead of writing out. Although some students may create a graphic organizer, others may be given a graphic organizer. Teachers might give some students word banks, copies of their notes, or hint sheets. English language learners may benefit from assignments containing pictures that give clues to meaning in assignments with difficult vocabulary and may find it easier to complete work in their native language first.

The amount of work is a huge obstacle to feelings of competence for some students. A task that takes the average student 15 minutes to complete could take another student an hour. It doesn't make sense for slower students to have to spend more time on homework than other students do-instead, teachers should simply give them less work (Goldberg, 2007).

A simple means of differentiating is to make homework time-based instead of task-based. Instead of assigning all students 20 questions to answer, assign all students to complete what they can in a specified amount of time: "Answer as many questions as you can in 30 minutes; work longer if you like." In one 5th grade classroom, the rule is "50 minutes is 50 minutes." Students are not expected to work more than 50 minutes each night. If students have homework in math, science, and reading and they spend 50 minutes on science and math, parents simply write a note saying, "Rhonda spent her 50 minutes on science and math and had no time for reading tonight" (Vatterott, 2009). Teachers who are uncomfortable with this method might want to prioritize subjects ("Do the reading first, then math, then science") or ask students to spend a little time on each subject ("Spend at least 10 minutes on each subject. You do not need to work more than 50 minutes total"). A better solution may be to limit homework to one or two subjects each night.

Teachers must also take care to adequately explain assignments-preferably in writing-and structure them so students know how to complete them (Darling-Hammond & Ifill-Lynch, 2006). "Read Chapter 4" is an inadequate direction at any grade level. Reading to acquire information or think critically about the content requires a scaffolded task. Teachers may rely on worksheets, but when students can simply fill in the blanks, they aren't necessarily demonstrating understanding of the content. A more meaningful scaffold would focus on broader concepts and would include graphic organizers, big-picture questions, or reflective tasks, such as the following:

List the four most important ideas in Chapter 4.

Keep a journal. After each chapter section, write a reaction to what you read.

During your reading, place sticky notes on the parts you have questions about.

During your reading, place sticky notes on the parts you found most interesting to discuss in class.

When we want students to focus on the main ideas of a novel or short story, high-interest and high-emotion questions such as these work well:

Which characters best typify the following virtues: honor, integrity, strength? What did they do that shows that virtue?

Which characters best typify the following vices: greed, jealousy, arrogance? What did they do that shows that vice?

With which character do you most identify and why?

How does the story relate to life today? (Vatterott, 2007)

Teachers need to adequately structure complex tasks. For example, if the assignment is for 4th graders to research and write a report about a time period or an important person, do all 4th graders know how to do research? Students not only need a rubric that details what they must include in the report, but they also need instructions on how to find resources, steps to follow in organizing the process, and suggested websites. Long-term projects require monitoring, with intermittent due dates for outlines and rough drafts.

If the homework assignment is to "Study for the test," does that mean memorize facts, review concepts, or learn new material not covered in class? And how do students know what it means? Although a study guide or take-home test that shows students exactly what they need to know is helpful, they don't necessarily have to write or complete anything to study. Teachers should encourage students to create their own best method of reviewing the information, suggesting possible options, such as organizing notes into an outline, writing test questions for themselves, putting important information on note cards, or studying with a partner.

Hallmark 5: Aesthetic Appeal

Every day, students make decisions about whether to do a homework assignment on the basis of their first impressions. The way homework looks is important. Five-page worksheets or endless lists of definitions or math problems look boring and tedious. As a gourmet cook would say, "Presentation is everything." Wise teachers have learned that students at all levels are more motivated to complete assignments that are visually uncluttered. Less information on the page, plenty of room to write answers, and the use of graphics or clip art make tasks look inviting and interesting (Vatterott, 2009).

In an effort to create appealing tasks, teachers sometimes compromise learning. A word search may look like fun, but it has little value in reinforcing spelling and can be a torturous task. A better task would be for students to create their own pattern of content-related words, as in Scrabble. Likewise, crossword puzzles are fun, but students may benefit little from matching definitions with words when the focus is on solving the puzzle. A better task would be for the students to find connections between the concepts that the words represent. For example, students might group words as "feeling words" or "action words," as nouns or verbs, or as words with one or two syllables.

Free to Learn

Meaningful homework should be purposeful, efficient, personalized, doable, and inviting. Most important, students must be able to freely communicate with teachers when they struggle with homework, knowing they can admit that they don't understand a task-and can do so without penalty.

References

Bennett, S., & Kalish, N. (2006). The case against homework: How homework is hurting our children and what we can do about it. New York: Crown.

Darling-Hammond, L., & Ifill-Lynch, O. (2006). If they'd only do their work! Educational Leadership, 63(5), 8-13.

Goldberg, K. (2007, April). The homework trap. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Chicago.

Kohn, A. (2006). The homework myth: Why our kids get too much of a bad thing. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press.

Marzano, R. J., Pickering, D. J., & Pollock, J. E. (2001). Classroom instruction that works: Research-based strategies for increasing student achievement. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Stiggins, R. (2007). Assessment through the student's eyes. Educational Leadership, 64(8), 22-26.

Tomlinson, C. A. (2008). The goals of differentiation. Educational Leadership, 66(3), 26-31.

Vatterott, C. (2007). Becoming a middle level teacher: Student focused teaching of early adolescents. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Vatterott, C. (2009). Rethinking homework: Best practices that support diverse needs. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.

Cathy Vatterott is an associate professor of education at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. She is the author of Rethinking Homework: Best Practices That Support Diverse Needs (ASCD, 2009); vatterott@umsl.edu.

