Channelling a child’s energy into skateboarding may be their saving grace.

Adam Walker is all too aware of society’s penchant for stereotyping and pigeonholing individuals. The 30-year-old father of two has dedicated much of his life to skateboarding, a sport and art form that has been mostly misunderstood by the wider community.

Adam is used to the negative comments people make about those who choose skateboarding as their pastime, sport, hobby, even profession.

However, there may be another side to what appears to be the wild antics and often gravity-defying skills of the ‘boarder and it is this side Adam will attempt to expose in his studies at James Cook University.

Having attained a Bachelor of Psychology and Social Sciences (majoring in anthropology and sociology), he is now writing a thesis on reducing the manifestations of ADHD (attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder) by using skateboarding as a psychosocial intervention tool. His interest in finding an alternative treatment for those diagnosed with ADHD comes from personal experiences.

“Yes, I was diagnosed with it,” he says. “I found skateboarding and music were great releases for my energies.

“At school I didn’t fit in with what was perceived as the ‘norm’ because while I had no problems socialising, I was not interested in the whole concept of playing team sports and group activities.”

Adam spent his childhood in Adelaide playing the guitar and skateboarding while his peers were out playing football, cricket and other team sports. He wants to highlight the difference between skateboarding and traditional team sports.

“There are a number of kids who don’t fit that ‘team sport’ criteria and get labelled as misfits, even troublemakers,” he says.

“What we need to do as a society, and educators in particular, is recognise the signs that they may have such children in their class/care but rather than sideline or exclude them, develop or use programs which identify their skills and talents. It’s about understanding how to channel that energy and turn what can so often be a negative situation into a bright, positive one which benefits the community as well as develop the individual’s self-esteem,” Adam says.

Adam has already been playing a role and walking the talk. Eight years ago Adam was sharing a house with a friend on the Gold Coast when a light-bulb moment came to him.

“I was skating, playing music and basically enjoying life,” he says. “But one night I sat at home and jotted down a few ideas of where I wanted to be and what I wanted to do with my life as a career/profession.

“I asked myself: ‘What if there was such a thing as a skateboarding coach?’.”

He thought little more about it until he moved to Airlie Beach where he worked at the town’s surf shop.

Within a month he was asked to manage the store, which in turn led to him rubbing shoulders with “corporate bigwigs”. Adam seized the moment, proposing the store expand to include a skate shop to capitalise on the growing calls from locals and visitors for such an outlet.

The skate shop took off and was a success, resulting in its thriving business which prompted the local council to ask Adam if he would be interested in taking a skateboarding coaching course in Brisbane. “It was the first fully accredited course in skateboard coaching in Australia,” Adam says.

Upon his return to Airlie Beach and the surf/skate shop, Adam developed and ran skate programs at the town’s newly built skate park. He was then approached to move up to a senior management position but felt he was not ready for that major step. “I didn’t feel I was qualified enough,” he says.

Instead, Adam moved to Cairns to embark on studies to gain the necessary management skills. But four years later, his focus has shifted slightly while his passion for skating has remained as resolute as ever.

“Since coming to Cairns I’ve realised I still have those dreams … my own dreams of coaching kids and helping them,” he says.

“But I also recognise that to be able to do that I have to work and earn and that means study to a higher level so I can deliver appropriate programs to them.

“I find it very liberating to teach kids and see the enjoyment they get from learning new skills and building confidence.”

Adam runs his programs through his company SkateMethod and this year had his efforts recognised by the Australian Sports Commission which awarded him a grant to purchase boards, helmets and related equipment for clinics at local schools.

While the skate clinics and courses are primarily fun, they also are designed to promote discipline, respect and dedication, qualities Adam learned from another individual art form.

“I trained for 12 years in Wing Chun (Chinese martial arts) and have transported all of the elements of discipline from that art form to these programs,” he says.

“In martial arts you need to be committed to practising constantly in order to perfect the moves and be dedicated to completing a task and not walk away when the going gets a ‘bit too challenging’.”

Adam has built in certain mechanisms to ensure the children apply themselves and are rewarded in a similar style to martial arts, except instead of different-coloured belts upon completing their grading, they receive a board sticker or decal.

“It’s about rewarding the achievement of learning that special turn, jump or flick they may have been practising,” Adam says.

Adam’s thesis and programs will attempt to educate the wider community on the benefits of using skateboarding as a key to unlock the minds of individuals whose learning experiences may not fit so comfortably with the established and, as he calls it, “rigid” curriculum. But in his attempt to do this he is acutely aware of being seen as “selling out” the underground culture.

