European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - April 15, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse New York times t he department of education recently gave president Reagan a list of 41 finding about what works in Public list begins with the assertion that what parents do to help their children is More important to academic Success than How Well off the family the department embraces phonics which stresses the relationship Between spoken sounds and printed letters As the Best method of teaching Reading and it says the most effective schools focus on Core academic subjects such As mathematics assign lots of Homework have students memorize and emphasize the teaching of history. The findings Are contained in a 66-Page Booklet entitled what works research about teaching and the report was described As an Effort to Tell the american Public what we know about How to the list of findings has drawn mixed reviews from educators. Frank l Smith chairman of the department of educational administration at the teachers College of Columbia University who reviewed an Early copy said the choices in the document presumed a specific behavioural View of teaching that Many educators did not accept. All the emphasis is on exactness and precision and effectiveness he said. They talk rigorous courses but the implication is that students should be passive recipients. Most people in the better schools want students to be Smith cited the finding that children Learned science Best when they were Able to do experiments and thus witness science in he noted that the editorial comment cited an Experiment with Gravity in which the teacher set out to disabuse students of the presumption that a basketball would always fall faster than a table Tennis Ball. A better finding would have been that students learn science Best when they have the Chance to originate a hypothesis themselves and then test it out he said. Others however praised the project. Bernard r. Gifford Dean of the school of education at the University of California at Berkeley who served As a consultant on the project commented i m for anything that stimulates parents teachers principals and others to think about How to improve Gifford a former Deputy schools Chancellor in new York City said he agreed with the orientation of the Booklet it supports the notion that the Way to improve schools is to strengthen curriculum establish standards and Sharpen accountability. It also does t apologize for children s poverty. It says that any child can the project was organized by Chester e. Finn jr., a former professor of education at Vanderbilt University who was hired last year As an assistant Secretary with a mandate to overhaul Federal educational research. He said the new Booklet which has been four months in preparation represented an Effort to rehabilitate educational research As a worthwhile the Field has been in Low repute for a Quarter Century mainly because it does t appear to have done anyone any Good he said in an interview. We want to show that education is not a Black Box into which students and teachers go and come out the other end. It is a reasonably Well understood set of processes that Are susceptible to improvement. In some areas like How do children learn to read we be Learned an awful lot in the last 20 initially More than 120 possible findings were suggested by staff members of the department s office of educational research and improvement. These were then circulated among educational researchers. Associated press Here Are the 41 research finding highlighted in what works a report by . Department of education that summarizes research on effective teaching strategies. All Are direct quotes parents Are their children s first and most influential teachers. What parents do to help their children learn is More important to academic Success than How Well off the family is. The Best Way for parents to help their children become better readers is to read to them even when they Are very Young. Children Benefit most from Reading aloud when they discuss stories learn to identify letters and words and talk about the meaning of words. Children improve their Reading ability by Reading a lot. Reading achievement is directly related to the amount of Reading children do in school and outside. A Good Way to teach children simple arithmetic is to build on their informal knowledge. This is Why learning to count everyday objects is an effective basis for Early arithmetic lessons. Children who Are encouraged to draw and scribble stories at an Early age will learn to compose More easily More effectively and with greater Confidence than children who do not have this encouragement. A Good foundation in speaking and listening helps children become better readers. Many highly successful individuals have above average but not extraordinary intelligence. Accomplishment in a particular activity is often More dependent upon hard work and self discipline than on innate ability. Belief in the value of hard work the importance of personal responsibility and the importance of education itself contributes to greater Success in school. Parental involvement helps children learn More effectively. Teachers who Are successful at involving parents in their children s schoolwork Are successful because they work at it. Children get a better Start in Reading if they Are taught phonics. Learning phonics helps them to understand the relationship Between letters and sounds and to break the code that links the words they hear with the words they see in print. Page 14 the stars and stripes children get More out of a Reading assignment when the teacher precedes the lesson with background information and follows it with discussion. Children learn science Best when they Are Able to do experiments so they can witness science in telling Young children stories can motivate them to read. Storytelling also introduces them to cultural values and literary traditions before they can read write and talk about stories by themselves. The most effective Way to teach writing is to teach it As a process of brainstorming composing revising and editing. Children in Early grades learn mathematics More effectively when they use physical objects in their lessons. Although students need to learn How to find exact answers to arithmetic problems Good math students also learn the helpful skill of estimating answers. This skill can be taught. Teachers who set and communicate High expectations to All their students obtain greater academic performance from those students than teachers who set Low expectations. Children s understanding of the relationship Between being smart and hard work changes As they grow. How much time students Are actively engaged in learning contributes strongly to their achievement. The amount of time available for learning is determined by the instructional and management skills of the teacher and the priorities set by the school administration. When teachers explain exactly what students Are expected to learn and demonstrate the Steps needed to accomplish a particular academic task students learn More. Students tutoring other students can Lead to improved academic achievement for both student and Tutor and to positive attitudes toward coursework. Memorizing can help students absorb and retain the factual information on which understanding and critical thought Are based. Student achievement rises when teachers ask questions that require students to apply Analyse synthesize and evaluate information in addition to Bennett said this stuff has been checked and checked and the research synthesis was directed by Milton Goldberg who supervised the research that went into the influential 1983 report by the National commission on excellence in education a nation at in an interview Goldberg said Many of the 41 findings seemed to be Little More than common for example one of