Oct. 20
Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School in West Oakland is taking its science and math instruction up a notch this year -- and to do it, Principal Roma Groves said, the faculty is enlisting parents' help.
This evening, the school held its first Family Science Night to involve parents in the school's new STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Math) focus. Teachers led demonstrations while parents helped out or just took it all in.
I didn't make it to all the classrooms, but I observed a geology lesson and watched the liquid substances kids dropped into plastic baggies turn into slime.
Jasella Jones, an MLK parent, said she doesn't remember having any science instruction when she attended another West Oakland elementary school years ago. Now, she said, her 8-year-old daughter, Amunique Usher, comes home from school and teaches her what she's learned. "She always has important questions that I can't answer about the moon and the stars and the sun," Jones said. "Just imagine what the future holds, not only for her, but for her kids and her grandkids and everyone else." Michele Williams' first-graders took home their neon-colored slime, but only after solemnly swearing to take care of it and not eat it, or smear it on other children. What do your schools do to promote science and to involve families in the process?
Oct. 16
On Friday, I wrote about the upcoming transfer of five Oakland teachers to other schools on Week 8 of the school year. David Braden, a teacher at Bella Vista Elementary School, wrote an essay for The Education Report about the effects of the district's budget-balancing act. His piece about the process known as "consolidation" is posted in full on the blog.
Braden writes: "Through the years, we have united together as a staff, we have felt safe to take risks and learn from each other, and we have firmed and solidified our teaching practice. We have consolidated ourselves into a high-functioning school of people who live, learn and achieve. To use the same word to describe the process we've been asked to endure, and which will surely set us back in our race to the top, is nauseating and hurtful."
Reader response
CogIntheOUSDWheel: Interesting post from David Braden. I certainly can testify to most of it, although many teachers do NOT know their assignments in May. Or June. Or July. Or much before the first bell. I too was "consolidated." ... I was moved out of a job where I was highly successful into a job I would never have applied for, because I knew it was the wrong population for me to work with. ... Just having a teaching credential does not mean that one is a match for every job and every school. I went from loving my job to dreading it. I used to be a great teacher, but that is not true now. I do keep plugging away, but my heart was sort of broken by being forced out of my job that I loved. Unfortunately, in OUSD, teachers are pawns and cogs in a wheel, interchangeable and easily replaceable. And what's really sad, is that noncertificated staff get even less respect than teachers, which is hard to imagine, but true.
Del: Consolidation is a huge problem and a nightmare for students, families, teachers, administrators, and everyone else. But what else can be done? There is no money to pay teachers if there are not enough students. Union rules understandably make the situation even less flexible.
Ms. J: I think it is worth repeating that the victims of consolidation are not only the teachers (and I am going to take on eight first-graders as a result of the consolidations at Bella Vista, taking my class to 30 kids), but the students. The district may not have any money, but the thing that is so frustrating and tragic is that this mismatch of funds is being sorted out 34 days into the school year.
News By:
mercurynews.com
Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School in West Oakland is taking its science and math instruction up a notch this year -- and to do it, Principal Roma Groves said, the faculty is enlisting parents' help.
This evening, the school held its first Family Science Night to involve parents in the school's new STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Math) focus. Teachers led demonstrations while parents helped out or just took it all in.
I didn't make it to all the classrooms, but I observed a geology lesson and watched the liquid substances kids dropped into plastic baggies turn into slime.
Jasella Jones, an MLK parent, said she doesn't remember having any science instruction when she attended another West Oakland elementary school years ago. Now, she said, her 8-year-old daughter, Amunique Usher, comes home from school and teaches her what she's learned. "She always has important questions that I can't answer about the moon and the stars and the sun," Jones said. "Just imagine what the future holds, not only for her, but for her kids and her grandkids and everyone else." Michele Williams' first-graders took home their neon-colored slime, but only after solemnly swearing to take care of it and not eat it, or smear it on other children. What do your schools do to promote science and to involve families in the process?
Oct. 16
On Friday, I wrote about the upcoming transfer of five Oakland teachers to other schools on Week 8 of the school year. David Braden, a teacher at Bella Vista Elementary School, wrote an essay for The Education Report about the effects of the district's budget-balancing act. His piece about the process known as "consolidation" is posted in full on the blog.
Braden writes: "Through the years, we have united together as a staff, we have felt safe to take risks and learn from each other, and we have firmed and solidified our teaching practice. We have consolidated ourselves into a high-functioning school of people who live, learn and achieve. To use the same word to describe the process we've been asked to endure, and which will surely set us back in our race to the top, is nauseating and hurtful."
Reader response
CogIntheOUSDWheel: Interesting post from David Braden. I certainly can testify to most of it, although many teachers do NOT know their assignments in May. Or June. Or July. Or much before the first bell. I too was "consolidated." ... I was moved out of a job where I was highly successful into a job I would never have applied for, because I knew it was the wrong population for me to work with. ... Just having a teaching credential does not mean that one is a match for every job and every school. I went from loving my job to dreading it. I used to be a great teacher, but that is not true now. I do keep plugging away, but my heart was sort of broken by being forced out of my job that I loved. Unfortunately, in OUSD, teachers are pawns and cogs in a wheel, interchangeable and easily replaceable. And what's really sad, is that noncertificated staff get even less respect than teachers, which is hard to imagine, but true.
Del: Consolidation is a huge problem and a nightmare for students, families, teachers, administrators, and everyone else. But what else can be done? There is no money to pay teachers if there are not enough students. Union rules understandably make the situation even less flexible.
Ms. J: I think it is worth repeating that the victims of consolidation are not only the teachers (and I am going to take on eight first-graders as a result of the consolidations at Bella Vista, taking my class to 30 kids), but the students. The district may not have any money, but the thing that is so frustrating and tragic is that this mismatch of funds is being sorted out 34 days into the school year.
News By:
mercurynews.com
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