This story, "Researchers Propose NAEP Look Beyond Academic Measures," by Education Week's Kathleen Kennedy Manzo is about a new report written for the Campaign for Educational Equity at Teachers College, Columbia University, which says that the National Assessment of Educational Progress should measure more than just basic academic skills. The report claims that the assessment should expand to include eight goals: "basic academic skills, critical thinking, social skills and work ethic, readiness for citizenship, physical and emotional health, appreciation of arts and literature, and preparation for work."

There's an interesting discussion forming in the comments, directly linked to student motivation. One commenter (New Teacher Network) says, "What really matters is the motivation, skills and aptitudes of young people going forward. Those are things that can be cultivated and measured and should be." But another (The Principal) asks, "How in the world do you MEASURE motivation, citizenship, emotional health, social skills, work ethic, and other such subjective measures?"

I tend to agree that these factors should be measured in some way, but I'm not 100% convinced that it's the responsibility of NAEP to do so. But perhaps it is--after all, NAEP has been dubbed "The Nation's Report Card," which implies that it looks at education as a whole. And, of course, student motivation plays a huge part in education.

What do you think? Should the assessments be expanded to include measures for things like student motivation? And if so, how should that be measured?

Posted by Katie Ash at 12:35 PM | Permalink | 3 Comments | Recommend

In a recent commentary piece on edweek.org, Vicky Shippers argues that recess is an important piece of a student's school day. It is the only unstructured time children have at school, and yet many recess activities--like kickball and tag--have been banned from the playground because of safety concerns, and in many schools, recess itself has been squeezed out because of time constraints. Shippers explains why this is a worrisome trend:

"Recess ... is about freedom. ... During recess, children are in a peer setting where they can watch how other kids act, decide whom they like and don’t like, and figure out why. With this knowledge, they are armed with some important clues about how to go forth into the larger world."

Even though recess may cause physical or emotional injuries to some students, it provides an essential unstructured arena for children to learn social skills, Shippers argues, and I tend to agree with her. Recess gives students a chance to self-organize teams for baseball or basketball, and it gives kids a chance to deepen their relationships with other students. Also as recent studies have shown, giving kids an hour to run around and be physically active helps them focus in class later on.

What do you think? Is recess an important part of school? Or is it a good place to start cutting in order to make time for more academic classes? Have the safety constraints that bar traditional recess activities from the playground done more harm than good? Or are they appropriately protecting students from injuries?

Posted by Katie Ash at 1:16 PM | Permalink | 4 Comments | Recommend

There's a relatively new blog up on edweek.org that showcases student work from a project called Students at the Center, which works in two New Orleans high schools. On the blog, co-directors Jim Randels and Kalamu ya Salaam give regular updates on what students in the project are up to and post the essays students write. This is a really great example of how educators have begun to use technology to motivate students and present their work in a different way.

The blog itself is an inspiring window into the lives of high school students living in New Orleans post-Katrina. Check it out.

Posted by Katie Ash at 1:58 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

It seems like lately every week there's been something new about cash-incentive programs, and this week is no exception. Debra Viadero's follow-up story about a three-year-old rewards program in Coshocton, Ohio reveals that their cash incentives have worked--sort of. Scores in math have improved, but reading scores have stayed the same. Test scores in science and social studies have also improved, although not significantly. Because of the mixed results, it seems like educators on both sides of this debate are using the study's results to support their position.

Also, I was a little surprised to see that an overwhelming majority (81%) of responders to last week's edweek.org poll did not think schools should offer cash rewards to students. Only 43 out of the poll's total 230 responders thought schools should offer cash incentives. And just a reminder: the poll is an informal feature and not a scientifically sound survey, but it's interesting nonetheless.

Posted by Katie Ash at 1:22 PM | Permalink | 1 Comment | Recommend

There's a letter to the editor this week that gets right to the heart of student motivation issues. It's from a former teacher who, as a substitute teacher, was appalled when he took over for a teacher who was letting students read comic books for an English class. But then he had a realization:

"These boys and girls, all from working-class families, many of them children of immigrants, were devouring the comic books, and were reading for pleasure for the first time. Some of them had moved from comic books to Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, and Jack London, and they enjoyed discussing Oliver Twist as much as Superman."