the findings declares children improve their Reading ability by Reading a lot. Reading achievement is directly related to the amount of Reading children do in school and Goldberg observed this May sound self evident yet a lot of people complain that children Aren t Reading As Well As they should. We re showing that there is solid evidence that the amount of Leisure time children spend Reading is directly tied to vocabulary comprehension and so Forth. Maybe we will inspire some of these same people to encourage their own children to do More a copy of what works May be obtained free of charge by writing to the consumer information Center Pueblo Colo. 81009. A new study examines the Way that children learn. Simply recalling facts. The ways in which children study influence strongly How much they learn. Teachers can often help children develop better study skills. Student achievement rises significantly when teachers regularly assign Homework and students conscientiously do it. Well designed Homework assignments relate directly to class work and extend students learning beyond the classroom. Homework is most useful when teachers carefully prepare the assignment thoroughly explain it and give prompt comments and criticism when the work is completed. Frequent and systematic monitoring of students Progress helps students parents teachers administrators and policymakers identify strengths and weaknesses in learning and instruction. The most important characteristics of effective schools Are Strong instructional leadership a Safe and orderly climate school wide emphasis on Basic skills High teacher expectations for student achievement. And continuous assessment of Pupil Progress. Schools that encourage academic achievement focus on the importance of Scholastic Success and on maintaining order and discipline. Schools contribute to their students academic achievement by establishing communicating and enforcing fair and consistent discipline policies. Unexcused absences decrease when parents Are promptly informed that their children Are not attending school. Successful principals establish policies that create an orderly environment and support effective instruction. Students Benefit academically when their teachers share ideas cooperate in activities and assist one another s intellectual growth. Teachers Welcome professional suggestions about improving their work but they rarely receive them. Students read More fluently and with greater understanding if they have background knowledge of the past and present. Such knowledge and understanding is called cultural literacy. Skimpy requirements and declining enrolments in history classes Are contributing to a decline in students knowledge of the past. A photo a study shows that telling children stories can motivate them to read for themselves. The Best Way to learn a foreign language in school is to Start Early and to study it intensively Over Many years. The stronger the emphasis on academic courses the More advanced the subject matter and the More rigorous the textbooks the More High school students learn. Subjects that Are Learned mainly in school rather than at Home such As science and math Are most influenced by the number and kind of courses taken. Advancing gifted students at a faster Pace results in their achieving More than similarly gifted students who Are taught at a Normal rate. High school students who complement their academic studies with extracurricular activities gain experience that contributes to their Success in College. Business leaders report that students with solid Basic skills and positive work attitudes Are More Likely to find and keep jobs than students with vocational skills alone. By Glenn Collins new York times t he report card has arrived. The grades Are not Good. Some of them in fact Are poo indeed. The parents Are properly what s the Best Way to react to the badness certainly not anger. Being visibly upset and getting the child upset Over the enormity of what he or she has supposedly done is one of the worst possible reactions to poor grades said Sanford m. Dornbusch a researcher at Stanford University in California. In fact we be found that such a reaction leads to a decline in grades in the future said Dornbusch a sociologist who is Reed Hodgson professor of human biology sociology and education at Stanford. He said that equally ineffective parental reactions include punishing students for getting bad grades promising rewards to students for getting Good grades or even expressing no reaction at All to children. What does work Dornbusch said is the Low key positive response offering Praise for the positive aspects of a child s performance encouraging the child to do better with those things that Aren t going so Well and offering to Dornbusch is the principal investigator in a study of six san Francisco Bay area High schools. The Survey covers 7,836 students. The researchers Are attempting to understand How students school performance is affected not just by factors like ethnicity economic status and social class but also by their family environments especially the behaviour of their parents. More than 3,500 parents and 500 teachers also participated in the Survey which has been conducted by Stanford social scientists since 1984. Although this has been a study of High school students we feel that the results May be helpful to parents in elementary schools and preschools As Well said Sam Johnson principal of Capuchino High school in san Bruno calif., who planned participation of secondary schools in the study. The preliminary findings show not Only that poorer grades Are received by children of parents who express negative reactions to bad report cards but also that the students grades Are More Likely to decline. The grades of about 2,000 of the students were tracked during two years. The same was True of parents who punished their children for poor grades Dornbusch said. The real Surprise he said was that even rewarding students for Good grades was associated with lower grades and a decline in academic Dornbusch said that one reason for this is suggested by research on Nursery school students by a Stanford psychology professor Mark Lepper. Extrapolating from that work it appears Dornbusch said As if the act of promising students the use of say a car increases the importance of the car but not the schoolwork. They focus on the external Reward and not the the most effective parental response expressing concern and offering to help focuses on the intrinsic motive Dornbusch said. It in t realistic to expect that parents won t be concerned about poor grades Johnson said. There Are Many ways to express concern. And then parents can say is it help or time we can provide or More information or even a Tutor " for Johnson the study s findings have been of More than theoretical interest. I m talking not just As an administrator but also As a Parent he said referring to his 16-year-old son. Now we be had our share of severe conversations when the Grade reports came in. But what our findings indicated to me was that the negative emotions i be expressed Haven t been helpful at All in my son s Progress and Johnson said that he and his wife had begun taking a positive approach and grades have gone in focusing on bad grades Dornbusch said parents can say things like i know you can do better if you just put out a Little More Effort " the exception to the effectiveness of the concerned helpful approach was among students who Are doing very badly Dornbusch said. If they be nothing but bad grades he said Low key encouragement does t seem to he suggested that parents of such students go to the school and persist until they can enlist the Aid of sympathetic school personnel to work with their children. It tells the school that the parents care he said and it says that it s something they really can t handle the stars and stripes Page 15
