October 1990
Teacher Magazine, Vol. 02, Issue 02
Education
Foundations: A Beginner's Guide
Like Goerig, teachers across the country are capitalizing on the growing number of programs that award grants to teachers. Today, according to the best estimates, private foundations and companies contribute well over $200 million annually to precollegiate education.
Education
A New Tour Of Duty
The initial focus, organizers of the effort say, is on some 640 junior officers compelled to leave the Army last month in the first phase of military-wide cuts. Eventually, the state intends to branch out and target Navy and Air Force personnel stationed at 32 bases throughout Florida, says Jim Pirius, director of the Army Transition Project for the state education department. Those branches of the service are "going to be affected [by cuts] down the line, too,'' he says.
Education
Current Events / in brief
Prosecutors in Connecticut have agreed not to try parochial school teacher Diane Pociadlo, who was accused of failing to report a case of suspected child abuse under a little-used state law.
Education
The Permanence Of Change
Another answer is that people tend to resist change. Perhaps it is the very inevitability of change that makes us struggle against it. The known is more comfortable than the unknown. There is solace in the familiar; the tried and true provide us moorings.
Education
The Ugly Secret
Studies by university researchers and social-service agencies have revealed some sobering statistics:
Education
A Journal For, And By, Teachers
A Journal For, And In Massachusetts, Reflections has become a key forum for educators
JAY SUGARMAN, AN Elementary school teacher in Brookline, Mass., was fed up. It was 1984, and teachers were drowning in a sea of reports by blue-ribbon panels. Those panels, he says, ``kept making declarations about education without any teacher voices.'' To fill the void, he started a new journal called Reflections to get teachers' thoughts out on the table. Six years later, Reflections--one of only a handful of publications dedicated to teachers' writing--is still going strong.
Education
From Chicken Soup To Captain Photon
Kathleen McCleary, a mentor teacher at the Divisadero Middle School in Visalia, Calif., has heard it all, and then some. So she came up with a way to ease the transition from the warmth and safety of the elementary womb to the cold, frightening world of middle school. She calls it the Panel/Shadowing Program.
Education
Bulletin Board
Vivian Johnson, project director for the Institute for Responsive Education, on her group's efforts to increase families' participation in school
Education
Beating The Banks
In addition to free or low-cost checking accounts-- called share-draft accounts in credit union lingo--credit unions also offer low-interest loans and high-interest savings accounts
Education
Money for the Asking
Annabel Crites made a discovery: She noticed that the same Spanish-speaking preschoolers in her bilingual kindergarten class who stared blankly at the alphabet could read boldly colored American signs that said "Dairy Queen'' and "McDonald's.'' Crites wanted those logos in her classroom. But where in the district budget would she find funds to purchase restaurant signs? Instead of taking her rather odd request to her school system, Crites applied for, and received, a grant from the Educational Enrichment Foundation in Tucson, Ariz. With $162 in hand to pay for the services of a photographer, she hit the local haunts and got blown-up pictures of the signs. "The pictures were the groundwork for literacy for my students,'' says Crites, who teaches at Tucson's Borton Primary Magnet School. "My students began recognizing the letter 'K' from 'Circle K.' Some kids even taught their parents words from signs that they learned in school.''
Education
Notebook
Teenage Depression: Fourteen-year-old girls are twice as likely as boys the same age to be depressed, according to a study of 802 public high school students by psychologists at the Oregon Research Institute in Portland. The study is part of a research project to find the age at which the rates of depression for the sexes begin to diverge. Previous studies have found that very similar percentages of young boys and girls suffer from depression, but adult women are twice as likely as men to be depressed. Debra Ladestro
Education
Rebirth
Whenever a grading period would end at the school near Juanita Cunningham's home, she could count on finding her yard full of trash. The students at Howard Middle School in Ocala, Fla., didn't bother bringing home the stacks of work sheets, tests, and reports that teachers had returned. Instead, th
Education
Roundup
A Dry Summer: The teachers in Campbell County, Tenn., normally are paid every other week all year long. But this summer, the paychecks stopped coming. About 375 teachers and more than 30 administrators and other district employees were victims of bad budgeting: A $1 million deficit left the school district unable to cover its payroll and raised the possibility of a teachers' strike.
