The New College Student

I ran across this story in the Baltimore Examiner last night. It discussed "The Sad, Sad State of College English." The story talks about a retired community college English teacher who, over the years, collected sentences written by her students. These sentences show that high school students are graduating from school unable to write a basic sentence or spell simple words. Some of them show a complete lack of historical awareness or ability to think clearly. Here's a few of my favorite examples:

It’s good I’m doing something with my self; Therefore, I can do better in the foochure.

I flought to Chicago.

Benjamin Franklin discovered America while fling a kite.

Jogging on a woman’s ovaries can be dangerous to her health.

My brother and I took a fairy across to Martha’s Vineyard.

Christopher Columbus sailed all over the world until he found Ohio.

According to the teacher who collected these sentences this problem, which has gotten worse over the years, is caused by a lack of reading. Reading, he says, exposes you to language used correctly, to vocabulary greater than your own, and allows you to slow down and think about what is being said. Students struggle with reading and don't like to read. The result is young adults who can't write a coherent sentence or express themselves clearly. Their language is limited to slang and colloquialisms.

Further, this inability to use language properly is not found across all student populations. The article states that adult students are willing to put in the work necessary because they understand what it takes to succeed and are willing to put in the effort. International students are also willing to work very hard to succeed.

What does this mean for us? We cannot compete in the world market if the majority of our students graduating from high school cannot think clearly or articulate themselves. Something has to change.

Fortunately, some parents are beginning to make the changes necessary. As more and more students are pulled out or kept out of our public school system, more and more students are being taught to read well and write clearly. However, it isn't enough to help just the small percentage of students who are homeschooled, something has to change to improve the outcomes of public school, as well. When will the American public finally rise up, demand better results, and be willing to support solutions that will work?

Appropriate is Not How I'd Describe It

A group of California public school first graders were taken on an extra special field trip this past Friday. If you've looked around my blog any, you'll know that I'm all for field trips. I think they are a great way to excite children about learning and that the learning they do during the field trip will be more cemented into their memory that plain textbook reading.

But how would you feel, if you knew that your tax dollars were spent taking those children to their teacher's wedding? This I cannot support. There is nothing educational about a wedding. It isn't tied to their learning plans; it isn't going to help them read better or compute addition better. If the parents just love their child's teacher, let them take their kids to the wedding themselves.

Finally, what if the wedding was a same sex wedding and the kids (at least some of them) were wearing political buttons advertising that people should vote "No" on an upcoming proposition which will eliminate same sex marriages if it passes? Additionally, the couple completed their wedding day by touring the city in a trolley with banners proclaiming "Just Married" and "Vote No on Prop. 8" on its sides. Isn't this both a political maneuver and an attempt to indoctrinate the kids with the idea that all sexual partnering is acceptable and good...when it isn't?

Of course, parents were notified of the field trip and could opt their children out. Even with the opt-out, I'd be furious.

What Does it Cost to Educate a Child

How much money does it take to educate a child? It's a question that comes to my mind this time of year for two reasons: teacher strikes and politics.

One of our local school districts went on strike at the beginning of the year. Two of the issues were teacher pay and health benefits. They began by demanding an 11% pay increase. They settled with a 5% increase over three years and increased health benefits. The average teacher salary in that district is $58,500 without benefits and $80,000 with benefits. That's more than $10,000 and $28,000, respectively, than what my family lived off of this year. From my perspective, those teachers are paid plenty and I don't understand why I should foot the bill to pay them more.

Now, with the election season upon us, we are hearing more about how the schools need more money. We already spend $497 billion (2005 figures) on education. Just how much more is enough? How about if we just give them all of it? Will that be enough?

So, how much does it cost to educate a child in America today? Well, it depends on where you live. Here's the 2005 figures:

New York spends the most -- $14,119 per student.
Utah spends the least -- $5,257 per student.
My state, Washington, is in the middle -- $9,982.69 per student.
My school district, Tacoma, is pretty high -- $13,245 per student.
Then there's little old me. I spent $577 this year on two students.