“Am I trying to regulate skateboarding? Yes, but only to explain there is a science behind its execution. You have to do things the right way for them to look as good or cool as they do,” he says. “Skateboarding has its origins in a non-conformist culture.

“So in a way, I’m trying to help turn around the lives of children who are often sidelined, even demonised as social misfits, and help them prove they have skills and energies that, when channelled correctly, can enable them to be contributing members of society.

“Also, the art form is always going to have its street edge. It’ll always be funky and cool and retain its underground following.”

Adam hopes to use his collected data to convince governments to invest in “niche activities” such as skateboarding and create an avenue for drug-free intervention strategies to treat conditions such as ADHD.

“I think there is a need to look at alternative treatments and this strategy is strong on education and discipline as well as fun and freedom,” he says. “It’s just delivered in a caring and nurturing environment and with different tools. This is a way to get kids to express themselves and learn.

It needs to be supported.”

Source: cairns.com.au, Australia
http://www.cairns.com.au/article/2008/05/13/3776_lifestyle.html

Parents are increasingly turning their backs on traditional parents’ evenings and would prefer more informal contact with schools to learn about their children’s progress, research shows.

The research finds that only half of parents report feeling very involved in their children’s education, with their working lives being the number one barrier to helping with homework.

The children’s secretary, Ed Balls, publishing the research, said: “We know parents are increasingly involved in their child’s education - and want to do even more. But for many it’s a difficult balancing act to juggle work, childcare and quality family time and still be able to help their children with homework and keep track of how their child is doing at school.

“Parents tell us they like having informal contact with their child’s school - whether that’s a chat in the playground or the chance to go online and see their teenager’s latest marks and make sure they are going to all their classes.”

Parent evenings would always have a role but schools should keep up to date with what parents want, he said.

Although the research, based on telephone interviews with more than 5,000 parents or carers of children at state schools, shows that only half of all parents feel very involved in their child’s education, that figure is up from 29% in 2001. The majority (65%) would like to be more involved.

The parents most likely to be involved in their children’s education - and to help with homework - are women not working full-time, parents of younger children, families from ethnic minorities, and parents who have been to university.

The popularity of parents’ evenings has plummeted since the last research. In 2001, 43% of parents said that parents’ evenings were the “most useful” way of communicating. That figure now stands at 19%.

Balls was speaking at an event to publicise the government’s Parent Know How scheme, which was showcasing new ways to offer support and advice to parents. The programme, worth £44m over three years, is designed to help more parents access information and help through the web, over the phone and through text and instant messaging.

Balls has put parents at the heart of his efforts to improve education. In his 10-year children’s plan, which was published in December, he promised parent councils and a dedicated tutor for every child who would build up a relationship with the child’s family.

Source: guardian.co.uk, UK
http://education.guardian.co.uk/schools/story/0,,2278429,00.html

Two leading scientific societies and a charity that promotes scientific understanding have written to every local education authority in the the UK to warn that a programme of exercises being promoted to help child learning relies on “pseudoscientific explanations” and a “bizarre understanding” of how the body works.

The British Neuroscience Association, the Physiological Society and Sense About Science are concerned that some local authorities have promoted the exercise programme, called Brain Gym, in their schools. Brain Gym involves teacher-led exercises that are supposed to improve the cognitive abilities of pupils in primary schools.

“According to the calls we have received and to the material in the Teacher’s Guide to Brain Gym, children are, for example, being taught special exercises to ‘connect the circuits of the brain’ and ‘unblock’ neural pathways,” the scientists wrote. They believe that promoting these bogus explanations of how the brain operates undermines science teaching in schools.

Calls to Brain Gym in the UK for comment were not returned, but the Brain Gym Teachers’ Edition textbook describes the exercises as, “a series of simple and enjoyable movements that we use with our students in Educational Kinesiology (Edu-K) to enhance their experience of whole-brain learning. These activities make all types of learning easier, and are especially effective with academic skills.”

Other promotional material reads: “All liquids [other than water] are processed in the body as food, and do not serve the body’s water needs … Processed foods do not contain water.”

The scientists dismiss all these claims as nonsense. “I know of no evidence to support the claim that, by doing a particular repetitive activity, children will gain general benefits in learning,” said Prof Colin Blakemore of Oxford University, a former head of the Medical Research Council. “There have been a few peer-reviewed scientific studies into the methods of Brain Gym, but none of them found a significant improvement in general academic skills.”

Source: Guardian, UK
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/apr/03/brain.gym

Michael Ferraro has a major-league swing in a tee-ball-size body, pounding one pitch after another into the back net of the batting cage.