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September 2010 | Volume 68 | Number 1 Giving Students Meaningful Work Pages 10-15 Cathy Vatterott The best homework tasks exhibit five characteristics. First, the task has a clear academic purpose, such as practice, checking for understanding, or applying knowledge or skills. Second, the task efficiently demonstrates student learning.

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A new paradigm of homework based on research.

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"Smile Foundation is to empower underprivileged children, youth and women through relevant education, innovative healthcare and market-focused livelihood programmes."
https://www.smilefoundationindia.org/aboutus.html#mission

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Non Profit Organization In India | Children Health And Education Foundation - Smile Foundation

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Smile Foundation may be contacted any time for queries related to donations, partnerships, media support related issues, events and communications or brand associations.

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These days happen.

"The leftover 15 minutes after the fire drill, when you know you don’t have enough time to actually finish the lesson you were teaching, but you don’t want to just let them sit there. "

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Listen to this post as a Podcast:

The term "lame duck" is most often used to describe a president who is still sitting in office after his or her successor has been elected. Technically this person is still the president, but his or her decision-making power is generally perceived to be minimal.

We have something like that in school: those days when technically we're still in school, but because it's right before vacation, the end of the school year is near, or we're in the middle of standardized testing, those class hours don't have the same instructional potential as your average school day. In some cases, like on standardized test days in certain districts, teachers are explicitly told they CAN'T plan regular instruction. On these Lame Duck days, it's hard to figure out what we can do to still provide valuable learning experiences for our students.

Sometimes instead of days, we have small bursts of Lame Duck time: The leftover 15 minutes after the fire drill, when you know you don't have enough time to actually finish the lesson you were teaching, but you don't want to just let them sit there. We often call the activities we need for these times "sponge activities." Regardless of what you call it or how much you need, we all have those times when students are right in front of us but the regularly scheduled programming just isn't going to work.

What then?

In some schools, they'll still let you show movies. I worked in a place like that, although near the end, we were starting to get pressured to cut that out. And I understand why: As a parent, when ask my kids what they did in school on any given day, and I hear "watched a movie," I'm annoyed. I mean, I can show my kids a movie at home. Surely school can step it up a notch? What's worse, "show a movie" in some classes actually means "Put a movie on, but let students do whatever they want while the movie provides background noise." And when the movie is, say, The Sound of Music, or some other classic I have waited years to experience with my kids, and then they tell me their music teacher puts it on all the time, I feel robbed as a parent.

Okay, that's my rant about showing movies in class. Take it with a grain of salt, because (a) I totally showed movies when I needed a day to grade papers and get caught up, and (b) I'm fully aware that a TON of absolutely amazing movies, video clips, and documentaries are absolutely jam-packed with educational value. So I get that it's not the worst thing you can do, and I know it CAN be done right. This is why I would never support a school banning videos across the board; that kind of blunt policy doesn't respect teachers' ability to make the best instructional choices for students.

HOWEVER...when it comes time to plan for Lame Duck days, we really do have so many more options beyond the showing of videos. So if you've decided you want to do something else, or you've been told you flat-out have to, here's a great list for what to do instead. Some of these ideas come from my own teaching experience, others come from online resources, and a lot of them are from a Facebook Live broadcast I did a few weeks ago, where other teachers contributed their own ideas.

I've broken this list into three sections, based on how much prep you'd need to do to for each one and how much time each one would take.

Some list items contain Amazon Affiliate links; if you purchase from Amazon after going through these links, Cult of Pedagogy receives a small commission at no extra cost to you.

Low-Prep

These activities can be done at a moment's notice, with little to no required materials. They can be used as a 10-minute filler or as the main activity for a whole class period.

1. Clean-up Day: Give students a chance to clean out their binders or lockers and enlist students to help tidy the classroom as well.

2. Learn a Line Dance: Either you teach your students, they teach each other, or you all learn together from YouTube. What's great about line dancing is that anyone can do it, whether they have rhythm or not. Go back a few years to learn the Cupid Shuffle, further back to learn the Macarena or go way back and learn the Hustle.

3. Thank-You Notes: Since this important life skill isn't really a part of any curriculum, a Lame Duck day is a perfect time to have students practice it and show some gratitude to the people who deserve it. Provide them with paper and envelopes and have them write thank-you notes to friends, family members, school staff members, or other students. For best results, show them a few examples of thoughtfully written notes ahead of time.

4. The Compliments Project: This is an incredible activity where students take turns being in the "hot seat" while their classmates write compliments on the board behind them. You have to see this one to appreciate its full impact. Watch here. Although this activity only takes about 5 to 10 minutes per student, which means it would be something you could squeeze into the end of a class period, you should only get it started if you know you'll eventually have time to put every student in the hot seat.

5. Go Outside: Many of the activities listed in this post could also be done outside, or you could just play a classic outdoors game like Red Rover or Red Light, Green Light. Check out this list of games for ideas.

6. Philosophical Chairs Debate: This technique has a lot of different names, like Four Corners, Physical Barometer, and This or That, but the idea is the same: You read some sort of statement to the class, like "Students should be allowed to go barefoot in school." Designate one side of the room as the "Agree" side and the other as the "Disagree" side. Students must physically walk to the side of the room that best represents their opinion. Then have students take turns explaining why they are standing in that spot. (If you want fantastic pre-made questions on a PowerPoint for this, take a look at my This or That icebreaker).

7. Group Story/Progressive Writing: Have every student take out a sheet of paper and have them all write the first sentence (or two, or three) of a story. Then have them pass it to the right and pick up where the last student left off. Keep going until you have a class set of unique stories. One variation of this is to give everyone the exact same sentence to start with, and see how many directions the different stories take.

Medium-Prep

These require you to do a bit of planning ahead of time, but for many, once you've prepared the materials, they can be used over and over again.