As this man discovered, it's important to keep an open mind to new teaching strategies, even when they aren't traditionally academic. I think this is especially relevant in light of recent movements like incorporating educational video games into the classroom. While playing a video game may not be as educational as reading a textbook or taking notes on a lecture, it's definitely more fun and engaging for students, and conceivably, they may learn more from the video game because they're tuned-in and paying attention.

Posted by Katie Ash at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

A couple of months ago, we had quite a debate going on this blog about the importance of homework--how much should be given, whether it's effective, and how much strain it puts on families. So when I saw this story ("Survey on Homework Reveals Acceptance, Despite Some Gripes") on edweek.org this morning, I immediately thought of the readers of this blog.

Debra Viadero's article says that 85 percent of American parents believe their kids are doing "the right amount" or "too little" homework. Seventy-five percent of students say they have adequate time to complete their homework. Overall, students, parents, and teachers overwhelmingly support giving homework.

There are a lot of tidbits of information in Debbie's article that are worth reading about. Like the fact that a quarter of students feel that their homework assignments are mostly busywork, down from three-quarters of students who felt that way six years ago. And the students who thought giving homework is a bad idea were generally students who were struggling academically.

There are still a lot of unanswered questions, and it's important to note that the survey doesn't focus on whether or not homework is effective, but rather on whether people think it's effective. Still, it's an interesting follow-up to the debate going on here awhile ago, and it certainly sheds some light on how homework is perceived as a whole.

Posted by Katie Ash at 1:42 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Education Week reporter Mary Ann Zehr, who posts frequently on her Learning the Language blog, just returned from a one-month stint in the Middle East. She wrote a number of fascinating dispatches while she was there, and her latest "Back in School, Iraqi Teen Lacks Motivation to Study" might be of particular interest to readers of this blog.

The circumstances surrounding the interruption of many Iraqi children's education are complicated and difficult to summarize, so I highly recommend that you go read the entire story. Once Iraqi kids go back to school after a long interruption, they are often grouped in with students who are younger than them. Just like American students who find themselves in classes with significantly younger peers, displaced Iraqi students find it difficult to thrive and often drop out.

The hardships endured by the family described in Mary Ann's story are heart-wrenching and certainly representative of what many Iraqi children are currently experiencing. Read more about Mary Ann's experiences on one of her latest blog posts.

Posted by Katie Ash at 10:16 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

In her story this week, Education Week's Debra Viadero says that research is drawing an increasingly strong link between exercise and academic performance. Here's an excerpt:

"There’s sort of no question about it now," said Dr. John J. Ratey, a clinical associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. "The exercise itself doesn’t make you smarter, but it puts the brain of the learners in the optimal position for them to learn."

This has significant implications for schools that, finding themselves in a time-crunch, have cut down on the amount of time allotted for physical education during school. Considering how long kids spend watching TV, playing video games, and surfing the net each day, P.E. could conceivably be the only hour they spend being physically active.

In light of this research and--perhaps more importantly--rising childhood obesity rates, it seems that some states are beginning to understand the value of P.E. This AP story describes legislation in Oklahoma that would increase the amount of required physical fitness activities in elementary and middle schools, and over the past few months, I've read several stories about similar efforts across the country.

I notice, as I'm sure many of you do, that I am less stressed, more attentive, and more alert when I can find the time to exercise than when I'm stuck at my desk, staring at a computer screen all day. It's good to see those personal observations backed up by scientific research.

Posted by Katie Ash at 11:09 AM | Permalink | 4 Comments | Recommend

Here's a new twist on the student incentives debate: Prison officials in California are considering offering inmates special privileges if they make use of academic classes.

The brief article doesn't go into much detail, but says that prison classes don't have enough teachers and are frequently disrupted by fights, which might be why participation in classes is low. In addition to considering incentives for inmates, officials are also hiring more teachers and addressing behavior issues.

Also, if you'd like to view all posts about incentives and rewards on Motivation Matters, check out our Incentives/Rewards topic page.

