All Articles tagged high-school.

5 Creative Ways to Teach Students with ADHD

December 1, 2014 Brad Hoffman Leave a Comment

By Leah Levy
Original Source: Edudemic
Originally posted November 10, 2014

Recently, the NY Times ran an excellent article entitled: A Natural Fix for ADHD. In this piece, Dr. Richard Friedman, Professor of Clinical Psychiatry and Director of the Psychopharmacology Clinic at Weill Cornell Physicians, explores the neuroscience behind ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). In so doing, Friedman attempts to reframe our understanding of just what ADHD is, and how much more nuanced our approaches for treating it need to be.

ADHD in the Classroom Has Long Been a Controversial Topic

On the one hand, advocates of pharmaceutical interventions like Ritalin and Adderall point to the substantial scientific and anecdotal evidence confirming that ADHD medications help students concentrate in the classroom and better manage their workloads at home. Many teachers consider these medications essential in terms of classroom management, as untreated students with ADHD can derail class discussions and require the teacher to devote enormous wells of energy just to keeping the class in line. (That said, it should be noted that ADHD manifests in many forms and affects quieter students at high rates as well; in fact, ADHD can take an even more serious toll in this case, as it often goes undiagnosed for much longer). For these reasons, it is not uncommon to hear teachers, parents, and even students themselves refer to ADHD medications as a “miracle.”

However, take a scroll through the comment section of any article written in support of these medications, and you are bound to see many commenters offering stories of inappropriate medication use. ADHD is often used as a catch-all diagnosis for all perceived behavioral issues, as it is easier to prescribe medications without probing further into root causes of outwardly displayed symptoms. Many parents and students describe feeling pressured into taking medication, and often lower resource students aren’t given any outside support beyond the prescription. When these students become adults, they describe feeling like they were pathologized for brain chemistry that was out of their control.

And yet every teacher, counselor, and administrator knows the frustration that ensues when a student clearly has ADHD and a family dismisses the medication route out of hand. Many counselors feel that treating ADHD with medication is just like treating depression, anxiety, and any other condition that arises in the brain.

Is there a compromise to be made here by stitching together a pharmaceutical, behavioral and pedagogical approach customized to suit the unique needs of the individual student? The answer to that is a clear yes — but in order to get to what that approach might look like, we first must begin with a deeper look at ADHD itself.

The Neuroscience Behind ADHD

ADHD may sound like a singular diagnosis, but it actually falls into three different subtypes. For students who mostly exhibit symptoms of inattentiveness, studies indicate that the neurotransmitter norepinephrine is at the root of the problem; that is, these students have variations in their norepinephrine transport genes that make it so that the amount of norepinephrine circulating in their systems is different than that of neurotypical control subjects.

In contrast, students with the hyperactivity-impulsivity ADHD tend to have fewer dopamine receptors. As Dr. Friedman describes it in his NY Times article, dopamine is a part of our brain’s reward pathway, so with fewer receptors available, students with this kind of ADHD need more stimulation in order to keep their minds’ from wandering. By blocking the reuptake of dopamine, stimulants like Ritalin and Adderall keep the levels of dopamine high in the brain, while a nonstimulant like Strattera blocks the reuptake of norepinephrine. In this way, all three medications (and medications like them) help students to focus.

(Wondering what the third subtype of ADHD is? A combination of the previous two.)

When ADHD Was an Evolutionary Advantage

Look up any definition for ADHD and you will find a laundry list of oft-repeated symptoms: easily distracted; has trouble maintaining attention; disrupts class; fidgets; always on the go; blurts out answers; butts into conversations. The list goes on.

But while these symptoms may be clear, there is less agreement on just how to interpret them. For instance, when Stephen Tonti spoke about his ADHD at TEDxCMU, he argued that attention “deficit” is a misnomer, as people with ADHD can hyperfocus when the task at hand interests them. Instead, he locates the heart of his difficulty in selecting something to apply that full attention to, and argues that what he experiences is a difference in cognition rather than a disorder. He is, in his own words, “attention different.”