1. Improv Skits: Have groups of students compete by performing improv skits. This can be done in so many ways, but two structures you could use are 3-Word Skits, where students are given three words and must come up with a skit that uses all three, and Bag of Titles, where you (or other students) write lots of interesting or odd titles (e.g., "The Lady with 100 Cats") and the performers must come up with a skit that matches the title. Both of these ideas came from the incredible website Drama Notebook. Another great source for improv ideas is this list of games played on the T.V. show Whose Line Is It Anyway? (Screen these yourself first, as they do contain some adult content.)

2. Icebreakers: Get students talking with one of my three favorite classroom icebreakers.

3. Skype: Once you learn about some of the free educational opportunities offered by Skype, you might not want to do anything else in your free class time. One of these is a Mystery Skype, where you connect with another class in an unknown location (only you and the other teacher will know), and students work together to ask a series of yes/no questions until they guess where the other class is. Another is a Virtual Field Trip, where your class Skypes with someone (often a professional in some part of the world, like an ocean exploration with Fabien Cousteau, the grandson of Jacques Cousteau). To learn more, visit the Skype in the Classroom page in the Microsoft Educator Community.

4. Board Games or Card Games: I think we can all agree that no one plays board games or card games as much as they used to, and the simple fun and social learning that can come from them are worth the time and effort. Some of my family's favorites are Pictionary, Spot It!, Dominoes, Scattergories, Scrabble, Quirkle, Uno, or Yahtzee. Or just buy a few basic decks of cards, then check out the Gather Together Games YouTube channel and learn how to play something classic like Gin Rummy, Spades, or Pinochle.

5. Minute to Win it Games: These require some equipment and set-up, but not a whole lot, and they will really break students out of their shells. This list from Happiness is Homemade has 10 fantastic ideas, like "Cookie Face" and "Junk in the Trunk."

6. Mindfulness Practice: Especially during testing season, mindfulness practice can ease stress and give students a skill they can apply in so many other areas of their lives. Two great resources for starting on this journey are the Mindful Schools website, and the book Teach, Breathe, Learn by Meena Srinivasan. Two easy-to-make mindfulness tools are glitter jars and breathing sticks.

7. Kahoot: If you still haven't tried Kahoot, you're in for a treat. This website lets you create interactive, game show-style quizzes that students play as a class on their own devices. You could create a content-based Kahoot, do one just for fun, or even have students create them.

8. STEM Challenges: A hands-on problem that students need to solve with science, technology, engineering or math skills is cognitively challenging, socially engaging, and just a fun break from routine in any class. Here are some fun challenge ideas. (Don't mind that it says "elementary." They would be fun for older kids, too.)

9. Open Mic: This was something I did several times in my middle school classrooms, and it was an incredibly bonding experience. The idea is simple: Invite any student who has some kind of performance talent-whether it's singing, playing an instrument, magic, martial arts, or even creative writing-to take the stage in your classroom and give a short performance. Something truly magical happens when students get to see their peers step outside of the roles they're normally in during class. And if your students are anything like mine were, they will recognize the courage it takes to get up in front of your peers and do this. I can still remember the day when one of my 8th grade girls got up and sang an Alicia Keys song a capella. Beautifully. When she was done the room just exploded with applause. If you have students who are too shy to perform live or whose talent can't be performed in a classroom setting, let them record themselves at home and play the videos in class. One of our great privileges as teachers is helping our students grow into full, well-rounded human beings, and letting them see their own peers in a different light is absolutely one way to do this. (Listen to me talk about this experience on my friend James Sturtevant's Hacking Engagement podcast.)

High-Prep or Long-Term

1. Genius Hour: Just in case you've never heard of Genius Hour, it's a structure for giving students time to explore topics and skills they choose completely on their own. Sometimes they study a foreign language, teach themselves how to code, even start their own businesses. A Genius Hour project usually happens over a period of weeks or even months, in small increments. So if you've already got a Genius Hour program going, these extra bits of time are perfect for continued work on projects. To learn more about Genius Hour, check out my friend A.J. Juliani's webinar and course here.

2. Community Service Project: One great way to make the most of the end of the school year is to have students identify a need in the community, then plan and execute a service project. Check out these 7 ideas for service learning projects from We Are Teachers. Another type of service project could be organizing a school-wide yard sale, with the profits going to charity.

3. Student Video Project: These can take all kinds of forms: end-of-year retrospectives, book trailers, tutorials or welcome videos for incoming students. You could even hold a student film festival where final projects are shown on the last few days of school. This classroom video guide from EdTechTeacher will help get you started.

4. Amazing Race Game: Just like with the Survivor game above, you could coordinate a game based on the show The Amazing Race following a plan like this one.

5. Literature Circles: Amid all these other creative ideas, the humble literature circle may not seem quite so exciting, but never underestimate the value of a small group of students talking about a fantastic book they're all reading. To learn more, see this Getting Started Guide to Literature Circles from ReadWriteThink.

6. BreakoutEDU Activities: BreakoutEDU is kind of hard to explain, but I'll give it a shot: It's a kit that contains several boxes, a few locks, an invisible ink pen and UV light, a USB drive, and a few other pieces of equipment. The deal with the box is that teachers use them to facilitate games, games that feel like a cross between a mystery and a challenge, where clues are left around the room and students have to answer questions in order to find them. In the same way that you can plug questions or content into a platform like Kahoot, you can do the same with BreakoutEDU (they also have a lot of pre-made games available for purchase). Learn more here.