Posted by Katie Ash at 2:17 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Over the past few days, a number of readers have pointed my attention to a variety of sources where you can find out more about cash-incentive programs. In the interest of providing as much information as I can about this topic, here's a roundup of some of the links that have been sent my way.

This blog post by eduwonkette, available from edweek.org, gathers links to some papers presented at a panel about student incentives at the American Economic Association's annual meeting. Overall, the studies found that giving students incentives was not very effective.

Independently of the cash-incentive program in New York City's public schools, Rewarding Achievement (REACH), which pays students for passing AP exams, is active in 31 NYC high schools. The privately-funded program was launched last summer as a part of The Council of Urban Professionals.

This AP story, published today, talks about yet another program opening up in Alabama that will pay students for passing AP exams. Students will receive $100 for each AP exam they pass.

Posted by Katie Ash at 2:05 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

I wrote a story about cash incentives for the upcoming issue of Education Week, and it's up now on edweek.org, if you'd like to take a look.

One thing I didn't have room to address in the story itself was assertions by both Andres Alonso, the chief executive officer of Baltimore public schools, and Gregory Fields, the assistant superintendent for high school curriculum for Fulton County, Ga., schools, that students regularly receive monetary incentives from their parents for good grades. Mr. Alonso, in particular, stressed that these programs were making those kinds of rewards available for students whose parents may not be able to provide such incentives. Paying students for high test scores isn't new, he told me, it's just the idea of doing it in an organized way that is causing controversy.

His point is well-taken, although to play the devil's advocate, there are some fundamental differences between parents paying their kids for good grades and schools doling out money to high-achieving students. The most obvious to me is that it is a parent's choice to offer those kinds of rewards to their children. I know some students who were paid for good report cards, and many others who were simply given a pat on the back. I happened to be one of those in the latter category, although I'd venture to say it had less to do with my parents having a moral objection to rewarding me for grades and more to do with the fact that it just wasn't necessary. If it makes a difference, I do remember being rewarded for other things, like not fighting with my sister and keeping my room clean, which makes me think that my parents would be open to trying rewards-for-grades if that had ever been an issue.

But in talking this story over with some of my friends, I had more than one tell me that when they were students, their parents were morally opposed to offering incentives to them for high grades. Their parents believed studying and performing well on tests was something their children were expected to do, not something above and beyond the call of duty for which they should be rewarded. By instituting these kinds of programs into school districts, school officials are taking away the parent's choice to either reward, or not to reward, their children. On the other hand, they're also giving parents who may not have the means to reward their children financially for high academic performance, the option to do so.

It's hard to know how to weigh-in on this complicated issue, and quite honestly, I'm not sure where I stand on it. For now, I'm just eager to see what the research looks like, when it finally starts rolling in.

Posted by Katie Ash at 11:56 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

This AP story details an innovative, and effective, program to get students to finish their homework. At Glenpool Middle School, teachers don't give out zeros for incomplete homework assignments. Instead, they send the students to a lunch study hall, where they are expected to complete the originally assigned work. If the work still isn't completed by the end of the lunch period, their parents are contacted to make arrangements for the student to finish the assignment before or after school hours.

I think this is a really good idea for a number of reasons. First of all, zeros pull down a student's average in a frighteningly quick and devastating way. Even if the student had all A's on every other assignment, one zero could conceivably bring his or her overall grade down to a C, or worse. Second of all, if students don't do their homework assignments and take a zero instead, they still have not learned whatever the assignment was designed to teach. This program tackles both of those problems by making it very difficult for students to receive zeros on homework assignments and making them do the work whether or not it's completed on time. Also, I imagine that losing out on lunch is extra motivation for students to finish their homework at home.

What do you think? Is forcing kids to finish incomplete homework assignments during lunch a good idea, or does it eliminate the consequences of not getting it done, and let them off too easy?

Posted by Katie Ash at 10:18 AM | Permalink | 2 Comments | Recommend

I came across a really good video of a talk about giving kids the freedom to explore dangerous things. Gever Tulley, who founded a summer program called the Tinkering School, which allows kids to build inventions and generally tinker with things, urges parents to let their kids play with fire, own a knife, and drive a car--among other activities--arguing that those opportunities teach kids invaluable life lessons about the way things work and allow them to explore their natural curiosity in a positive way. It reminds me of the debate I had with my Dad about whether increased safety regulations were stifling students' interest in science.