I look at those figures and I am astounded. With so much money being spent on each student, how could they possibly being doing such a bad job? In contrast, I spend a tiny fraction of what the public school spends yet my children are not only doing well but are at least one year ahead of public school students in every subject. Oh, what I could do with over $9,000 per student!
Is money really the issue? Or could it be the fact that public schools are a monopoly? With public schools being the only option for most people, do schools have any incentive to do better? What about the fact that unions make it impossible to fire ineffective teachers? Bad teacher? Tough! Can't fire them. Or is it the fact that public schools were originally designed to teach students to conform, among other things?

Tacoma Public Schools Increase Hours

Each week school is in session, my children are required to participate in educational activities related to their customized student learning plan for a minimum number of hours. For Sammy, the minimum number of hours is 20. For Mika, it's 25. Because we are able to complete our core subjects in much less than that, I must get creative in how I meet these requirements.

In contrast, Tacoma Public Schools, which primarily teach only core subjects (and poorly, at that) has decided to extend the school day for elementary and middle school students. Starting September 3, 2008, all students within the school district will attend school 6 1/2 hours a day. This includes kindergartners who now attend full time as well. Elementary students will begin school at 9am and continue until 3:30pm. Middle schoolers (grades 6-8) will attend school from 8:15am to 2:45pm and high schoolers (grades 9-12) will attend school from 7:35am to 2:05pm.

Why the change? The district must meet a required 1000 school hours for all students grades K-4 in order to receive state funding for all-day kindergarten. They also need the extra time to be able to take off 5 full days for teacher training and their numerous early release days. These days, or partial days off, do not count towards the 1000 hour requirement. They are also claiming that the increased hours reduce transportation costs.

My question is: how will this affect the kids? Is it fair to require kids as young as 5 years old to attend school for 32.5 hours a week? Are they ready for that kind of time commitment? When you count homework, some students will be putting in an excess of 40 hours a week towards school activities. Can elementary students handle that kind of stress without it negatively impacting their health, physically and mentally?

It becomes even more alarming when you consider that the Tacoma School District no longer has set recess times. Teachers provide recess for their students if and when they have time. I know some students only get one 15-minute recess a day, compared to the two we got in school when I was a student. PE, which used to be daily when I was in school, is now only twice a week. I'm not sure how much play time students get after lunch, but I know some schools rotate students taking their lunch at their desks in the classroom to handle the problem of too small cafeterias. That's a lot of desk time and very little play time for these students. I've seen reports that the extra school time will be used to cover current curriculum. Perhaps it would be wiser to give the kids more time to play.

This is a really hard thing for me to swallow. Children need time to play and pursue enjoyable activities of their choosing. There's plenty of opportunities for responsibility and stress later. I agonize over the requirement I have to do school for 20-25 hours a week. I've found that amount of time not necessary to more than adequately teach my kids. They've proven that by scoring exceptionally high on standardized tests. I also tend to have moments when I feel that 4-5 hours a day of school is just too much. It's the only thing I don't like about being enrolled in CVA. At least, I can be creative in meeting that time, filling a good portion of it with fun activities that don't feel like school. Thinking about it makes me glad my kids aren't in school and hopeful that nothing happens to make enrolling them in traditional public schools necessary.

Are we requiring too much of our kids?

My Letter

April 15, 2008

Dr. Terry Bergeson
State Superintendent of Public Instruction
Old Capitol Building
600 South Washington
Olympia, WA 98504

Dear Dr. Bergeson:

Yesterday, I watched the evening news which included a story about the Seeds of Compassion children's event at the Key Arena featuring the Dalai Lama. The story explained how you encouraged local public schools to take advantage of this opportunity and take their students to see the Dalai Lama speak. You mentioned how Buddhist children would like the opportunity to see their spiritual leader and how it was a great opportunity for all children. I agree with your assessment and applaud your willingness to go against the often tauted "separation of church and state" when it comes to mixing religious instruction and public schooling.

