KHAYELITSHA, South Africa — Seniors here at Kwamfundo high school sang freedom songs and protested outside the staff room last year because their accounting teacher chronically failed to show up for class. With looming national examinations that would determine whether they were bound for a university or joblessness, they demanded a replacement.
Group items tagged
Eager Students Fall Prey to Apartheid's Legacy - 1 views
-
-
In the black townships of South Africa, many public schools do not meet the students' high expectations of career or college preparation. This article describes how students have worked for justice: protesting (at times violently) and teaching themselves lessons when teachers fail to show for work.
-
-
Here in the Western Cape, only 2 out of 1,000 sixth graders in predominantly black schools passed a mathematics test at grade level in 2005, compared with almost 2 out of 3 children in schools once reserved for whites that are now integrated, but generally in more affluent neighborhoods.
-
Apartheid is alive and well in South Africa's education system.
-
-
-
The author relies on interviews with current teachers, students, and administrators in South Africa. She also cites data and perspectives from the Development Bank of South Africa. In her piece she examines the current situation in a single township, then ties the issue to the entire nation.
-
- ...5 more annotations...
-
NYT's Celia Dugger examines the quality of education for South Africa's majority black population. 15 years after the election of Nelson Mandela and the official end to apartheid, the nation's school system remains a bastion of inequality.
Harlem Success Academy Prepares for Tests at Queens Farm Museum - NYTimes.com - 0 views
-
New York State’s English and math exams include several questions each year about livestock, crops and the other staples of the rural experience that some educators say flummox city children, whose knowledge of nature might begin and end at Central Park
-
Educators have long known that prior knowledge of a subject can significantly improve a child’s performance on tests.
-
I think this factor of prior knowledge of a subject matter is one of the most difficult things to contend with in the debate about standardized tests. If students walk in to a learning experience with this lack of prior knowledge it becomes very difficult for them to ever catch up to the test's expectations.
-
-
The New York State Education Department runs statistical analyses of its tests to look for gender, racial or socioeconomic bias, but it does not compare the performance of rural and urban students, partly because it is hard to isolate whether a disparity is the result of a lack of familiarity with an environment or is caused by other factors like socioeconomic status or quality of classroom instruction.
-
Some of the examples provided in this article provide clear examples in my opinion of why the department should compare the performance of rural and urban students.
-
- ...1 more annotation...
-
The Harlem Success Academny takes its students on field trips that aim to help students do better on standardized tests by taking them on fields trips to introduce them to subject matter that will be on the test, such as a farm.
Initiative Focuses on Early Learning Programs - NYTimes.com - 0 views
-
A result is that poor children, even many who have access to government-financed early care or learning programs, tend to enter kindergarten less prepared for school than those with wealthier parents.
-
I was especially struck by this line when I thought back to Ch. 5 in Mathison - Defining the Social Studies Curriculum. It lists the goals of Goals 2000: Educate America Act. The first thing listed is "All children in America will start school ready to learn". The reality is that not all students start school ready to learn or at least at the same place. As this newspaper article acknowledges, many poor children enter less prepared for school than those with wealthier parents and this is, in some cases, despite some having access to learning programs. Would an influx of new funds from such a bill create a more organized and directed early learning strategy? And if so, I wonder how educators can really help parents take advantage of the available services.
-
-
; a plan for reaching out to parents;
-
I think a plan for reaching out to parenst will be a crucial step in making this worthwhile. Communities need to provide the structures that would enable to parents to take advantage of these options and that might include adult education or parenting classes, too.
-
-
This article provides a look at a bill that proposes to raise the quality of early learning and care programs that serve children from brith through age 5.
1 - 5 of 5
Showing 20▼ items per page