Education
An Oasis
We now are teachers of children who step over crack vials and pass homeless people in their doorways before they ever get to class. They know about polluted air and water. They know something of endangered animals and the disappearing ozone layer. Their streets are dirty, their subways are dangerous, and their parks are unusable. They must walk in groups to be safe, and they fear being alone at home. Their heroes have betrayed them with drugs, deceit, and dishonor, and there is no one left to look up to. Is it any wonder that they have become the discouraged children of a discouraging society? We are their teachers, and we have to do something.
Education
Share Your Ideas
Share Your Ideas
Is there something about your work, your profession, or the state of American education that you've been wanting to say? An idea or scheme that you've been longing to share with your colleagues? A humorous or inspiring experience that keeps rattling around in your mind? We want to know about it.
Is there something about your work, your profession, or the state of American education that you've been wanting to say? An idea or scheme that you've been longing to share with your colleagues? A humorous or inspiring experience that keeps rattling around in your mind? We want to know about it.
Education
Building Bridges
He enrolled in the rigorous academic program and showed such promise that its organizers helped him win a scholarship to a private middle school, where he attended the 8th grade. Last year, he earned a scholarship to Phillips Exeter Academy, the private boarding school in Exeter, N.H. Had he attended his local high school in San Francisco, where he feared exposure to drugs and gangs, he would never have been so academically challenged, he says.
Education
Books: For Young Readers
The reviewer is the education media specialist for the Van Holten School in Bridgewater, N.J.
Education
Local Education Funds
Her trip to Illinois paid off in other ways: The university has invited her to apply for an assistantship that would cover tuition for her to work toward a Ph.D. in mathematics education. "If the fund hadn't informed me of the institute, I wouldn't have attended and this wouldn't have happened,'' she says. "It changed my life.''
Education
Extra Credit
October 15. Overseas Teaching.
The U.S. Information Agency's 1991-92 Fulbright Teacher Exchange enables American teachers to trade assignments for one year with teachers in any of 27 countries. Applicants must be currently teaching, have three years of teaching experience, hold a bachelor's degree, and be U.S. citizens. They also should be proficient in the language of the host country. In addition, applications will be accepted for three- to eight-week summer seminars to be held in Italy and the Netherlands. Contact: Fulbright Teacher Exchange Program, USIA, E/ASX, 301 Fourth St., S.W., Washington, DC 20547; (202) 619-4555.
The U.S. Information Agency's 1991-92 Fulbright Teacher Exchange enables American teachers to trade assignments for one year with teachers in any of 27 countries. Applicants must be currently teaching, have three years of teaching experience, hold a bachelor's degree, and be U.S. citizens. They also should be proficient in the language of the host country. In addition, applications will be accepted for three- to eight-week summer seminars to be held in Italy and the Netherlands. Contact: Fulbright Teacher Exchange Program, USIA, E/ASX, 301 Fourth St., S.W., Washington, DC 20547; (202) 619-4555.
Education
Notebook
Taking Charge: The American Home Economics Association has introduced "Project Taking Charge,'' a curriculum for 7th graders that promotes pregnancy prevention through sexual abstinence. The curriculum, the product of three years of research and field testing, is available for $28.75 from: AHEA, 1555 King St., Alexandria, VA 22314.
Education
Dressed For Battle
On a field in Pennsylvania near Fort Duquesne Vince Watson stands at the ready, proudly wearing a gold-trimmed tricorn hat and a uniform of blue wool breeches, waistcoat, and stockings. As Watson reaches down to check his 1763 Charleville musket, something on his wrist glints in the sunlight. It's not a part of traditional 18th-century military attire--it's a 20th-century Timex.
Education
Robots In The Classroom
Although the TAM performs fairly simple tasks in the classroom, its components are identical to those used in high-tech manufacturing. It has been constructed to capture the attention of its users, especially the young ones. Its parts are colorful: The robotic arm is orange, the milling machine bright blue. It looks complex: The joints, bolts, screws, and wires are in plain sight, so students can see exactly how the robotic arm works. And it makes noise: The pneumatic clamp on the miller makes a loud blast when it opens to receive the small metal piece and again when it closes on it, and motors in the miller let out organ-like chords as the machine carves.
Education
Big Wheels On Campus
With a timely shove in the right direction, he believes, "kids like that'' can make an honest living.