He’s 7 years old and works out with two former professional baseball players as many as five times a month.

“He’s a good little listener, and he takes what you tell him and puts it into play,” says Billy Horton, a former minor-league player who now runs Cactus Athletic Camps, which offers clinics and private instruction, in Phoenix.

In the past decade, the number of parents hiring professional trainers for their grade-school athletes has exploded, experts say. No one tracks the figures nationwide, but coaches say their business has doubled or tripled in that time.

Parents shell out $50 to $100 an hour for individual coaching in baseball, soccer, basketball and hockey. And they send their youngsters to camps, clinics and places such as Tempe’s Arizona World of Baseball, where children work with former pros. Even city parks and recreation departments are hiring former pros to give lessons at batting cages.

“This has become big business,” says Gregg Heinzmann, director of the Youth Sports Research Council at Rutgers University.

Some experts worry that too much professional coaching and kids specializing in one sport could put too much pressure on young athletes and take the fun out of playing.

Although there are parents who hire personal coaches to improve their child’s chances of earning a college scholarship, if not a pro career, many say they want to help their kids improve at the games they love.

“I don’t push him,” says Michael’s dad, Mike Ferraro, as he and Horton watch the youth in the batting cage. “I just say, ‘Do you want to get a lesson?’ If he doesn’t feel like it, we don’t do it.

“I just want him to enjoy himself. I’d rather he be the best he can be.”

Coaches and parents cite good reasons for professional training: Kids may get little individual training on teams of 10 or 20 players, depending on the sport. And volunteer coaches often don’t have the technical expertise of professionals. Few sports are fun if a young athlete is experiencing little success.

When Sean Whyte, a former pro hockey player, began coaching at Ozzie Ice in Phoenix in 2001, he worked with hundreds of kids. This year, he’s on track to coach more than 1,000 youngsters.

Like most coaches, his business comes from referrals.

“I tell parents, ‘If your child truly loves it, give them every opportunity you can afford to help your child reach their full potential,’ ” Whyte says. He cautions parents that private lessons will not make their child an instant star.

The goal should be to improve basic skills that lead to proficiency and a lifelong love of the game.

Professional coaching is not a must, Horton and Whyte agree, but it can help. They work with kids as young as 4 and up through college age.

It’s only natural that parents want to help their young athletes improve, Horton says. In his youth, his mother would scrape together $10 in quarters so he could practice at the batting cages at Golf N’ Stuff in Phoenix.

Some parents bring their kids in for a few lessons at the start of the season; others come regularly all year.

But like Whyte, Horton also cautions parents, “I’m not trying to build this child into a professional athlete. I’m trying to build confidence in this child.”

1-sport pitfalls

Despite the growing numbers of private coaches, Heinzmann of Rutgers University finds the trend troubling. He has conducted clinics on youth sports for 20,000 parents and coaches, most recently in Glendale.

“We see it exploding in recent years from the standpoint of not only parents hiring privatized instruction, but children focusing on one sport to the exclusion of all others and at younger and younger ages,” he says.

A generation ago, the ideal was to earn varsity letters in three sports in high school, Heinzmann says. Now that children are pursuing one sport, they’re suffering more overuse injuries and burning out sooner.

He wonders if it’s worth it.

About 70 percent of kids involved in sports drop out before they turn 13, according to a recent study by Richard Stratton of Virginia Tech’s Department of Health and Physical Education. Just 2 percent of high-school athletes earn scholarships and play in college, Heinzmann says. And the chances of anyone making it to the pros are 0.1 percent - that’s one in 1,000.

Parents put too much pressure on their kids by investing in professional coaching, says Chad Thibodeaux, a longtime coach and host of Kids and Sports radio show on KGME-AM (910).

On the air, parents often compare a professional coach with a math tutor, a comparison Thibodeaux says misses the mark. A child needs to know math, he points out. A child does not need to know how to throw a fastball.

A fairer comparison would be music or drama lessons. Odds are as low that a child who takes piano lessons from a professional will wind up with a scholarship or playing to crowded concert halls.

“There’s this underlying societal pressure to keep up with the Joneses, not just in sports but also in academia and the arts,” Heinzmann says.

Professional coaching may be right for a child intent on making a club team or a high-school student in the running for a scholarship, Heinzmann says. But he doesn’t think younger kids need such training on a regular basis.

Thibodeaux says to wait until a child is at least 12 and even then only if the child wants to do it and parents can afford it.

Prior to turning 12, kids should be in recreational leagues where they can have fun while they work on fundamental skills, Thibodeaux says. Little kids should be going out for pizza with their teammates, he says, not worrying about their stats.