From the way Tulley talks, you'd think the kids at the Tinkering School regularly come home with broken bones and bloody scrapes, but as he mentions later on his blog, only two kids have ever gone home with injuries serious enough to require a band-aid.

I especially like what he says about allowing kids to take apart appliances. I've had the same thought myself many times, when I realize that I have absolutely no idea how half the devices I use in my every day life work--from my computer, to my cell phone, even something as simple as a cassette tape. If I were asked to replicate one of those items, or even explain conceptually how they work, I would be at a complete loss.

The more students get hands-on experience with taking things apart, hypothesizing about which part does what, and putting them back together, the better they'll understand how they work as a whole, Tulley says. And it makes sense. When I was in college, I had to pass a certain number of science classes before I could graduate, and my last class was a one-credit course called "Everyday Electronics." When I left class after the first day, I was completely overwhelmed and frustrated. "For our final exam, we have to make a working doorbell that plays a song!" I lamented to my Dad over the phone, convinced I was on the verge of failing out of school. "I'm an English major; I do sentences, not circuits," I told him.

The first couple of weeks were equally as fear-inducing, and I left class every week feeling like I would never understand. But about midway through the semester, something clicked and all that tinkering around with wires and circuit boards started to make sense. Suddenly, our class assignments didn't seem impossible and the final exam seemed like something I might actually be able to do. And then, to my utter dismay, I started liking the class. I even briefly (for about five minutes) considered giving up my English degree to become an electrical engineer. (It certainly would have been a more lucrative career path.)

Needless to say, I didn't follow through with that plan, but the whole experience took the fear out of electronics for me. It was almost like learning another language. Once I knew the rules and basics, I could piece together how the bigger stuff might work. And that was definitely a lesson worth learning.

Posted by Katie Ash at 5:23 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Here's a story about a school that's doing a lot of things right. Samuel Powel School in Philadelphia has met No Child Left Behind's federal benchmarks for the past four years, and in a district where less than half of students can read on grade level by the end of third grade, 96 percent of Samuel Powel School's third graders read on grade level, says the article.

So what's its secret? The classes are small, it has a low rate of teacher and student turnover, and the parents are actively involved. The article also details an engaging reading lesson by one of the third grade teachers who doesn't just read a book to his students, but asks them questions about what they thought certain words might mean, what might happen next in the story, and how they felt about it. As a result, the students are interested in the lesson and excited to read on their own.

The article says this school's model would be difficult to replicate, and that's probably true, but I'm sure this didn't all happen overnight, nor was it simply chance that this school was able to put together such an effective model. I'm sure certain strategies were put into place to encourage such high levels of parental involvement and teacher satisfaction. And the lesson plans, which seem to be working wonders, could be implemented almost anywhere.

What do you think? What aspects of this school's model might work for other schools or districts? Which might be harder to replicate? And how might those obstacles be overcome?

Posted by Katie Ash at 11:57 AM | Permalink | 2 Comments | Recommend

As we are all aware, a variety of factors--including academic pressure and laziness--motivate some students to cheat. This article in The Oregonian notes that new technology brings even more ways for students to break the rules. The Internet can be used to download plagiarized research papers, cell phones can take pictures of exam questions, and graphing calculators can store information to be called up during a test, the article says.

However, the number of cheaters remains steady--and staggeringly high. "Two-thirds of high school students admit to cheating at some point during their academic careers," says the article. That's an overwhelmingly large number, although I have no trouble believing it. I'm pretty sure that many of my high school peers cheated on something, whether it was as small as a homework assignment or as major as a final exam.

On a related note, I read a prediction on the Engaging Learners blog yesterday that said by the year 2020, cheating will become obsolete and replaced by collaboration, in accordance with new work ethics that will emerge from 21st century developments. It's hard to put stock in predictions like those, but it's definitely food for thought.

Posted by Katie Ash at 3:01 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend