Who's Ready for Kindergarten?

Here's an interesting little piece in the NY Times about one of our favorite topics, Kindergarten readiness! My take on the five commentators' pieces is that no one really seems to disagree: current K curriculums are getting pressure to be more academic and contain more literacy and math than is appropriate for a genuine K program; that "kindergarten readiness" is by necessity relative to the curriculum of the potential class placement; and that while children of upper/middle class people may not need the early start in kindergarten because of literacy-rich environments at home, those of lower SES or disadvantaged or minority backgrounds do need the early kindergarten experience in order to avoid later equity traps.

Thanks to Andrea Gordon, ECC Director, for passing along the link.

The brain is a fascinating place...

Brain calistenics for abstract ideas, by Benedict Carey

For years school curriculums have emphasized top-down instruction, especially for topics like math and science. Learn the rules first — the theorems, the order of operations, Newton’s laws — then make a run at the problem list at the end of the chapter. Yet recent research has found that true experts have something at least as valuable as a mastery of the rules: gut instinct, an instantaneous grasp of the type of problem they’re up against. Like the ballplayer who can “read” pitches early, or the chess master who “sees” the best move, they’ve developed a great eye.

Now, a small group of cognitive scientists is arguing that schools and students could take far more advantage of this same bottom-up ability, called perceptual learning. The brain is a pattern-recognition machine, after all, and when focused properly, it can quickly deepen a person’s grasp of a principle, new studies suggest. Better yet, perceptual knowledge builds automatically: There’s no reason someone with a good eye for fashion or wordplay cannot develop an intuition for classifying rocks or mammals or algebraic equations, given a little interest or motivation.

Thanks to Sima for the tip to this article!

Project Runway, TBS Middle School style!

Today the graduating 8th grade students put on a Fashion Show as the final project in their Art class. Working in groups of 3 or 4 students each, they found and repurposed pieces of clothing to create "fashion forward" designs. As one group member walked the runway in the outfit (to the wild applause of the collected K-7 students), Benicia, the Middle School Art Teacher, read a script prepared by the group that explained the materials they used, the decisions they made about repurposing those materials, and the vision and idea that drove their projects. Themes varying from Steampunk to Futuristic to Concrete Jungle to Formal Wear, with styles and eras ranging from the '20s and '40s to the previously unimagined. After the catwalk, all eight groups came out and answered questions from the judges (teachers Emma, Javanne, Maple, and Chris) and audience members that explored the materials,designs, and collaborative processes in more detail. The judges then awarded a series of certificates for design aspects such as "" and ""

In the language of Project Zero, this was a genuine Culminating Performance - the final piece of a unit of study in which students' understanding of specific concepts, ideas and information (in this case various aspects of fashion design) is made visible to themselves, each other, teachers, and the community. The outfits themselves spoke volumes, and combined with the written statements and the answers to on-the-spot questions (some of which showed ongoing misunderstandings and confusion on the part of students), the format of an exhibition/presentation allowed the students to share their learning with,

inspire and motivate, and feel recognition from and connection to, the entire student body and collected faculty, while having "serious fun" - a phrase Janet Stork often used to describe the joy and satisfaction that comes from working hard and feeling passionate.

I have a feeling this is going to become an annual project for the 8th grade class!