First up in Horton’s batting cage is 14-year-old Jeff Clasen, who plays for the Scottsdale Storm and plans to try out next year at Brophy College Preparatory in Phoenix.

“Remember, knob to the ball, not knob up,” Horton says, and Jeff nails the ball.

Jeff’s dad, Steve Clasen of Paradise Valley, says he brought his son to Horton for help during a hitting slump about a year ago. Jeff has no aspirations to play baseball beyond high school; he simply enjoys the game. But he enjoys it more when he’s hitting well - thus, the regular lessons with Horton.

His 5-year-old son, John, is too young for lessons, Clasen says. He’s having fun on his tee-ball team.

Bart Shillingburg of Scottsdale says his sons, 9-year-old Kyle and 7-year-old Alec, seem to take instruction better from someone else. He played ball in high school, but he says, “I don’t have all the techniques that Billy (Horton) or these other guys have.” This is Kyle’s second lesson with Horton and Alec’s first.

The boys play basketball and football in the off-season, which puts them at a disadvantage come tryouts for Little League. They compete for spots on teams with boys who play baseball year-round.

Like little Michael Ferraro with his major-league swing. He started playing baseball at age 3 1/2. Right now, he plays with 9- and 10-year-olds, some twice his size. Michael also trains with Dax Jones, formerly of the San Francisco Giants.

In Horton’s batting cage, the coach pitches a fastball right by Michael.

“He’s throwing gas at you, son!” his dad says, laughing.

Michael grins.

“Who’s the best hitter in Arizona?” Horton asks.

“Me!” Michael says and sends the next fastball flying.

Source: Arizona Republic, AZ
http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/arizonaliving/articles/0331kidstrain0331.html

This is what my eight-year-old daughter had to do for homework last week: answer a set of questions on telling the time, draw up a top 10 list of what we can do to save the environment, and complete a chart of words that have the “ee” sound.

Is this too much? Does it stress her out? The Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL) thinks so and has called for a ban on homework in primary schools. The National Union of Teachers, Britain’s biggest teaching union, will debate a similar motion next week.

According to the ATL, teachers are under pressure to provide homework because of the Government’s love of targets and testing, when in reality it’s a pointless exercise. “I think a lot of homework is a waste if time,” says Dr Mary Bousted, ATL general secretary. “It puts a huge amount of stress on disadvantaged children.”

Her argument is that children from educated homes are at a distinct advantage when it comes to homework because they are more likely to get support at home. Their parents talk to them about their homework, ask them if they have done it and help them if they are finding it boring or difficult.

“Disadvantaged children do not necessarily have the extra learning support that the middle-class children have and consequently it doesn’t tell you much about the relative abilities of different children,” says Bousted.

The unions’ concern about the stress that English children are subjected to in general is supported by the United Nations Children’s Fund, and an inquiry by Cambridge University into primary education, which suggest that younger children are unhappy and anxious.

Is this really true?

At my daughter Ruby’s school, Brookfield Primary in north London, helping your child with homework is part of the school/parent agreement that all parents are asked to sign. Ruby gets an assignment every Thursday and hands it in the following Tuesday. “I think homework is good,” she says, “because you have to keep your mind working.”

All Year 3 children have a homework folder. Weekly homework includes literacy and maths, tasks linked to a current topic, such as the environment, and regular reading. Parents are encouraged to write comments about each assignment, and the children rate the homework by circling a smiling or grumpy face. Last week, Ruby’s homework took her about an hour and a half – not including the time spent trying to get her to do it. This is exactly the time required under the government guidelines for pupils in Year 3 and 4.

How things have changed. In the Seventies I attended the same primary school as Ruby and was given no homework at all until the last two years. I remember receiving textbooks and being assigned a certain exercise to do in maths but I don’t remember it being difficult.

By contrast, today’s children are doing homework at a younger age and parents are expected to help. And this is where the real stress begins, according to the parents I talk to.

“I felt pressurised over my daughter’s homework when she started Year 2,” says one parent whose daughter attends a London church primary school. “It was terrible. She had to learn spelling words like ‘lifebuoy’. When is a six-year-old going to need to spell that? I understand schools are under pressure because of SATS and league tables, and reading and spelling is fine, even some times tables; but the jump from Year 1 to 2 left me in shock.”

At Brookfield, the school has a new homework policy to help parents understand what is being set and why. It is also a way to standardise homework in a school with 14 classes of 30 children, ranging in age from five to 11. The policy urges parents to make homework a positive experience, bearing in mind that making mistakes is essential in order to learn.