7. Student/Teacher Unconference: Using a chunk of hours or a whole day, teachers and students plan short lessons on things they are interested in outside of school (crafts, yoga, cooking, martial arts, music, dance, technology), then sign up for time slots like an EdCamp. With the schedule in place, students and teachers can then sign up to attend the ones they are interested in. This would definitely take some planning, especially the first time, but it could be so worth it. What is an unconference?

8. TED Talks: Watching these short, powerful presentations has become almost a rite of passage for 21st century humans. Have students watch a few to understand the style, then plan and deliver their own.

Even More Fantastic Ideas:

There's so much more where this came from.
Join my mailing list and get a weekly email from me that will help you crush it in the classroom. As a welcome goodie bag, you'll get access to my Members-Only Library of free downloads, which includes my e-booklet, 20 Ways to Cut Your Grading Time in Half. Come on in!

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Listen to this post as a Podcast: The term "lame duck" is most often used to describe a president who is still sitting in office after his or her successor has been elected. Technically this person is still the president, but his or her decision-making power is generally perceived to be minimal.

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Tomato timer - Work for 25 minutes, short break for 5 minutes!

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Using the Eisenhower Matrix is a great way to prioritize tasks.

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The Eisenhower Matrix is a task prioritization technique that could be the answer to your overloaded to-do list and notification nightmares.
You've got a lot on your plate. In addition to your actual projects, it feels like you also have 50 other little tasks that demand your attention. There are a ton of unanswered emails in your inbox. A coworker on another project desperately needs your input on something, and they're on a deadline. Not to mention that overflowing laundry bin waiting for you at home.

With all of these priorities whizzing around your brain simultaneously, it's hard to actually tackle any of them. The anxiety of not knowing where to start is leaving you in a state of analysis paralysis.

You feel overwhelmed, and stuck. And if you don't have a time management method, it's easy to fall into the trap of thinking that every task is urgent and important.

But it's not all bad news. Solutions for prioritization and decision-making are not new. In fact, one of the greatest frameworks for decision-making and time management came over a half a century ago, from old school productivity master and very busy fellow Dwight Eisenhower, 34th President of the United States.

During his presidency , President Eisenhower managed Cold-War tensions, ended the war in Korea, and created the Interstate Highway System among many other achievements. You could say he was a very busy fellow, and thankfully he left this productivity legacy to help you free yourself from hurry worry and the anxiety to complete all your activities within a day.

The Eisenhower Matrix

The Eisenhower Matrix (or Eisenhower Box) is an easy, yet extremely effective way to figure out how to prioritize your tasks so that the most important don't fall by the wayside to the sudden, unexpected, and urgent ones.

Here's a quick video tutorial for how to organize your tasks into the do, delegate, decide and delete buckets:

The idea is that all of your tasks can be sorted into four quadrants, with axes of Important and Urgent on either side. These four quadrants are given number values of 1 through 4 based on their priority.
Image credit: Jamesclear.com

1. "Important" and "Urgent" tasks. These receive a priority level of 1 and should be your primary focus to complete.

2. "Important", but "Not Urgent" tasks. These are the long-term goals and tasks that you are important to you personal and professional development, but don't have a firm deadline.

3. "Not Important", but "Urgent" tasks. These tasks are the ones you can delegate or schedule to complete after your 1st quadrant tasks are completed.

4. "Not Important" and "Not Urgent" tasks. These tasks are placed in the 4th quadrant ones you put to wayside and should eliminate. Do you really need to binge-watch Season 1 of This Is Us or could that time be better used to work on your 2nd quadrant tasks, such as reading one new book per month?

The Eisenhower Matrix is a simple framework that helps you break out of that pernicious analysis paralysis which occurs every time you "feel like you don't even know where to start." By assigning each task to a quadrant, it is easy to understand what actually requires your attention this very second and what can wait until another day.

Most importantly, the matrix helps you focus on your long-term goals by clearing out the distracting shallow work that keeps you from exercising, learning how to code, or other large projects that require more time to accomplish, but ultimately improve your life and career.

Why Is It Hard To Make Decisions?

This means that decision-making is actually tied to mood regulation. Indeed, anxiety and depression are often categorized as feelings of immobility, being stuck, and an inability to make decisions.

That's why adopting a framework like the Eisenhower Matrix to help you triage your tasks, or decisions you need to make, is an easy way to reduce your emotional load.

By practicing the Eisenhower Matrix regularly, your brain will begin to rewire itself and you'll easily get into the habit of quickly identifying the difference between important tasks and non-important tasks.

Make It Visible
Sample board here
The Eisenhower Matrix can be translated into a Trello board of your tasks. Make a list for each quadrant, as well as an "Incoming" list where you can dump everything you need to do, and triage when you're ready. It will look something like this:

Just looking at your board will give you the visual ease of load balancing. Do you have a lot of cards in the Not Important/Urgent list? Start tackling little things on there to make those lists seem more manageable. These activities could include writing and responding to a batch of emails in one hour, or topping up your social media queue with tweets and Facebook posts for the week.

Tasks that are Urgent but not necessarily Important are often tasks that can be delegated to someone else when appropriate. Remember that assigning priority to tasks means different things to different people. For you, scheduling that flight for the conference might be urgent because if you don't do it in advance, airline fares will break your budget. For others, that might be a task that is better delegated to an assistant.

Fun fact: President Eisenhower was a master delegator. He created the position of the White House Chief of Staff.

Automate What Comes Into The Matrix

If you work across a few Trello boards, you can attach a card or a board to another card with the related cards feature . At a glance, you can get key information from other projects, such as due dates and checklists, in your own matrix so you can manage your progress to your heart's content without changing your team's own Trello organization process.

You can also use automation tool Zapier to create cards in your Incoming list. Connect other apps you're using to Trello, and when specific events happen, it will trigger a Zap and send a card to your Trello list.

