Learning Leader Resource

As I listened to the President talk about throwing more money into education (this after the government spent the last four years cutting education), I questioned where the money will come from…are we simply taking from those who are working to pay those who are not ~ in essence spreading the wealth? I have worked as a classroom teacher on the same salary, with no bonuses, for the past five years. No cost of living increase, no raise, zero bonus dollars, and very little reimbursement for personal money spent. All that coupled with an increase in responsibilities related to my position.

This morning I received my e-mail newsletter from Stephen Krashen and once again, he is so accurate. For those of you who are no lucky enough to receive his insights, read below:

Posted on:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/is-obamas-call-to-modernize-schools-really-necessary/2011/09/08/gIQANrLSDK_blog.html

President Obama proposed investing $30 billion for school repairs and
renovations and another $30 billion to prevent teacher layoffs. There
was no mention of an obvious means of saving money: Reduce testing and
scrap plans to increase testing.

It is widely agreed that schools currently do too much testing, far
more than is helpful or necessary, and the US Department of Education
is planning to increase testing well beyond what we are doing now,
without any supporting evidence.

Test development, test revision, the time spent on test preparation,
administration and scoring will cost billions. The new tests will all
be administered on-line, and this will cost additional billions.

New York City schools are planning to spend about a half billion to
“primarily pay for wiring and other behind-the-wall upgrades to city
schools” (NY Times, March 30, 2011) so that students can take the
computerized national standardized tests. Extrapolated to the entire
country, this amounts to about $45 billion.

If we adopt the principle of only testing when it is helpful, this
will save more than the $60 billion the president wants to invest in
schools.

Stephen Krashen

Thank you Stephen for not only continuing the fight against testing children way too often, but for reinforcing that if we reallocate money we have budgeted, we will not need to increase government, increase spending, increase debt. Education spending does not need an increase…it needs an evaluation of current spending!

That’s my opinion, I welcome yours!

Please click on the link below and vote for North Forest Pines Elementary Technology Proposal ~ the $25,000 would help our school increase access to technology for all students. It would help us to put an interactive learning board in five classrooms…this would take a load off of our P.T.A. as they try to earn money to implement Smart Technology in every classroom!

http://www.refresheverything.com/north-forest-pines

Your vote…which can be refreshed each of the next five days…is greatly appreciated by the staff, students and parents of the North Forest Pines Elementary community!

North Forest Pines Elementary, Raleigh, N.C. has written a $25,000 grant proposal to build the technology base in the school. They are seeking money for interactive boards, hand held computers and reading sources. Pepsi is offering money to schools based on the number of votes they receive on their Refresh Everything web site. The North Forest Pines proposal will be posted on September 1st. Each person can vote five times from their e-mail, five times from their text and five times from their Facebook account.

PLEASE SUPPORT THIS FANTASTIC CAUSE! Simply go to the link below, register for an account and begin voting on September 1st. Remember: North Forest Pines Elementary, Raleigh, N.C., $25,000 Technology Grant…vote, vote, vote!

http://www.refresheverything.com/categories/education

The proposal I wrote on Donors Choose is a proposal for word work manipulatives. I am a huge fan of Lakeshore Learning. They have tons of hands on, color coded learning activities to choose from. All four of the item proposal requests are from Lakeshore. Once the proposal was accepted and posted, I learned that I would only need to collect half of the dollars requested, as Lakeshore proposals were getting 2x the amount donated. My proposal was for over $350 and in order to be fulfilled, will now only need to collect on $182! This final amount is less than I would pay for the manipulatives alone on the Lakeshore web site!

Write proposals now…it can’t hurt…email your proposal to family, friends, P.T.A.s, post it to your social networking sites…get to it…it is a 50% off coupon!

As the year round school year nears the end of the first quarter, I have been seeking ways to gather funds to purchase various needed items for my classroom. Several of the web sites that I found include: Donors Choose, Teacher Wish List, Adopt a Classroom and I Love Schools.

My Donors Choose proposal includes Literacy Learning Manipulatives needed to build foundational literacy skills related to letters, words and patterns among them. This is a great need in early literacy learning so that students read most fluently, leading to better comprehension. All the item requests can be found at Lakeshore Learning.

My I Love Schools proposal simply has an open account to donate money. My goal for ‘KehlerKids’ is to collect $1,200 so that I can mount the interactive Smart Board onto a movable track system in my classroom as well as purchase a color laser printer for my classroom. Both these technology upgrades would increase instructional time each day. The interactive board would be less likely to need to be reoriented if mounted and up away from little bodies bumping it…and the printer in the classroom would allow us to collect our products immediately rather than having to run down the hall to get our work.

Adopt a School does not list my school as a possible location to support, so I have an email into them to add North Forest Pines Elementary to their school list. The proposal I have drafted is the same as my goal for the I Love Schools account where I am attempting to get enough funds to mount my interactive board and purchase a laser printer.

My Teacher Wish List has day to day needed items such as band-aids (that actually stick, rather than the school provided ones that don’t), sanitizing wipes, board erasers, white board markers, etc.

Any and all monetary or material purchases are greatly appreciated…as with any donations to the public school system!

As the state of North Carolina released data from last school year’s testing…one notices that fewer schools across the state met 100% their AYP goals. Which subgroup is at greatest risk for not meeting AYP? The economically disadvantaged.

Let’s start from the beginning. What is one of the greatest predictors of academic success? Some professionals suggest that parental involvement can be the primary factor in a child’s academic success. With that said, a child is born a good five years before they would enter in the public school system. Let’s use that valuable time to provide foundations for our children, giving them ‘hangers’ if you will, on which to hang future learning. This means parents would have to be parents.

Moving on to the early school years…using parental involvement as a primary factor for student success. Use the dinner table to discuss your child’s day. Talk to them about their learning. Read to and with them…have them read to you (all free through the public library!). Look over their assignments from the day or week. Unplug the video games and television and get to talking! This means parents being parents.

I will stop there…I think once the aforementioned strategies are implemented across the board, no matter the economic situation of the family…directed at parents being parents…the nation would see increases in the percentages of learners meeting yearly learning goals.

School leaders and politicians do not want to confront the truth for fear of being condemned. Many of the issues we are seeing in the public school system can be directly addressed by PARENTS BEING PARENTS. There…I said it…if you are having children, then BE A PARENT.

That’s my opinion…I welcome yours.

Teachers should look into all the sales going on around them this time of year. Staples, Office Max, Lakeshore Learning, Teachers Pay Teachers and many more companies are running sales as many children head back to school. The state of North Carolina has a sales tax holiday this coming weekend…no sales tax on school supplies, clothes or shoes. With school and household budgets tight…stretching the dollar will go a long way. Shop smart…get more with less, that is what this school year is going to be all about!

Loving the speech made by Matt Damon…powerful. Hopefully, with someone having the platform of notoriety speaking out and saying what teachers all over the nation have been saying, those making decisions in education will take note. Let’s stop the ‘war on teachers’ and begin empowering teachers to instill of love of inquiry and learning rather than creating environments of memorization and test taking.

Year Round Schools are three weeks into teaching and planning. Year Round calendars are a great plan…if there were planners in the higher positions. When departments decide to make changes to curriculum and/or resources three weeks in, it sure puts those who have already begun instruction in a seemingly lose/lose situation. They lost all the time they’ve spent forecast planning…they will lose future minutes re-planning…those outside the classroom apparently don’t recognize this burden.

Just a Thought:
*Those of you who are running a year round school system…all departments should be prepared to plan in time for those groups beginning their year in July. It is wrong to step into the first nine weeks, week four, and make changes to the curriculum that some teachers are already teaching.*

That’s my opinion…I welcome yours.

Great way to reach out to others who want to donate to classrooms!  You can even put a link on your class website so that those visiting your site can see your needs.

Let’s hope it catches on!