“Homework is incredibly controversial,” says Dilys Hillman, Brookfield’s head teacher. “Parents used to complain that there was too little or too much, that it was too hard or too easy. People have different ideas of what children should be doing at primary school. Some are anxious about academic standards, others are more interested in the development of the whole child. We have a nice balance now and it’s meaningful because it’s related to what they are doing in class.”

Right on cue a group of Year 4 children walk into the head’s office with examples of their homework. Archie Jones has a model village he’s made of grass-roofed houses on stilts because he’s been learning about India. It took him an hour to research the village on the internet and three hours to build the model. “My mum helped with a bit of the building but it was my idea,” he says. Classmate Bonnie Russell has made a model rickshaw, while Rosie Watson has photographed a friend making chapattis.

What do they think of the idea that homework should be banned? “Yes!” says Archie punching the air; but others aren’t so sure. Classmate Charlotte Graham says: “My dad would get cross because he got tons when he was a child and thinks I should too.” They agree the best homework is fun and creative, and there is no mistaking the pride they feel in their projects.

Year 6 pupil Jack French thinks homework is a good way for parents and children to bond. “Mine don’t sit next to me but they are there to help,” he says. “It also means you don’t forget your topic. It helps you to practise and remember.”

Jack begins secondary school this year and expects to get homework every day. He insists he has no stress about doing homework, unless he leaves it to the last minute and has to rush.

Those who do get anxious can join Brookfield’s homework club, which runs for an hour and a half every Thursday after school. Attendance varies but it is aimed at juniors and around a dozen go each week.

“My daughter Kesem goes to homework club every week, which means she finishes it on the day it is set,” says Brookfield parent Lyn Iglinsky. Kesem likes having older children around to help, and enjoys being with children who aren’t in her own class. “For her it’s a social event,” says her mother. “Although I suppose then it’s school work and not home work.”

Learning at home is an essential part of good education, according to the Government, and gives parents the opportunity to engage with their children’s education. The emphasis on homework is something that New Labour has embraced and pressure to increase the amount of set homework began in 1997 under New Labour’s first Education Secretary David Blunkett. For the first time guidelines were published outlining the amount of homework to be set for four- to 16-year-olds. But the guidelines are exactly that – guidelines – and are not compulsory, unless a school decides to set homework, in which case they have the right to make it compulsory.

So if homework is not compulsory, what happens if a child doesn’t do it? That is up to the school, but in some cases children may miss playtime or part of lunchtime to do the uncompleted work, which means they miss out on fresh air and exercise to do something that isn’t required by law.

The jury is still out on whether homework does any good. In a study published in 2007, the American academic Alfie Kohn claimed that too much after-school study turns pupils off education and causes family rows. He also claimed it does nothing for test scores. An international survey has corroborated this, showing that the Finns, who do less homework than Britons, score higher in international tests. The Italians, who do more homework than we do, actually score lower in the tests.

On the other hand, if done correctly, homework assignments can impart independent learning skills, ensure pupils do not forget what they have learnt, and improve performance in subjects such as maths.

But this is only the case if the children do the work, not their parents. Some mums and dads are so keen to help their children that they do the homework for them. One mum at another London primary school recalls her child being asked to build a mobile showing the solar system. “There I was helping her do her homework and thinking, actually I’m the one doing this.” But the child was only four, and she couldn’t cut out planets. “She could colour them in, but I had to string them together. On the way to school it was windy, the whole thing got tangled and she ended up in tears.”

Ruby had similar homework last year when the class were asked to build a tower. My heart sunk at the thought of the entire weekend being consumed by this. I decided she needed experience of independent learning and left her to her own devices. On Monday morning the other children came in with gloriously wobbly towers, but Ruby had produced nothing. While I hung my head in shame, she sat there unperturbed. So who’s really stressed out by homework?

Source: Independent, UK
http://tinyurl.com/2lxca2

Children and youth, whose parents actively support learning at home, do better in many ways. They get better grades, have higher graduation rates, and are more likely to go to college, said an American educationist.

Delivering the keynote speech at the Supreme Education Council’s (SEC) annual symposium on “Parents: Partners in Education”, Dr Heather Weiss said: “You need great schools and hardworking teachers. But you also need strong parental involvement for the best academic performance of children.”

The children are hardly spending 18 percent of their whole day in the schools. Rest of the time is being spent with the parents and family members. This underpins the need for parents’ active involvement in their educational affairs, she said.

“All parents must know what is important for their children and they must develop the skill to support their children. On the other hand, the education supporters must also reach out to the parents,” she said.