Drop The Dread Of Decision Making

The Eisenhower Matrix is a visual framework that can be used with productivity tools you're already in, like Trello, to keep everything organized. It's an easy way to batch tasks into four priority levels, one of which (Not Important/Not Urgent) is immediately dropped, so really it's only three categories of attention-worthy tasks to focus on.

All you need to do is spend time analyzing your tasks and goals and categorize them into activities that you can be completed within certain time frames. Through this method, your prioritization and delegation skills will become top-notch.

In short, you've already got plenty on your plate. Don't make the process of prioritization yet another thing you need to deal with. Thanks, Ike!

Next: The Complete Guide To Boosting Your Personal Productivity

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The Eisenhower Matrix Productivity Method [Video Tutorial]

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The Eisenhower Matrix is a task prioritization technique that could be the answer to your overloaded to-do list and notification nightmares. You've got a lot on your plate. In addition to your actual projects, it feels like you also have 50 other little tasks that demand your attention.

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An online to-do list, sign in using a Gmail accoutn.

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Todoist gives you the confidence that everything's organized and accounted for, so you can make progress on the things that are important to you.

See the big picture with Todoist Boards

Organize your projects with an easy-to-understand layout that can be as simple, or as in-depth, as you need.
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Link Todoist with the apps you already use and make it your central, organized hub for getting things done.

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Everywhere you are

With 10+ apps and plugins, you'll be able to review your upcoming tasks - and jot down new ones - no matter where you happen to be. Everything stays in perfect sync across all your devices.
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Templates to get you started

Get a head start with project templates for work and life. Import them into your Todoist with just one click.
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Join millions of people who organize work and life with Todoist.

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Todoist gives you the confidence that everything's organized and accounted for, so you can make progress on the things that are important to you. Organize your projects with an easy-to-understand layout that can be as simple, or as in-depth, as you need.

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Aiming to complete 1 big task, 3 medium sized task, and 5 small tasks.

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A couple months ago, our founder and president Alex Cavoulacos (who also happens to be the most productive person we know) shared her secrets for actually getting through your to-do list. And since then, we at The Muse have been trying out her tips on our own overflowing lists.

And you know what? They work.

One in particular has had a major impact on our productivity: the 1-3-5 rule.

Here's the gist: Understand that you can't accomplish an endless number of things each day. Instead, accept that you can reasonably get one big thing, three medium things, and five small things done. So keep your daily to-do list to just those nine items.

Sound scary? Well, it is, at first. But you only have so much time, and you can only get a finite number of things done in a day. Making a 1-3-5 list before you get started means the things you will get the most important tasks accomplished.

Of course, this can be flexible. If you spend much of your day in meetings, for example, you might need to cut your number of items down. If you have a lot of unexpected tasks thrown at you in your job, try leaving some of your task slots blank to fill in as things come up.

But the point is, prioritization works. So, give it a whirl-we've even created a template you can use to try it out! Just download, print a few copies, and spend the rest of your days this week focusing on the few things that matter most. We think you'll be surprised by how much you actually get done.

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The Best To-Do List Strategy: The 1-3-5 Rule

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A couple months ago, our founder and president Alex Cavoulacos (who also happens to be the most productive person we know) shared her secrets for actually getting through your to-do list. And since then, we at The Muse have been trying out her tips on our own overflowing lists.

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A few tips on how to stay safe on the web. The site contains further links for parents.

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How could we live without our smartphones, laptops, and other devices that allow us to go online? That's how most of us keep in touch with friends and family, take pictures, do our homework, do research, find out the latest news, and even shop.

But besides the millions of sites to visit and things to do, going online offers lots of ways to waste time - and even get into trouble. And just as in the non-cyber world, some people you encounter online might try to take advantage of you, steal your personal information, or harass or threaten you (called cyberbullying).

You've probably heard stories about people who got into trouble for something they did online - whether it was sending an inappropriate photograph by text message, joining in on some online bullying on a website or message app, or getting ripped off by someone they met through a website.

Because users can easily remain anonymous, some of the more popular websites and messaging apps might attract adults who pretend to be teens or kids. They'll sometimes ask visitors for pictures or information about themselves, their families, or where they live - information that shouldn't be given away.

Usually, the people who request personal information like home addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses use this information to fill mailboxes and answering machines with advertisements. In some cases, though, predators may use this information to begin illegal or indecent relationships or to harm a person or family.

Smart Surfing

First rule? Check your mood! Are you feeling upset or angry? Then this is not the time to be messaging or posting on a social media site. People don't always make good decisions or think straight when they're stressed out or upset. If you have to, call someone or go for a run instead before you start venting online.

Second rule: when you're on a website, try to remain as anonymous as possible. That means keeping all private information private. Here are some examples of private information that you should never allow the public to see:

your full name

any type of photograph (even of your pet!)

your current location (some phones have automatic GPS apps built in that may need to be turned off)

home or school address or the address of any of your family or friends

phone numbers

Social Security number

passwords

names of family members

credit card numbers

Most trustworthy people and companies won't ask for this type of information online. So if others do, it's a red flag that they may be up to no good. Always check with a parent if you are unsure, especially when shopping online or signing up for a website or app.

Think carefully before you create an email address or screen name. Web experts recommend that you use a combination of letters and numbers in both - and that you don't identify whether you're male or female.

When using messaging or chat/video apps, use a nickname that's different from your screen name. That way, if you ever find yourself in a conversation that makes you uncomfortable, you can exit without having to worry that someone knows your screen name and can track you down via email. Some people who hang out with their friends online set up private chat rooms where only they and the people they invite can enter to chat.

