As I wrapped up the Read Along of Rae Pica’s book, What If Everybody Understood Child Development?: Straight Talk About Bettering Education and Children’s Lives (affiliate link), I intended to do a typical Q&A follow up with Rae.
Intrinsic vs Extrinsic. How Do We Motivate Kids? :Read Along Section 9- What If Everybody Understood Child Development?
Whether you’re a parent or an educator (or both!), child behavior is at the top of your concerns at some point in each day. In the latest section of our read along series, What If Everybody Understood Child Development?: Straight Talk About Bettering Education and Children’s Lives (affiliate link), Rae Pica explores several topics surrounding our adult approaches to managing child behavior. She shares a key concept that is at the heart of what I teach about Positive Guidance : [Read more…]
Rigor in Early Education. “I do not think it means what you think it means.”: Read Along Section 8-What If Everybody Understood Child Development?
You know that famous scene in The Princess Bride, when the legendary Spanish swordsman, Inigo Montoya, says, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
Succeeding Through Failure: Read Along Section 7–What If Everybody Understood Child Development?
Growing up in the 80s and 90s, my brother’s room was a shrine to Michael Jordan. After I came home one day, devastated about missing out on a part for a children’s theater production, I was taken by my brother to his display. He pointed at one of his favorite posters.
An Assessment of the Testing Culture: Read Along Section 6 – What If Everybody Understood Child Development?
The topic of “testing” gets a very passionate response from educators (and parents), and not usually a very good one. But ask them about assessments, and you’re likely to get a very different response. It may be a matter of semantics, but the underlying cause is not something to consider lightly.
Wait! What Happened to Recess? : Read Along Section 5 – What If Everybody Understood Child Development?
The mystery of the disappearing recess, is not an uncommon topic of discussion in elementary education. The majority of adults remember a morning recess, a lunch recess, and an afternoon recess. I think most Americans would hazard a guess and say that there is probably less time devoted to recess today than in years gone by.
Let Them Be Little: Read Along Section 3 – What if Everybody Understood Child Development?
Until about the mid 1700s, childhood wasn’t recognized as part of the lifespan. Children were viewed as miniature adults. The same rules, expectations, and responsibilities were applied equally to children and adults. (Hence, the child kings, child brides, child laborers, etc.) No one considered that children might have different needs, different ways of thinking, or different capacities. The shift in perspective that allowed adults to consider children and childhood to be unique was one of the great advances of the 18th century
Teaching Children the Way They’re Meant to Learn: Read Along Section One –What if Everybody Understood Child Development?
A Tale of Two Studies: What We Know About Children and What We Do
In 2005, Dr. Walter Gilliam, a researcher from Yale University, released a study examining the expulsion rates of preschoolers. That’s right — expulsion. As in kicked out. Dr. Gilliam found that in his large, nationally representative sample of prekindergarten programs, preschoolers were being expelled at THREE TIMES the rate of students in grades K-12.
Are preschoolers really three times as difficult as their older counterparts?
I don’t think so.
There are many factors that contribute to this elevated rate of expulsions. Gilliam outlined several in a presentation he made at an NAEYC conference in 2009. (*Slide presentation now located here.) All deserve our consideration as we create quality early childhood programs, but two in particular catch my attention. [Read more…]