Dr Weiss, founder and director of Harvard Family Research Project (HFRP), said parent involvement is a major component of American education reform efforts.

“The US research on parent involvement suggests that there are three particularly important aspects of parent involvement for children’s development and academic success. The first aspect is parenting – the attitudes, values, and interactions about learning that parents demonstrate as they raise their children. The second is parent involvement in home-school relationships – the formal and informal connections, communications, and partnerships with the child’s school and teachers. The third aspect is a sense of shard responsibility for learning outcomes-parents as well as the school take responsibility for the child’s learning and education“, she said.

On the early learning, Dr Weiss said, children’s vocabularies increases rapidly, and they acquire the ability to remember experiences, sustain attention, count and recognize letters. Through interactions with adults and peers, they develop self-concepts and self-esteem, improve emotional self-regulation. In this stage of a child’s life, nurturing, warm and responsive parent-child relationships and parental participation in child-centered activities.

Children who live in a stimulating home environment with books and educational materials, parent-child discussions and other learning experiences develop curiosity and stronger academic skills, and demonstrate higher achievement. When parents limit television watching, children have better academic outcomes, she said.

Significantly, parent involvement in the middle and high school education shows that involvement tends to decrease due to teenagers’ desire for self-reliance and less outreach for parent involvement from schools. (…)

Source: Peninsula On-line, Qatar
http://tinyurl.com/yoepfx

In recent years, single-sex schooling in the public sector has gained momentum. There has been renewed interest in many cities across the country for two main reasons: Parents are looking for more educational choice and the academic crisis that girls and boys have been reported to experience.

The girls’ crisis was given much attention in the 1990s. Some educators responded by offering all-girl public schools to focus on their studies, work with peers and develop confidence on their way to college and employment.

In 2001, the Schott Foundation for Public Education commissioned research on the education gender gap to update data on the progress of girls. They discovered that K-12 female students were making significant progress and that males were performing less well. Nationwide, boys are nearly twice as likely as girls to be suspended, and more likely to drop out of high school. Boys comprise two-thirds of special-education students, are 1.5 times as likely to be held back a grade and 2.5 times more likely to be given diagnoses of ADHD.

The most shocking data revealed black male students showed underachievement on every school-related factor.

A complex array of gender equity concerns has led some educators to consider single-sex public education as one way to address the disparate experiences and outcomes of girls and boys. Urban educators in particular began exploring single-sex education for boys left behind.

The majority of these boys are African-American and Hispanic, a compelling rationale for innovation given the preponderance of literature that these boys are in academic and socio-economic crisis.

The 2006 Delaware State Testing Program 10th-grade reading proficiency scores are 47 percent for black boys, 52 percent for Hispanic boys, and 85 percent for white boys — a gap of almost 40 percent.

Black girls score at 69 percent, Hispanic girls at 52 percent, and white girls at 91 percent.

The 10th-grade writing proficiency scores put black boys at 52 percent, Hispanic boys at 60 percent, and white boys at 81 percent.

Black girls score at 73 percent, Hispanic girls at 61 percent, and white girls at 91 percent proficiency in writing.

The 10th-grade math proficiency scores put black boys at 28 percent, Hispanic boys at 48 percent, and white boys at 80 percent — a gap of more than 50 percent.

Black girls score at 50 percent, Hispanic girls at 42 percent, and white girls at 78 percent in math.

Several studies found that students in single-sex schools devoted more time to homework, had higher aspirations for academic and educational achievement, and wanted to be remembered for their scholastic abilities rather than leadership in activities or popularity.

Studies that find positive effects in single-sex schools emphasize that characteristics of students’ peer groups, including their academic orientation and peer influence may affect outcomes and be indirectly related to the school’s composition.

Other research suggests that some boys, particularly the disadvantaged, benefit from single-sex education. For example, Cornelius Riordan’s research indicates that “single-sex schools do not greatly influence the academic achievement of affluent or advantaged students, but they do for poor disadvantaged students … White middle-class (or affluent) boys and girls do not suffer any loss by attending a single-sex school … At worse, they realize a neutral outcome.”

One researcher has contended that disparate research outcomes for girls and boys in single-sex schools result from the overwhelming focus on girls.

Today there are nearly 360 public schools offering some kind of single-sex option in 37 states. Boys and girls’ charter and traditional public schools are doing well in high-need areas including New York, Houston and Chicago. Washington, D.C., opened its first all-boys charter school in 2006 and will open an all-girls in 2008. Philadelphia opened its first all-boys charter in 2007. Single- gender charter schools are planned for New Orleans and Atlanta.