Safety experts recommend that people keep online friendships in the virtual world. Meeting online friends face to face carries more risks than other types of friendships because it's so easy for people to pretend to be something they're not when you can't see them or talk in person. It's safer to Skype or video message with someone first, but even that can carry some risks. Check with a parent that this is a safe thing for you to be doing. They may want to meet some of your contacts or sit in on a conversation before they allow you to set up Skype by yourself.

If you ever get involved in any messaging or online chats that make you feel uncomfortable or in danger for any reason, exit and tell a parent or other adult right away so they can report the incident. You also can report it to the website of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children - they have a form for reporting this type of incident called CyberTipline. They will then see that the info is forwarded to law enforcement officials for investigation.

Cyberbullying

It's not just strangers who can make you feel uncomfortable. Cyberbullying refers to cruel or bullying messages sent to you online. These might be from former friends or other people you know. They can also be sent anonymously - in other words, on a website where everyone has a screen name, so teens being bullied might not even know who is bullying them.

If you get these bullying messages online, it's often better to ignore them rather than answer them. Cyberbullies, just like other bullies, might be looking for attention or a reaction. Plus, you never want to provoke bullies. By ignoring them, you can take away their power. You also can try to delete or block bullies so you no longer see their messages or texts.

Fortunately, most people never experience cyberbullying. But if you're getting cyberbullied and ignoring it doesn't make it stop, getting help from a parent, school counselor, or another trusted adult might be a good idea. That's especially true if the cyberbullying contains threats.

Other Things to Consider

Although email is relatively private, hackers can still access it - or add you to their spam lists. Spam, like ads or harassing or offensive notes, is annoying. But spam blockers can keep your mailbox from getting clogged. Many service providers will help you block out or screen inappropriate emails if your parents agree to set up age-appropriate parental controls.

If you don't recognize the sender of a document or file that needs to be downloaded, delete it without opening it to avoid getting a virus on your device. Virus protection software is a must for every computer and should be updated regularly. You also can buy software that helps rid your computer of unwanted spyware programs that report what your computer is doing. Some service providers make software available to protect you from these and other online annoyances, such as blockers for those in-your-face pop-up ads.

When you're out and about with your devices, keep them secure. Don't let other people use your phone unless you're with them. Don't leave your phone where someone else might pick it up, and turn your laptop or tablet off when you're not using it. Don't make it easy for other people to get a look at your personal information.

Finally, remember that any pictures or text messages that you send could become "leaked," or public, as soon as you hit send. Think about whether the words you've written or the pictures you're about to share are ones that you would want other people reading or seeing. It's always better to be safe than sorry. A good rule is that if you wouldn't want your grandmother to see it or read it, you probably shouldn't send it or post it.

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is it ok to give away personal information online

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How could we live without our smartphones, laptops, and other devices that allow us to go online? That's how most of us keep in touch with friends and family, take pictures, do our homework, do research, find out the latest news, and even shop.

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A quick how-to sheet for teens on how to deal with cyberbullying.

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What Is Cyberbullying?

Cyberbullying is the use of technology to harass, threaten, embarrass, or target another person. Online threats and mean, aggressive, or rude texts, tweets, posts, or messages all count. So does posting personal information, pictures, or videos designed to hurt or embarrass someone else.

Cyberbullying also includes photos, messages, or pages that don't get taken down, even after the person has been asked to do so. In other words, it's anything that gets posted online and is meant to hurt, harass, or upset someone else.

Intimidation or mean comments that focus on things like a person's gender, religion, sexual orientation, race, or physical differences count as discrimination, which is against the law in many states. That means the police could get involved, and bullies may face serious penalties.

Online bullying can be particularly damaging and upsetting because it's usually anonymous or hard to trace. It's also hard to control, and the person being victimized has no idea how many people (or hundreds of people) have seen the messages or posts. People can be tormented nonstop whenever they check their device or computer.

Online bullying and harassment can be easier to commit than other acts of bullying because the bully doesn't have to confront his or her target in person.

What Are the Consequences of Cyberbullying?

Sometimes, online bullying, like other kinds of bullying, can lead to serious long-lasting problems. The stress of being in a constant state of upset or fear can lead to problems with mood, energy level, sleep, and appetite. It also can make someone feel jumpy, anxious, or sad. If someone is already depressed or anxious, cyberbullying can make things much worse.

It's not just the person being bullied who gets hurt. The punishment for cyberbullies can be serious. More and more schools and after-school programs are creating systems to respond to cyberbullying. Schools may dismiss bullies from sports teams or suspend them from school. Some types of cyberbullying may violate school codes or even break anti-discrimination or sexual harassment laws. So a bully may face serious legal trouble.

Why Do People Do It?

Why would someone be a cyberbully? There are probably as many reasons as there are bullies themselves.

Sometimes, what seems like online harassment may be accidental. The impersonal nature of text messages, posts, and other ways of communicating online means it can be hard to figure out if someone is joking or not.

Most people know when they're being bullied, though, because bullying involves repeated insults or threats. The people doing the bullying know they've crossed a line, too. It's not a one-off joke or insult - it's constant harassment and threats that go beyond typical fun teasing or a nasty comment made in anger.

What Can I Do About Cyberbullying?

Sometimes, people are afraid or not sure if they're being bullied or not. So they don't do anything about it. If you're being bullied, harassed, or teased in a hurtful way - or know someone who is - you don't have to suffer in silence. In fact, you absolutely should report any upsetting texts, messages, posts, or emails.

Tell someone. Most experts agree: The first thing to do is tell an adult you trust. This is often easier said than done. People who are cyberbullied may feel embarrassed or reluctant to report a bully. Some may hesitate because they're not 100% sure who is doing the bullying. But bullying can get worse, so speak up until you find someone to help. Sometimes the police can track down an anonymous online bully, so it's often worthwhile to report it.

Most parents are so concerned about protecting their kids that sometimes they focus on taking major steps to stop the bullying. If you're being bullied and worry about losing your phone or computer privileges, explain your fears to your parents. Let them know how important it is to stay connected, and work with them to figure out a solution that doesn't leave you feeling punished as well as picked on. You may have to do some negotiating on safe phone or computer use - the most important thing is to first get the bullying under control.

You also can talk to your school counselor or a trusted teacher or family member. If the bullying feels like it's really getting you down (like if it's affecting your sleep or concentration), therapy can help. If you're not ready for that, you can still benefit from the support of a trusted adult.

Walk away. What you've heard about walking away from a real-life bully works in the virtual world too. Ignoring bullies is the best way to take away their power, but it isn't always easy to do - in the real world or online.

If you see something upsetting, try to step away from the computer or turn off your phone for a while. Don't respond, and never forward the message to someone else. Find something to distract yourself from what's going on. Do something you love that doesn't give you time to think about what's happening, like playing the guitar, going for a run, or losing yourself in a book or movie. You can also just chat with a parent or sibling or play with a pet.

Taking a break like this allows you to keep things in perspective and focus on the good things in your life. It also gives you time to figure out how you want to handle things.

Resist the urge to retaliate or respond. Walking away or taking a break when you're faced with online bullying gives you some space so you won't be tempted to fire back a response or engage with the bully or bullies. Responding when we're upset can make things worse. (Standing up to a bully can be effective sometimes, but it's more likely to provoke the person and escalate the situation.) Taking a break gives the power back to you!

Although it's not a good idea to respond to a bully, it is a good idea to save evidence of the bullying if you can. It can help you prove your case, if needed. You don't have to keep mean emails, texts, or other communications where you see them all the time - you can ask a parent to make a copy or save them to a flash drive.

Report bullying. Social media sites take it seriously when people post cruel or mean stuff or set up fake accounts. If users report abuse, the site administrator may block the bully from using the site in the future. If someone sends you mean texts or emails, report it to phone service or email providers (such as Comcast, Google, and Verizon).

Block the bully. Most devices have settings that let you electronically block the bully or bullies from sending notes. If you don't know how to do this, ask a friend or adult who does.

Be safe online. Password protect your smartphone and your online sites, and change your passwords often. Be sure to share your passwords only with your parent or guardian. It's also wise to think twice before sharing personal information or photos/videos that you don't want the world to see. Once you've posted a photo or message, it can be difficult or impossible to delete. So remind yourself to be cautious when posting photos or responding to someone's upsetting message.

If a Friend Is a Bully

If you know of a friend who is acting as a cyberbully, take him or her aside and talk about it. Without putting your friend down, stand up for your own principles: Let the bully know it's not OK.

Explain to your friend that bullying can have serious consequences: for the bully, for those being bullied, and even for bystanders like you and your friends.

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Cyberbullying is the use of technology to harass, threaten, embarrass, or target another person. Online threats and mean, aggressive, or rude texts, tweets, posts, or messages all count. So does posting personal information, pictures, or videos designed to hurt or embarrass someone else.

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Various ways to report cyberbullying from stopbullying.gov

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When cyberbullying happens, it is important to document and report the behavior so it can be addressed.

Steps to Take Immediately

Don't respond to and don't forward cyberbullying messages.

Keep evidence of cyberbullying. Record the dates, times, and descriptions of instances when cyberbullying has occurred. Save and print screenshots, emails, and text messages. Use this evidence to report cyberbullying to web and cell phone service providers.

Block the person who is cyberbullying.

Report Cyberbullying to Online Service Providers

Cyberbullying often violates the terms of service established by social media sites and internet service providers.

Review their terms and conditions or rights and responsibilities sections. These describe content that is or is not appropriate.

Visit social media safety centers to learn how to block users and change settings to control who can contact you.

Report cyberbullying to the social media site so they can take action against users abusing the terms of service.

Report Cyberbullying to Law Enforcement

When cyberbullying involves these activities it is considered a crime and should be reported to law enforcement:

Threats of violence

Child pornography or sending sexually explicit messages or photos

Taking a photo or video of someone in a place where he or she would expect privacy

Stalking and hate crimes

Some states consider other forms of cyberbullying criminal. Consult your state's laws and law enforcement for additional guidance.

Report Cyberbullying to Schools

Cyberbullying can create a disruptive environment at school and is often related to in-person bullying. The school can use the information to help inform prevention and response strategies.

In many states, schools are required to address cyberbullying in their anti-bullying policy. Some state laws also cover off-campus behavior that creates a hostile school environment.

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When cyberbullying happens, it is important to document and report the behavior so it can be addressed. Don't respond to and don't forward cyberbullying messages. Keep evidence of cyberbullying. Record the dates, times, and descriptions of instances when cyberbullying has occurred. Save and print screenshots, emails, and text messages.

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* Plan short and long term assignments
* Create plans to prepare for summative assessments
* Use appropriate strategies for organizing complex information

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* Practice focus and concentration to overcome distractions
* Make informed choices on behaviors and course of action
* Practice positive thinking
* Practice dealing with disappointment and unmet expectations
* Practice dealing with change
* Practice strategies to prevent & eliminate bullying

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Developing a growth mindset is an important step in learning.

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Moving forward.

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A Film by Adrian Bautista explaining “Home”.

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So Where's Home? A Film About Third Culture Kid Identity

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So Where's Home? explores the unique perspectives and identities of Third Culture Kids, people who have spent a significant portion of their childhood overseas. The purpose of this short documentary project is to understand why third culture kids struggle to answer the question of “so where’s home?” and the implications this difficulty has on personal identity.

