Children learn through interaction and experiences. Everything a child sees, touches, smells and feels helps to develop the brain.  Children are expected to hit every milestone in their development within a framework of time or they are considered developmentally delayed.  Poverty, the lack of experiences, money in the school system, resources, home life and quality educators can all have long lasting effects on a child’s education and development. The article titled, “Poverty’s Long Lasting Effects on Students’ Education and Success”, points out that reforms need to be made. And the organizations that have been started need to be supported. 

            “Young children growing up in poverty face challenges with cognitive and literary ability and (often) begin school both academically and socioeconomically behind their peers from higher income backgrounds” (www.insightintodiversity.com) Living in poverty children are at a disadvantage.  Poverty is defined as a household with two working parents and a yearly income of less than $24,339 a year. In 2015, one in five children lived in poverty making up 20% of the children living in the United States. Children living in poverty at times lack the experiences, and one on one time needed for growth. 

Children living in impoverished conditions are faced with circumstances growing up that other children are not. They may not be privy to healthcare and they may have physical and cognitive development delays. The pressures on these children to help provide income for the family as they get older is real.  “Data show that low-income students are five times more likely to drop out of high school than those who are high-income and 13 times less likely to graduate from high school on time“ (www.insightintodiversity.com)   The pressure from home along with a lacking educational foundation contribute to less success in school and higher education. 

In the United States education pays.  In many instances it is important for students to earn their masters degrees in order to see future financial success. Students who come from impoverished home lives, face the pressure of earning immediate income, but also lack study skills and the necessary foundation to see success at the college level. In order to overcome these current statistics money needs to be invested into quality K-12 education programs in poverty stricken areas. Pre-Kindergarten programs have been started and a program called Stand for Children,  is open in 21 states.  Its main focus is “promoting high- quality universal pre-kindergarten for all children and ensuring that those in kindergarten through third grade can read well” (www.insightintodiversity.com).  Efforts are in place to help children be educated until high school completion as well. 

It is believed that not only do these children come from impoverished backgrounds, but less is spent on their education as well. In 2011, “more than 40 percent of low-income schools do not get a fair share of state and local funds” (www.insightintodiversity).  In some cases their schools are filled with less experienced teachers and less resources.  Charles Best founded a charity called DonorsChoose.org.  His program allows people to donate basic resources and technology to schools to help teachers provide the best possible education that they can for their students. Any type of donation is accepted: crayons, field trip money, books, anything to support the learning experience for these children. 

Learning for all children needs to be fun and an experience. Every student needs to hear “ You matter. We have high expectations for you. You can do it” (www.insightintodiversity). Children are born into families some that have better incomes than others, but overall that should not be a factor when it comes to education.  In America, education should be universal for all and equal for all, but it is not.  Stigmas are attached to impoverished areas and that limits educators who want to teach in those areas and resources are not as plentiful.   All children need to see the value that they have and the system needs to be revamped to help change the current system equaling out resources  and money to all schools.  Children who live in poverty need to feel as though they have a chance at success. That societal paths can be changed so that children living in poverty do not feel as though they are constantly fighting an uphill battle. 

Works cited

INSIGHT Into Diversity, 8 Apr. 2020, http://www.insightintodiversity.com/.

The Safety of Schools

My mom asked my brother, “What did you do today in school?” His reply, “ We had a lock down drill.  All of us had to squeeze into a closet in the science lab room and be completely quiet.  Sal and Conner got in trouble because they were talking and messing around.”   My mom calmly reminds my brother, “ You do know that lockdown drills are important and should be taken seriously.  In case of an actual emergency it is beneficial for you and your friends to practice your reaction and know how to respond. “  In school’s today, safety, is a problem that is constantly being addressed and examined.  Since the year 2000, there have been more than “130 shootings at elementary, middle and high schools, and 58 others at colleges and universities.” ( Bump 2018) The issue of school security has grown into a multibillion dollar business, but little research has been completed on what is the best way to protect students from gun violence.  

School lockdowns drills are in place in schools around the country just as fire drills are.  Faculty and staff have been trained through in services how to respond to such an emergency and each school has their own procedures in place.  Students and staff need to be familiar with how to respond if an emergency  should arise and to react quickly. Being quiet and remaining calm are crucial components of a successful drill. The purpose of a drill is to teach students how to “ barricade themselves in classrooms and hide from as armed and violent intruder” (Lee 2019) In a crisis, the situation should be analyzed because staying inside the building may not be the best option.  A.L.I.C.E -Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, Evacuate- is a program founded by Greg Crane.  Crane is a former SWAT officer.  Crane believes that drill should not focus solely on hiding but analyzing the situation.  “In ninety-eight percent of these situations, you have a solo shooter, if I knew that I have a killer inside the building, then I would run outside.” ( Lee 2019) Not one plan works in every situation.  If it is announced that something is happening in a particular hallway, then people should react fast.  Is it best to leave the building or hide? According the Crane, “A drill should ideally include kids and teachers developing and discussing the best options to a violent threat and then having those ideas reviewed and evaluated by safety experts” ( Lee 2019) Crane also supports teaching faculty, staff and students techniques in order to fight an intruder if possible. This is not something that is fully supported and has been refuted by Ken Trump, the president of the National Schools Safety and Security Systems, which is  private firm.  He believes that there should not be any thought given toward fighting off an intruder.  “ What about special ed. children? What’s age appropriate? And how can you ask middle schoolers who can’t choose between lunch entrees to make a split- second coordinated, life-and-death decisions? ( Lee 2019)  Trump would like to see schools work out plans and work directly with local enforcement agencies in order to help practice them and make them as safe as possible. 

            In October of 2019, the U.S. Department of Education announced a new grant of $71.6 million in funding in order to better safety in schools and to improve student access to resources regarding mental health. Mental health is assumed to be a main cause of school shootings. Research shows that mental health does not cause gun violence. “Surprisingly little population-level evidence supports the notion that individuals diagnosed with mental illness are more likely than anyone to commit gun crimes” (Metzl and MacLeish 2015)  Those who commit mass shooting are not well.  They may feel desperate, hopeless and are more likely to overstep their boundaries and be violent toward others, but “shooters rarely have a diagnosed (or diagnosable) mental illness.” (Beckett 2014) It is known that people who have a violent history should not be in possession of a hand gun or any weapon, but a quick mental illness diagnosis of a shooter is actually more complicated than just that.  Mental illness does not cause gun violence.  And mental illness is not equal to a threat of violence. “It is understandable the US policymaker, journalists, and the general public look to psychiatry, psychology, neuroscience and related disciplines as sources of certainty in the face of the often-incomprehensible terror and loss that mass shooting inevitably produce” (Metzl and MacLeish 2015). There is little evidence that shows that people with a mental health diagnosis are any more likely to commit a crime with a gun, but it is a trend to fall back on insanity and shooters lack of saneness.  “Meanwhile, a host of other narratives, such as displaced male anxiety about demographic change, the mass psychology of needing so many guns in the first place, or the symptom created by being surrounded by them, remain unspoken ( Metzl and Macleish 2015). 

            School violence and lock down drill are realities. Schools are taking steps in order to make schools safe havens again.  Security measures have been put into place. School doors are locked and one main entrance is used that has a surveillance camera in place.  Visitors are buzzed in and licenses are scanned for record of visit and identity.  Teachers exit buildings to go out to recess with walkie talkies providing correspondence with the main office in case any incident should arise. Depending on the neighborhood of the school, metal detectors and guards are at schools for protection.  With schools that contain multiple buildings, students, staff and faculty are given badges to wear during the day that make them stand out as being someone allowed on campus but the badges are also used to open the doors. And most importantly students should never open locked doors for anyone even if they know the individual. Students need to be vigilant and aware and report suspicious behavior to people of authority.

            No security measure is going to be perfect. Every school violence situation is different. But it is important to try to reduce the risks. Schools are for children and they are supposed to be safe havens for them. Schools are drug free, gang free and places that should be designed for students to thrive. Gun violence and school safety is a sad reality that we face today.  Parents drop their children off in fear of what could happen because as we know from past cases, tragedy in school can happen anywhere. School safety is a problem within schools and there is a need for it to be continually addressed.  No school is safe from harm. 

                                                            Works cited 

Bump, Philip. “Analysis | Eighteen Years of Gun Violence in U.S. Schools, Mapped.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 14 Feb. 2018, http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2018/02/14/eighteen-years-of-gun-violence-in-u-s-schools-mapped/.

Bump, Philip. “Analysis | Eighteen Years of Gun Violence in U.S. Schools, Mapped.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 14 Feb. 2018, http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2018/02/14/eighteen-years-of-gun-violence-in-u-s-schools-mapped/.

Lee, Katherine. “How Parents and Schools Can Boost School Security Today.” Verywell Family, Verywell Family, 2 Nov. 2019, http://www.verywellfamily.com/what-parents-need-to-know-about-school-lockdown-drills-620503.

Lee, Katherine. “How Parents and Schools Can Boost School Security Today.” Verywell Family, Verywell Family, 2 Nov. 2019, http://www.verywellfamily.com/what-parents-need-to-know-about-school-lockdown-drills-620503.

Metzl, Jonathan M, and Kenneth T MacLeish. “Mental Illness, Mass Shootings, and the Politics of American Firearms.” American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, Feb. 2015, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4318286/.

“U.S. Department of Education Announces New Grant Awards to Address School Safety and Improve Access to Mental Health Services.” U.S. Department of Education Announces New Grant Awards to Address School Safety and Improve Access to Mental Health Services | U.S. Department of Education, 8 Oct. 2019, http://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/us-department-education-announces-new-grant-awards-address-school-safety-and-improve-access-mental-health-services.

Teaching has been fine tuned into  “teaching to the test”.  Eliminating important material in chapters knowing that it will not be tested and in turn focusing on material that will be tested. Testing has turned away from teachers learning from their students tests and seeing how they need to improve their teaching styles and methods.   Teaching has turned into focusing on subject matter that will help students be prepared for a test. “ The core problem isn’t a particular format. It’s the predictability and limited scope of standardized tests.” (108)

            Schools prep for tests in a number of ways. Class time may be cut short on those classes that are not involved in testing.  Teachers are pressured to raise test scores so in turn subject matter deemed not important to the test is skipped or cut back on. Unfortunately some of the material that is being cut and deemed unimportant is important information for students to know.  And in the long run may make them less competent in a field. So for instance more time on math may create a strong math student, but in turn less time is spent on science and reading creating an unbalanced curriculum. 

            Another type of test prep is reallocating time. Harping on content that is known to be tested. The importance here is not the content that is emphasized and instructed, but that is pushed aside. Analyzing past tests and knowing what material has had a heavier emphasis on what is tested.  This does not only happen in an academic environment. It was pointed out that car manufacturers found out that drivers sides would be tested, the focused on safety on the driver’s side.  In turn, the passenger’s side did not get the same safety upgrades as the driver’s side. At the time, the safety score was assumed to be for the entire car, but it actually was not. Back to tests, “For more than two decades, teachers have been reporting in studies that they cut back on important material, including content explicitly included in their curriculum , because it doesn’t help them on the test.” Overall, reallocation helps to inflate scores. Spending a lot of time and teaching to content that is known subject matter on a test leads toward mastery and inflated tests scores.

            Coaching students to score well on a test requires analysis.  Knowing how specific questions are going to be tested. Will the math concept be tested by means of a graph, specifically what kind of graph?  And how will the answer be scored. Coaching directly to the style of the test and not necessarily on the thorough understanding of the material. Understanding the material outside of the specific way it is thought to be tested may not be mastered. Students who thoroughly know the material should be able to attack the information in a number of ways. Using the process of elimination is a good strategy when taking a  multiple choice test, but just because the student got the right answer through process of elimination does not mean that the student knows the  correct answer, they just knew which ones were wrong. Teaching kids math equations, for example, not through real life examples but in a way to make test answer come quicker and correct.  Students are instructed to immediately write formulas on the top of test paper and memorize lists of words. 

            My role was looking into score inflation. Score inflation is used more in areas that serve high concentrations of students and students with disabilities. Score inflation was meant to help the students do better. But in reality it just demoralized them, made them feel like they were not good enough. 

            Without a doubt teaching for the test benefits nobody in the long run. You will not remember what you learned after you took the test. Teachers should be teachers should be teaching their students life skills that will help them in college and later in life. 

I found an article published by the young teachers collective, that gives perspective of a young Swedish student who goes to school in America who was deculturalized by her school. It also goes into what we talked about in class with the beginning of deculturalization. Students with a different background are often asked to pick up American culture right away and are forced to drop their old culture, and as future teachers we can no longer let this happen. 

This young girls mother was born and raised in Sweden and their family goes back every year to visit their grandparents, cousins, uncles, and aunts. The young girls Father is from Minnesota. She would speak Swedish to her father and English to her mother. Her school did not offer Swedish as a language and as a result of that, she no longer and speak Swedish. She has lost all contact with her Swedish relatives, which brings me to ask the question, should young students, such as this girl, be able to take a language that that can already speak? They are young they don’t know the whole language and still have a lot to learn. This happens a lot with international students, they come to America and are forced to learn a third language in their second language, or should they be excused from taking another forgiven language. 

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries is when Native American deculturalization was going on. The government was building “off reservation” boarding schools to attempt integrate Native Americans into the Anglo American society. These people were removed from their families and homes, were not allowed to use native American expressions, and were being converted to rural Christian farmers and labors. They were forced to cut their hair, burn their cloths, and celebrate American history, like thanksgiving and fourth of July. This lead to a lot of abuse and suicides among the Native Americans. 

When this teacher asked her peers about the deculturalization situation they answered with “from the classroom, to school, to the entire town: community plays a crucial role in grieving” and “it is a teachers responsibility to examine and critically think about race, justice, and our own privilege, and most importantly how these play out in the classroom.” I think the main point in those was the sense of community. As future teachers I think we need to do a better job of giving these kids a sense of community. Knowing who everyone is and where they come from. We need to make sure the students know that they can come to us in any situation or problem they have encountered, and also their peers are there to help also. The classroom needs to be a community. Maybe assigning projects that involve students to go home and buy things isn’t do able for every student. We need to put ourselves in their shoes as teachers. 

As future teachers we have a huge responsibility. We have to stop deculturalization not only in the classroom but in the community. Kids take what they learn in the classroom and take it home and into their communities and it is important to set a good example. 

Editor. “Reflecting on Deculturization in Schools.” Young Teachers Collective, 28 May 2015, youngteacherscollective.wordpress.com/2015/05/28/reflecting-on-deculturization-in-schools/.

Matthew Berdysiak 

Professor Shutkin

ED253

28 February 2020

This week’s reading was about undocumented immigrants in the education system. These immigrants come to the united states looking for a new start and once they step over the border they are in danger of getting deported. Getting deported has a psychological and physical effect on the child. 

It is a constitutional right to be able to go to school. 5.3 million youth (10%) are unauthorized or live with one unauthorized parents. Thousands of undocumented students go to school everyday and wonder if their family is gonna be their when they get home. There is always a threat of the student’s parents getting deported when they are at school. With losing a family member, the kids experience many negative psychological effects. 

Not a lot of research has been done on this situation because of ethical, ethical, and logistical problems. But there was a pilot study done on undocumented immigrants. The Study showed that having a family member detained or deported has the same psychological impact as being homeless. At school the students are insecure as well as being more prone to being bullied, both physical and mental. 

The immigrant youth has a higher chance of experiencing interpersonal, socioemotional, health and substance problems. The kids that are experiencing these struggles are targeted for mass deportation. These kids have grown up in very hostile environments. Growing up in hostile environment can make you socially awkward, lead you taking advantages for substances, and aggressive out lashings. Along with this unauthorized families report low feeling of social belonging resulting in mental health issues. Being unauthorized also has a negative impact on your education. 

Our learning community decided to emphasize the main points of the article. The social, psychological, citizenship, and programs to school enrollment and citizenship. We thought these were the most important points mentioned in the article. These are what effect the children the most and the most beneficial ways have success in America. 

As a group we decided to make a power point and have an activity where we all think of a question and people write their answers on the board. My question was Do schools specifically for immigrant (ESL) students help integrate students into society? My favorite answers were along the line of “ Absolutely , every student deserves a safe, comfortable learning environment.” And “yes, but it does not integrate them into American society.” I liked the second one a lot because it was a mixture of both a safe learning experience, but also the student needs to integrate himself into American society. My responsibilities were going over parental detainment and deportation, psychosocial impacts, academic impacts, along with coming up with a question for the discussion. 

As a whole this was a very powerful article informing the community about undocumented families. This is a large part in politics today and extremely relevant in todays society. This is important for us teachers in training to read about because we have to be informed about our students. I think it is very important to help your students inside the classroom but also outside the classroom. My favorite teachers always cared about me personally. 

The education system is very unjust and unfair to the lower class citizens of America. Schools in lower class neighborhoods are getting extremely underfunded which as a direct correlation to how students are doing in school. With a shifted focus toward standardized testing students are receiving a less engaging education. America is doing nothing to help these students get more resources to help them succeed on more than just tests. 

Neoliberalism is taking over the education system and turning it into a business. A big part of this is the no student left behind act. Hannah Arendt sums up neoliberalism with the following;

As a result, purveyors of neoliberal ideology and policy have been working relentlessly to undermine public education in order to define it in strictly economic terms. Taking an instrumentalist approach obsessed with measurement and quantification, they have aggressively attempted to turn education into a business, faculty into devalued clerks and students into consumers.

Teachers are just teaching for the test, to pass the regions test or whatever it is, schools are ignoring social issues. If the students don’t do well on the exams, the school looses funding, students will get grant money to privet schools, and the school will eventually go out of business. I believe testing is a very poor way of seeing ones potential or intelligence. The first test that comes to mind is the ACT or SAT. Many people do not like these tests because their future depends on how well you do. If you don’t reach a certain score you cant go to a certain college. People realize this and get very nervous and start second guessing themselves and end up not doing very well. Another part of these tests is most of them are timed. Timing them puts a whole different spin on things because you have to answer a certain amount of questions in a certain amount of time. This gives you limited time to work on a problem which is a problem for people who are not as fast as the others. Growing up I always had extra time for tests, but when it came to the ACT I did not which affected me. You can also pay for tutoring and to take it multiple times. This is a privilege for the upper class people and is very unfair to the people who cant afford this. Every time I took the ACT I did better. If someone can only afford to take it once, they are at a disadvantage. So there is a lot more than intelligence that goes into these tests.  

Public schools are funded off of property taxes. A school in an upper class neighborhood, is going to have more funding because the houses are bigger. A public school in a lower class neighborhood is going to have significantly less funding because the houses are smaller. This leads to a very big difference in funding for resources. The school in the upper class neighborhood is  going to have a lot more funding for resources such as a higher salary’s for teachers, food, construction for new facilities, transportation, and operation and maintenance fees. But in reality the school the most likely needs more funding is going is the school in the lower class neighborhood. Schools that don’t do well on testing become charter schools for lower class citizens. So say the school in the lower class neighborhood hasn’t tested well and is now giving grants for the students to go to a different school, the family might not use that money for school. They might use it to pay off bills or for food. I believe a good idea to fix this would be to still tax on property but everything goes to the state government and is dispersed equally through all the public schools in the state. This would provide equal funding for all the public schools in the state which would provide equal opportunity’s and and equal education for everyone. 

This has not gone unnoticed In our society. On January 14th 2020 in Los Angeles 33,000 teachers took action and protested against the destruction of public schools. They protested for higher salaries, higher funding for resources, and less testing. Instead of teaching for the test, teachers need to be teaching about community they are apart of. These protest’s have started more protests around the country. When people are moving they look at the local public education systems to dictate where they move to. They shouldn’t have to do this. All public education systems should be equal.

Works cited 

Rodriguez, Jared, et al. “Teachers Are Rising Up to Resist Neoliberal Attacks on Education.” Truthout, Truthout, 22 Jan. 2019, truthout.org/articles/teachers-are-rising-up-to-resist-neoliberal-attacks-on-education/.

This past week I have had the responsibility of reading and analyzing John Deweys pedagogic creed. Dewey believed that learning is best done threw experience. Dewey started a lab school in Chicago. A lab school is an experiential learning place. They are also known as demonstration schools. It’s a place where teachers are encouraged to experiment with different teaching styles. Everybody learns in different ways. people learn through seeing things, hearing things, or doing things. I learn through experiencing things. When I study I act things out or right them down to help me memorize them. Instead of learning through real world experiences that you might encounter. Instead of teaching a math equation that the students are gonna forget after the test, teaching a math problem about how to pay taxes or take care of a business would be much more beneficial to the student. The student should be able to take what they learn in the class room and apply it to the real world. He wanted the students to want to learn.

In our leaning community we chose to emphasize three major points, Lab schools, the no child left behind act, and Montessori schools. I already spoke about lab schools, so I will dive into the no child left behind act. The no child left behind act is based off all state testing scores. If a schools average is below the norm for a certain amount of years, their budget will be cut. I believe that intent of the act was good, but it has not produced the same outcome. If the school has low scored it might be because their budget is already low, so taking more money away doesn’t make sense. If they gave them more funding, the test scores might go up. We also looked up Montessori schools. A Montessori school is a place where the student decides what they learn. They are based off the students. If the students want to learn about squirrels, that’s what they will learn about. I don’t think Dewey would 100% agree with this. I think Dewey would want a little more structure. I think a Montessori would be great for young kids. It would be fun for them and they would want to learn. As kids get older I believe they need more structure. As a student figures out their passion in life, I believe they should have more structure.

Our group decided that we were all going to take one of the main points and explain it to the class. My topic was lab schools. I researched what lab schools were. I think lab schools would be very beneficial for young students that want to figure out how they learn. I think everyone needs to know how they learn, this will be their backbone all throughout school. They should always be able to rely on their learning style. I went to the University of Chicago’s website for the lab school that Dewey created to learn more about lab schools. I also went to a website called “The Conversation”. This told me in depth what a lab school was. The history, how they developed, and their practices. This was my main source of information.

1. What name do you prefer to be called? Do you have preferred pronouns? Matthew or Matt. I go by either one.

1. Hometown and photograph of you (inserted in your blog so we can connect you with your name). I am from Buffalo, New York.
2. Grade level and subject(s) that you want to teach. I want to teach 5th grade history.
   
3. What are you into; what makes you special? Share a few “unique” aspects about yourself that would help our classroom community get to know you a bit more. Are you on an athletic team? Sing in the choir?  Are you trying out for a play? Painting? What are you planning on doing this semester in your life that is noteworthy? I play on the lacrosse team here at John Carroll. I grew up in a family of five. I was the second oldest, so growing up my and my three other brothers were very competitive. Still to this day we are very competitive, none of us like to lose at anything.
4. I want to know what matters most to you.  To this end, please share with the class an essay that is essential to your interests. (Include the reference/link to the essay [chapter, article, website] and a few sentences about its significance to you). https://www.uslacrosse.org/about-the-sport/history

Hello my name is Matthew and I will be your host for today! Welcome to my blog.

Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.

— Oscar Wilde.

This is the first post on my new blog. I’m just getting this new blog going, so stay tuned for more. Subscribe below to get notified when I post new updates.