A school for boys has now been proposed for Delaware.

Prestige Academy intends to counteract the negative social forces operating in poor communities and to address the apparent failure of conventional schooling to get many disadvantaged minority boys to identify with academic success. The scholarly and popular literature is replete with studies demonstrating the epidemic of academic failure and social dysfunction especially among minority boys living in poverty.

Prestige Academy will seek to improve choice for boys by offering a highly structured, achievement-oriented school from fifth to eighth grades. Prestige Academy’s goal is to eliminate the achievement gap and prepare students for success in demanding college-preparatory high schools.

The choice of a single-sex school is one that financially able families in Delaware have been able to make for decades. Delaware charter schools should be allowed to provide this option to the many other mothers, fathers, sons and daughters — and challenge them to dream, compete and succeed.

Source: The News Journal, DE
http://tinyurl.com/ysy8qf

“Parents do not have a constitutional right to home-school their children,” Justice H. Walter Croskey wrote in a unanimous California appeals court ruling on Feb. 28. The case in question was about child mistreatment, not school methodology. But the justice’s precedent-setting words sent shock waves throughout the state and threaten to criminalize tens of thousands of parents in California who teach their children at home.

The opinion deserved and received an immediate legal challenge.

The unexpected decision also startled many home-schooling parents across the country — including me. My wife and I home-school our children. We believe that, apart from protecting children against abuse, it is not the government’s role to dictate how parents raise their families.

The court also said that parents who teach children at home must be credentialed. If not, those teaching will be subject to criminal action.

Religious conservatives were appropriately outraged.

“How dare these judges have the audacity to label tens of thousands of parents criminals — the equivalent to drug dealers or pickpockets — because they want to raise and educate their children according to their deeply held values?” said James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family, during a broadcast last week.

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger also raised concerns.

“Parents should not be penalized for acting in the best interests of their children’s education,” Schwarzenegger said. “This outrageous ruling must be overturned by the courts. And if the courts don’t protect parents’ rights, then, as elected officials, we will.”

Mark May, president of the local Teaching Parents Association, estimates that 8,000 families home-school in Kansas. To do so in the state, families are required to register with the state as a private, denominational or parochial school. The teacher requirement is that the instructor be competent, and the amount of time spent schooling must be roughly equivalent to the amount required of public school students.

Nationwide there are more than 1 million students who are home-schooled. According to the National Household Education Surveys Program, the three top reasons people choose to educate their children at home are concerns about the environment of other schools, to provide religious or moral instruction, and because of dissatisfaction with the academic instruction available at other schools.

My wife and I like that we can customize our children’s education to their personality and interests.

Much research shows that students taught at home often excel academically. In 2004, an ACT profile report showed that the 7,858 home-schooled students taking the ACT scored an average of 22.6, compared with the national average of 20.9.

Home schooling isn’t for everyone, but it is a legitimate choice for many families. Most important, it’s a decision best made by parents, not by an overreaching court.

Source: The Wichita Eagle, KS
http://www.kansas.com/opinion/castillo/story/339678.html

Six months before five-year-old Gaby was due to start first grade, her mother, Rebecca, was confronted with the horrible realization that perhaps her daughter was not as smart or as developed as the other children in her kindergarten.

“The teacher told me that she was already falling behind with the prereading skills, didn’t know her numbers and that perhaps she should stay back another year before going into first grade,” recalls Rebecca, who lives just outside of Jerusalem.

“I was not keen on the idea. My daughter is very mature, and considers herself much older than she is. Emotionally I knew that she was ready to start first grade but thought that maybe she just needed another adult to sit down with her one-on-one and teach her some of the basic skills that other children her age have.

“I decided to hire a private tutor,” says the former British immigrant, adding that it is sometimes difficult for an English-speaker and busy working mother to find the time to be a teacher in Hebrew as well. “Children also don’t like to listen to a parent in that capacity. With my older son, I held back from getting him a private tutor to prepare him for elementary school. I thought it was just a lot of hysteria and competitive parents. But now that I have a child already in elementary school, I realize that being fully prepared from the beginning is invaluable. It gives them so much confidence.”

“There is always the risk of a child falling behind even from the first few weeks of first grade,” says L. another mother from Jerusalem, who sent both of her children to private preparatory classes. “That is the main reason to sign up for one of these programs. The teacher continues on with the strong students and the weaker ones get left behind.”

L. explains that it was also her older daughter’s kindergarten teacher who made her realize preparatory lessons were a must.