This project was my final senior thesis project for my film & media studies minor at Georgetown University. 

Special Thanks To:
Interviewees — Rickie Koo, Victoria Perrachon, Jake Wright, Yuko Shimada, Connor Liu, Oliver Silsby, Natalie Muller, Amy Burns, Hanah Lee
Thesis Adviser — Milena Santoro
FMST Georgetown — Caetlin Benson-Allott,  Edward Clark, Bridge Waugh, Bernie Cook

To all the FMST 2012 seniors, other interviewees, friends, and family involved: thanks for all the support over the past semester.

Dedicated To David Heavy

Equipment:
- Canon 7D
- Canon EF Lens 50 mm F/1.4
- Canon EF Lens 28-135mm IS
- Zoom H4N
- Sony UWP-V1 Wireless Lav Mic Kit

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A Google Chrome extension that provides website citation and credibility score.

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Cite web sites with one click using the EasyBib Toolbar and receive advice on the credibility of the web site you're citing.

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MLA 8 Formatting and Style Guide from Purdue Owl.

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We are a globally renowned resource that provides assistance with English to students, teachers, professionals, and organizations across the world. Our goal is to assist clients in their development as writers - no matter their skill level.

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Purdue OWL® - Purdue OWL® - Purdue University

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We are a globally renowned resource that provides assistance with English to students, teachers, professionals, and organizations across the world. Our goal is to assist clients in their development as writers - no matter their skill level.

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Teaching kids about fake news.

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The students don't yet know it, but Huchon and his colleagues at video news network Spicee created the video themselves, as part of an experiment after the French terrorist attacks in 2015. They noticed how conspiracy theories against the official version of the attacks were spreading on the Internet, and they wanted to do their own experiment.

"So we created a fake story," says Huchon. "We put it on the Web, and what we expected to happen happened: Lots of conspiracy theorist websites picked up on this information and spread it without any kind of verification."

Huchon says that before they removed it, their video had 10,000 hits on YouTube and thousands of shares on Facebook.

Widespread concerns about the inability of many people in France to tell a real news story from a fake one have led this French journalist to visit 81 schools since 2016, on a mission to teach kids about fake news and disinformation.

In this classroom, in the seaside town of Le Touquet in northern France, Huchon asks the kids to raise their hands if they believed the documentary.

One girl with her arm in the air says it's absolutely unconscionable what the United States did. Usually, about a third of the students believe the hoax, Huchon says, because they have no reason to be skeptical of him.

"And we play with this," he says. "We use this as a trap to make them realize that even when they are in confidence they should not believe de facto. They should have a few reflexes to try and fact-check a little bit more."

Huchon puts on a second video that tells the class that the first one was a total lie. It also explains how conspiracy theories are made to look credible: menacing music; trigger themes like the CIA and AIDS; highlighted text the viewer doesn't have time to read; and always some historical facts and truths sprinkled between the many lies.

The kids are shocked. Many feel tricked. So Huchon shows them how they can keep from being fooled again.

First off, he says, they have to check the authenticity of articles, pictures and videos. To do that they must first make sure that the author has put his name and the date on the work. That will help them cross-check the information on other sites. They should also try to go upstream to look for some of the original sources.

Another important element is to verify that the information is not taken out of context. That a picture, for example, does not claim to be taken somewhere it's not.

They talk about a picture making the rounds of anti-Muslim websites. It shows Muslim women wearing the burqa standing in line for welfare benefits. The face-covering veil is illegal in France. The picture was actually taken in London.

The class also has a long discussion about being careful with pictures and personal information on the Internet. Huchon explains to the kids how their personal information - even such minor things as "likes" on Facebook - is used by advertisers to target them. American voters were targeted in this way, he tells them, and it may have altered the 2016 presidential election.

After the two-hour session, 13-year-old Sharon Victor Caron says Huchon has changed the way she sees the Web.

"I'm going to be so much more careful now and not be fooled like so many people are," she says. "And I definitely will think before sharing something that could be false."

Huchon says a steady stream of teachers contacts him to come into their classes. He says it's not easy for the teachers because they are dealing with a generation that operates with new codes and has new ways of getting information. He says presenting alternate facts is not the way to combat conspiracy theories.

"When, for example, a pupil is going to put forward a conspiracy story about World War II and say that, for example, the gas chambers didn't exist, the teacher will be completely taken aback," says Huchon, and the teacher will often try to counter this discourse with facts.

Huchon says facts against facts is a fight you can never win. And conspiracy theories strip a teacher's authority.

"The best way to fight this kind of fake news discourse is not to give counterarguments," he says, "but to try to check the validity of the other person's argument."

President Emmanuel Macron has proposed enacting a law to fight fake news during French elections. Huchon says that won't work. He says the only way to win is to teach young people how to think critically.

Copyright 2018 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.

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A Conspiracy Video Teaches Kids A Lesson About Fake News

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The students don't yet know it, but Huchon and his colleagues at video news network Spicee created the video themselves, as part of an experiment after the French terrorist attacks in 2015. They noticed how conspiracy theories against the official version of the attacks were spreading on the Internet, and they wanted to do their own experiment.

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Lera Boroditsky: "How Language Shapes the Way We Think"

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There are about 7,000 languages spoken around the world -- and they all have different sounds, vocabularies and structures. But do they shape the way we think? Cognitive scientist Lera Boroditsky shares examples of language -- from an Aboriginal community in Australia that uses cardinal directions instead of left and right to the multiple words for blue in Russian -- that suggest the answer is a resounding yes. “The beauty of linguistic diversity is that it reveals to us just how ingenious and how flexible the human mind is,” Boroditsky says. “Human minds have invented not one cognitive universe, but 7,000.”