In his NY Times piece, Dr. Friedman focuses on the tendency of the ADHD-brain to seek out novel experiences. In so doing, he argues that ADHD was once evolutionarily adaptive, pointing to a recent study of the Ariaal, a mostly nomadic tribe in Kenya with a recently splintered and settled subgroup. The study found that nomadic men with a dopamine receptor variant related to ADHD were more likely to be well-fed, while those with the variant in the settled splinter tribe were gaunt. Friedman hypothesizes that ADHD is adaptive for a dynamic environment, in which novelty-seeking and a short attention span actually keep nomads aware of their surroundings and make them better hunters. In contrast, ADHD becomes problematic in a more sedentary culture where activities like school, farming, and selling goods require more sustained focus.

This explanation gels with a critique often raised by ADHD advocates: that it is not the ADHD-brain that is problematic, but an overly regimented school environment constructed for an industrial age with a high need for workers and bureaucrats. Still, whether you agree with that statement or not, this is the system we have right now, and students with ADHD will need to navigate it both here and as they enter the work world. What’s more, teachers must have the ability to teach their classes without constant interruptions.

5 Creative Approaches

1. Get Hands-On

Many students with ADHD work best with hands-on learning. As such, to appeal to their learning style, it is often better to “do” rather than “tell.” Whether it’s engineering their own popsicle stick building, manipulating blocks, typing on a computer, drawing illustrations for a class book, putting science into action in the lab, participating in a Maker Fair, or getting to be the “teacher for the day,” hands-on activities are sure to engage and build confidence.

That said, it’s important not to assume that all students with ADHD will be kinesthetic learners, and to engage students in the modality that most speaks to them. We recommend having your student take a learning styles quiz to give you a grounding for developing customized approaches.

2. Vary the Routine

If we know that students with ADHD are novelty-seeking, why not use that to our advantage? Keep lectures as short as possible, and rotate students often through activities. While it is important to keep students with ADHD organized with a structure you have provided, changing the routine up once in awhile will be a nice surprise and will help prevent boredom. Encouraging students with ADHD to pick up extracurricular activities can also be useful, as it will allow students to hyperfocus with their passions and also to nibble at many different tasks throughout the day.

3. Incorporate Movement Into Your Lesson Plans

If you’ve determined that your student with ADHD is a kinesthetic learner, there are many creative ways to incorporate movement into the classroom. When reviewing questions for an upcoming test, try tossing a ball to students you want to call on rather than addressing them by name. Acting out great scenes from history will embed facts and dates deeply into student minds, as will turning letters and sounds into characters and acting out their characteristics as you are teaching a class to read. And never underestimate how fun it can be to simply get out of that desk, stretch, and do a little dance break!

4. Teach Mindfulness

Teaching mindfulness in the classroom is becoming an increasingly popular technique, and one that can be particularly helpful for students with ADHD — although a student with ADHD may need intensive, individual coaching in this area. In so doing, it can help to have reminder words that you can say to let a student know when it might be time to pull back for a moment, reflect, and draw on the mindfulness techniques you’ve covered previously.

5. Create a Tutoring Program

All students deserve a customized, student-centered learning experience, but students with ADHD will need extra attention in developing sets of tools and strategies for navigating the classroom. Smaller class sizes would be ideal here, but since class size is beyond teacher control, it can be more useful for teachers to advocate for a tutoring or mentoring program for the school. With one-on-one attention, students with ADHD will have someone there for them to help provide structure and stay on top of their progress, while also translating the neurotypical classroom experience for them, and helping them to develop the skillsets they need to operate well in school and beyond.

The Verdict

Students with ADHD are highly intelligent and packed with potential, just as long as they are given the resources they need to thrive. That may mean medication, but that also means working hard to find customized teaching and behavioral strategies as well. In the end, only a nuanced, multi-pronged approach will prove effective — all the more so when those approaches are backed up with a diverse support network.

Math Needs Reading and Writing

November 12, 2014 Brad Hoffman Leave a Comment

$Math Needs Reading and Wriitng$ I clearly remember those high school days as a student in a classroom with at least thirty-five classmates. As an introverted person, I also remember thinking to myself: “If I do not understand something, I will wait to go home and read the textbook; that should be enough.”

To my surprise, reading the textbook was far from enough to clarify most of the questions derived from a math class; perhaps the textbook was too complicated or I did not have the proficiency required as a reader to decipher the math text myself. To make things more complicated, completing a project was usually a difficult task since I was used to short meaningless answers such as “True,” “False,” “A,” or “x=10.” The lack of structure in reading and writing and how it was negatively affecting my performance in mathematics was evident. Why was I not able to understand the book and communicate my findings to my teacher?

The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics states: “The development of a student’s power to use mathematics involves learning the signs, symbols and terms of mathematics. This is best accomplished in problem situations in which students have an opportunity to read, write, and discuss ideas in which the use of the language of mathematics becomes natural. As students communicate their ideas, they learn to clarify, refine, and consolidate their thinking” (NCTM, 1989). It is reasonable to infer that whether or not students are proficient in reading, they need to be trained in reading mathematical content in order to build independence in the future and understand the unique reading skills of the discipline when teachers are not around to assist them. Moreover, if we think of a topic, such as algebra, as a unique language that allows one to translate verbal expressions into algebraic expressions and equations to solve real life problems, the reading of mathematical contents should become more natural and meaningful, allowing students to become more comfortable and confident while studying math.

On the other hand, writing offers students and teachers valuable information about the processing and understanding of math concepts and provides an opportunity to organize ideas and improve the communication of findings. Furthermore, the teaching of math as an isolated subject is a thing of the past; nowadays we have the chance to incorporate interdisciplinary lessons in our teaching that can help students in the process of integrating not only reading and writing in mathematics, but also other disciplines, allowing students to make connections between math and other subjects. Generally speaking, it is extremely important for teachers to guide their students, regardless of the discipline being taught, in the process of becoming effective communicators in a very demanding global society where communicating and learning on one’s own are becoming required skills to improve one’s chances of success.

By Jose Parra, Private Tutor

Physics: What’s the Answer?

October 17, 2014 Brad Hoffman Leave a Comment

When I am discussing a physics problem and a student interrupts me to ask for the answer, I sometimes wait a moment before replying. Not because I don’t want the student to know the answer. On the contrary, I am pleased if he or she can get it right without my help. But if I sense that the answer is the only thing the student wants, then I wait.

Teaching physics is not just about getting the right answer to the problem at hand. It’s also about teaching how to view the natural world, how to think critically, how to approach the unknown so that the student may eventually become a master and solve a physics problem no one has ever solved before.

This sounds idealistic. Of course, the reality of homework assignments, lab exercises, quizzes, tests and exams should not be ignored—like all instructors, I want my students to do well. Furthermore, not all those who study physics in high school or college will go on to study the subject at higher levels. Nevertheless, I think it’s important when teaching physics—and science in general—to convey some sense of the whole enterprise, which goes beyond memorizing formulas or facts, but is aimed at understanding the interrelationships of nature.

And this leads to a paradox. Because the only way I am able to convey any general idea is through specific examples. That is, I work with my students, guiding them through problems and showing them how to analyze situations that are not completely general. These problems—such as throwing a baseball—usually contain some simplification (the ball doesn’t rotate) or approximation (air drag is neglected) that limits how well any result obtained (say, for the speed of the ball just before it reaches the bat) corresponds to what goes on in the real world. And yet, I still hope that the students will catch on and realize that there is a general pattern, so that they will be able to apply what they learned with the baseball to a jet of water coming out of a fountain and maybe one day to designing a missile defense system.

Therefore, after the student has asked for the answer and the wait is over, I say, “I’ll tell you the answer. But first tell me how you solved the problem.” Once the student has told me what he or she did, I’ll probe a little more and ask about the assumptions the student made or any limitations of the calculation, trying to encourage a general view of the physical principles involved. And then I’ll give the answer. Because we all like to get it right.

By Neer Asherie, Private Tutor

Can Students “Go Deep” with Digital Reading?

October 16, 2014 Brad Hoffman Leave a Comment

By Holly Korbey
Original Source: Mind/Shift Online
Originally posted September 9, 2014

Mark Pennington’s students often read on their laptops. Pennington, who’s a reading specialist in Elk Grove near Sacramento, Calif., sees a need to teach kids how to read digitally and stay engaged, and thinks that digital reading will eventually catch up to what kids can do reading print. When asked if his seventh-graders are more engaged when reading from digital readers or in print, he said it depends — motivation and environment play a big role.

“Most of the digital reading that students ‘practice’ is at home on Instagram, chat lines, Facebook and texting,” he said. “Since students are choosing to read and respond in these mediums, and since students have considerable prior knowledge and expertise in the subject matter, their engagement/comprehension is high.”

The trick to being a good reader, no matter the medium, is being an engaged reader, a fact that Pennington notes is well-supported by research. “It’s pretty clear that good readers are active readers engaged with the text,” he said.

“You can also flip back and forth very easily, and spatially, there are advantages to print media.”

One of the best ways for readers to show engagement with the text, he said, is through marginal annotations.

“There are real advantages to print,” he said. “You can write on the text right there,” noting that if students aren’t allowed to write in textbooks, they can use small sticky notes that come off easily. “You can also flip back and forth very easily, and spatially, there are advantages to print media.”

Making those annotations in digital readers, like iPads and Chromebooks, can be more challenging than grabbing a pencil and sticky note.

When Pennington’s seventh graders took the Smarter Balanced Assessment in English Language Arts on new Chromebooks last April, Pennington didn’t teach them how to use the test’s annotation feature. Students would have been able to highlight reading passages and take notes on the text to help them answer test questions. He thought it was too complicated for them to learn how to use well in time for the test.

“It was so cumbersome,” he said. Students had to turn on the annotation feature, move back and forth between screens, remember the location of the notes, and then return to the questions they were trying to answer. He said for most of his students, it would have been tricky to “walk and chew gum at the same time,” so he shelved it.

Drawback of devices… for now

While ever more schools adopt textbooks and student reading materials to digital readers like iPads and Chromebooks, some recent research suggests students may comprehend more from reading print. Middle school students who read from both print and e-books showed they understood more of what they read from the ink-and-paper books, according to one preliminary study presented by Heather Ruetschlin Schugar and Jordan T. Schugar of West Chester University.

Although tablets and touch devices allow readers to interact in innovative ways, the researchers wrote, “Reading comprehension research with multi-touch devices is still in its infancy and students will need to adapt new reading strategies in order to maximize their learning in this environment.”

For older students, the ability to take notes easily appears to be a big reason for choosing print textbooks over digital. In a Hewlett Packard online survey of 527 college students at San Jose State University, 57 percent of students who responded said they preferred print materials to e-books when studying. When citing reasons for their preference, 35 percent of print users cited “note-taking ability” as a reason for preferring print vs. six percent of those who favored e-books.The Schugars have conducted two additional studies in which grade school students better understood material when not distracted by the bells and whistles of an interactive digital book. Annie Murphy Paul, in writing about the Schugars’ work for the New York Times, wrote, “It seems that the very ‘richness’ of the multimedia environment that e-books provide — heralded as their advantage over printed books — may overwhelm children’s limited working memory, leading them to lose the thread of the narrative or to process the meaning of the story less deeply.”

Yet those who study reading seem to understand that comprehending in the new medium may require some new training and practice to receive the full benefits. In a recent New Yorker article, Being a Better Online Reader, Maryanne Wolf, author of a history of reading called Proust and the Squid, said she’s developing digital apps to help train students to deep read digitally. She cites a new study that showed fifth-graders became better digital readers after learning how to use the digital annotation feature.

“The same plasticity that allows us to form a reading circuit to begin with, and short-circuit the development of deep reading if we allow it, allows us to learn how to duplicate deep reading in a new environment,” Wolf said in the article.

Teaching new skills

Maybe new note-taking skills require nothing more than a shift in perspective. In a recent MindShift article about a one-to-one iPad program, Hillview Middle Principal Erik Burmeister said that annotating digital books gives his students a sense of freedom – a place to “dirty up” their materials with thoughts and ideas.

“In a traditional school environment, you’re given a textbook and told not to write in it at all. And this is really counter-intuitive to what we want kids to be able to do in the real world,” he said. “We want them to write all over the things that they’re reading.” Since allowing every kid to write on paper books would mean throwing away those books at the end of every year, the devices give kids the chance to annotate inside the document.

“It”s being able to engaged with the material in a really kinesthetic way,” Burmeister said. “The material is so sacred that it’s not sacred, you can really dirty it up.”

So if engaged readers annotate, and students may or may not prefer taking notes in print books, what’s next for the e-book? Where does it fit into school? What’s the best use of an e-book for learning? More research will need to be done, especially on how students use the annotation features of e-books, to get a clearer picture of how well students can take notes and be able to find them on digital readers. Perhaps technology will improve, and annotation features will become more intuitive in the next generation of devices. And maybe parents and teachers will need to distinguish reading for fun on tablets, with the distracting bells and whistles, from reading for school, where material is less interactive but more straightforward for better absorption.

Mark Pennington believes that there will always be room for both print and digital reading in school. In the mean time, he will continue teaching kids how to annotate, because giving students the “ability to talk to the text, to create an internal dialogue with the text,” is the best way to help students understand what they’re reading. Whether that ends up being most effective tapped on a tablet or scribbled in the margins remains to be seen.

12 Ways to Identify a Good School

October 14, 2014 Brad Hoffman Leave a Comment

By Jay Matthews
Original Source: The Washington Post
Originally posted August 24, 2014

Fourteen years ago, I wrote a Washington Post magazine piece about a young couple seeking a school for their daughter, including 12 things to look for in a good school. The article survives online. Parents still ask me if I would change any of those recommendations.

I would, a bit. Here is the original list, with my updates in italics:

1. A Good Principal. Spend at least 30 minutes with the principal. Five or more years experience at the school is a good sign. If the school has had more than two principals in the past five years, that’s a bad sign. Be particularly cautious if the principal doesn’t have 30 minutes to see you. I stand by this, and never had principals complain they couldn’t handle it.

2. What It Feels Like. Don’t discount the mood and the atmosphere. Are the walls gaily decorated? Are the teachers friendly? Do the children seem happy? Yes.

3. Active Parents. Never put your child in a school without speaking to at least two parents already there, including at least one PTA officer. If you can’t find such a person, or if there’s no active PTA or equivalent organization, beware. Still true.

4. Good Teachers. If average scores are in the 70th percentile, or are rising year to year, that’s a good sign. But more important is the quality of the teachers your child will likely get. Ask experienced parents about them. Fourteen years of the most intense focus on test scores in U.S. history have taught me to distrust the results. Some schools with great scores are not so good, and vice versa. Let parents be your guide.

5. Long-Term Superintendent. Most urban systems, including the District, average little more than three years per superintendent, and yet have many good schools. But a suburban system with rapid superintendent turnover is less common and a matter for concern. If the principal impresses you, don’t worry about the superintendent.

6. A Well-Stocked and Well-Used Library. Are there enough books and computer terminals? And how many students are using them? A library full of kids is a sign of health. This will always be true.

7. Using Every Minute. Are there before-school classes for students with special needs? Is there tutoring available at lunch or after school? Are there Saturday sessions? An active summer school? I would put more emphasis now on tutoring, unless of course you can do that yourself.

8. High Expectations. Are there accelerated classes? Gifted student services? Are these available for all students who want them, not just for those who have high grades? Look for signs of enrichment outside the classroom — student musicals, publications and athletic contests. I no longer think gifted services are important so long as you are sure your child will be challenged.

9. Connections to Adults. Some schools have set up systems to ensure that at least one school employee — a teacher, a counselor, an aide, a coach — knows each child and his or her family well. Such schools are rare gems.Still correct.

10. Safety. This is less likely to be a problem than the headlines would suggest. If you are comfortable living in your community, then the neighborhood school almost certainly will be safe enough for you. If you are looking at a school far from home, talk to parents who send their children to that school. Yes.

11. Challenges Ahead. Does the high school your child is headed for have Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate or Advanced International Certificate of Education courses? Does it provide dual enrollment in local college courses? Are such programs open to any student who wants them? This remains very important.

12. Listen to Your Heart. The school may pass all these tests, and yet you’re still not sure. If there’s another school you like better, even if it doesn’t look as good on paper, go there. Still true. How is your child going to be comfortable with the school if you’re not?