“When my daughter was in kindergarten, I began noticing that some of the children were already reading and my child wasn’t,” she recalls. “It was very competitive and while it did not stress my daughter out, I felt that she would be disadvantaged when she got to school.

“So often children arrive in first grade with no background, and because they start off working fast and because the classes are so large, those children start to fall through the cracks. I know it’s all down to the hysteria of parents, but we all want what to see our children succeeding.”

Parents pushing their preschool children to succeed and providing them with a head start on their academic career before they even start school is a growing trend, according to Keren Yifrah, adviser of studies and customer service director at Limudit, a nationwide company dedicated to providing private tutors for children from preschool through to their final school grades.

“I believe that private tutoring is much more popular here than in other places and the bottom line is that there is the feeling that the Israeli education system is just not very good,” she says. “Parents are simply trying to take responsibility for their own children.”

Yifrah, who says that Limudit has been operating for the past 15 years, notes that in recent years the demand for preschool courses has been growing.

“People want to get their children to the basic level before they start school,” she says, noting that Limudit’s classes are tailored to each child’s capability and that they focus on prereading and basic math. “We have even had some requests from parents of preschoolers wanting their children to start learning English as young as four.”

While the phenomenon derives from a desire by parents to help their children, Yifrah also says that the younger generation is growing up much quicker than in the past.

“They are already learning so much from television programs and the world around them,” she notes. “Learning to recognize the letters or numbers really won’t cause a child emotional damage but can really give them a confidence boost.”

At the Ministry of Education, courses for preschoolers are only recognized unofficially, and there are no figures on how many children arrive at school with some kind of formalized teaching.

“We are not against such classes, but if we accept them, then we are admitting that our system is not giving preschool children the preparation they need for school,” says Sara Reuter, elementary education administration director at the Education Ministry, adding that while she is head of the department, such courses will not be offered as a matter of official practice.

“It is not really a question of whether a child needs such preparation or not. We accept any child who reaches the right age for school whether they are academically ready or not. Hopefully, we are able to provide them with any extra help they need in the classroom or in the framework of school.”

A former teacher, Reuter adds that the ministry is aware of the phenomenon but is really “not sure where or how it started.”

“Parents are exposing their children more and more to the world,” she theorizes. “They are reading more books to their preschoolers, taking them on trips within Israel and overseas and really showing them the world. That means that children are more ready and open to learning at a younger age.”

However, Reuter also says the desire to equip children with additional tools for first grade is mainly driven by parental fear that their “little bird is moving on to a much more advanced stage of life. Physically school is so different from kindergarten. It’s so much bigger and there are many more people. Parents are scared of that change.”

Rebecca agrees that it is partly parental fear that prompted her to seek lessons for her daughter.

“I did not want her to be struggling with the academic lessons and miss out on the social aspect of school,” she says. “At that age, school is supposed to fun, but the children get so much homework and have to take on so much responsibility even from first grade that if I can ease that for her in advance, surely it’s worth it?” (…)

Source: Jerusalem Post, Israel
http://tinyurl.com/2mg663

There was a certain paradox in last week’s state appeals court ruling that requires parents who school their children at home to hold teaching credentials.

For many of the homeschooling parents, it seemed more than a little hypocritical for a state that fails to ensure a credentialed teacher in each classroom - and is often slow to remove underperforming teachers - to impose its “standards” on families that have opted out of the system. Also, the argument that more state oversight is required for the best interests of the homeschooled children would seem to represent the height of audacity in a state with public schools that produce far too many dropouts and far too few students with the basic skills to cope in modern society.

The court ruling has touched a nerve, especially among the parents of the estimated 166,000 children who are homeschooled in California.

The homeschool movement would contend that the state’s approach of recent years - which is basically to look the other way - has worked just fine. They point to the homeschool graduates who are excelling at elite universities, or the students who are dominating spelling bees, as evidence that the laissez-faire approach should continue.

Then again, the students we worry about are those whose parents isolate them from a full curriculum of basic subjects - especially those who follow the philosophy of “unschooling.”

The state must balance parents’ rights with its obligation to make sure all young people have access to an education.

Anyone who thinks a credential is a panacea should consider the abysmal outcomes of public schools in Richmond or Oakland.

A noncredentialed parent-teacher with the guile and determination to secure the right resources and tutors could give his or her child a far more rounded education than a parent with a credential and a false sense of infallibility.

California legislators should look for ways to increase the level oversight and accountability of homeschooling. But the teaching-credential requirement, as ordered by the appellate court, is not the answer.

Source: San Francisco Chronicle, USA
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/03/10/EDV7VH9OV.DTL