Now that you have opened the doors to religious instruction (or instruction by religious leaders) using public time and funds, I believe you have an obligation to give equal time and funds to encouraging the other major world religions. These would include, but not be limited to, Hinduism, Islam, Catholicism, Mormonism, and Christianity. I'm sure the Pope, Billy Graham, Thomas Monson, and other religious leaders will be thrilled to receive your invitation to come speak to Washington public school students about nonreligious topics such as compassion.

Thank you for your courage in stepping out of the box to allow all students equal opportunity to see their religious leader speak and to learn about each of the major world religions as part of their public school experience. I look forward to your announcement that public school students will be visiting with these other religious leaders in the near future.

Sincerely,

Separation of Church and State

There are many reasons why we chose to school our children and home. One of them is the hypocrisy found rampant in the public school system and I just saw a perfect example of that on the evening news.

The dalai lama is up in Seattle, only 30 minutes from here, and its been big in the news. Today's story was about the Seeds of Compassion children's day at the Seattle Center and touched on how the Washington Superintendent of Public Instruction encouraged schools to bring their students to see this event. She talked about how the Buddhist kids would obviously want to see their spiritual leader and how it was good for all kids to see him speak on compassion.

How does the Superintendent of Public Instruction urging local public schools to take their students to see the Buddhist leader fit with separation of church and state? Apparently, separation of church and state only matters when you are talking about religious beliefs that center around the Bible. And to prove that, here's a direct quote from the Washington Superintendent of Public Instruction in response to whether she would arrange for schools to bring their students to see the Pope, the Catholic equivalent of the dalai lama.

Her answer, "No, I probably couldn't get away with the Pope but the dalai lama is a man of the whole world."

Huh?

If the schools are going to use public money to take kids to see the Buddhist leader, I think they should be fair and represent all of the major religions. It's all of none; they need to make up their mind.

I Thought They Didn't....

I thought that the public schools weren't suppose to teach to the test. If that is true, why are public school students coming home with pages and pages of "WASL practice" for homework? These WASL practice sheets look identical to the standardized test and, from what I've read, may very well be copies of previous WASL tests. (WASL is our state's standardized assessment test.) And, if they are spending all this money, time, and effort preparing the kids for the test, when are they teaching non-test subjects?

Here's a couple of links about the WASL.

Richland School Board President discussing the cost and inefficiency of the WASL

Teacher talks about how 2 full months of the school year is spent on WASL practice and teaching to the test.

List of misleading "facts" given in 2004/2005 WASL test to make it look like students scored well

It's things like this that have led to our decision to homeschool for educational reasons. We have other reasons as well.

Public School Vicariously

Every so often, my daughter gets to see what public school students do vicariously through her friend who is one year older but at the same grade level as my daughter. For the past three weeks, we have picked her friend up from school at 3:00pm each day. The experience is helping my daughter appreciate homeschooling more.

For example, three weeks ago we learned that her friend gets one recess a day, not including lunch. Recess is typically 15 minutes. On days when we are home, she gets two recesses a day. Outside recesses are 30-45 minutes long and sometimes we take advantage of a great opportunity and just stay out for an hour or two. On days that we are home but not on schedule, we may start late or finish early...think of those long recesses at the very beginning or end of the school day. She's realizing that she has a lot more play time during school hours than her public-schooled counterparts.

We also learned that her friend has PE twice a week. My daughter also has PE twice a week but she gets to do it for longer (1 hour 45 minutes on Tuesdays and 1 hour on Thursdays). She also likes that she gets to do activities she enjoys rather than having to do those "boy sports."

Then there's the field trips. My daughter thinks it's "impossible" that public school students only get a couple a year. She's used to a couple per month.

My daughter is also realizing what homework does to your playtime. She looked forward to seeing her friend all day today only to find out that she had a lot of homework today. Homework was 4 pages of math, spelling (writing a story using the spelling words), and 20 minutes of reading. So, rather than playing with her friend, she had to wait for her to finish at least some of the homework. Over an hour later, they were finally able to play for 15 minutes before mom showed up to take her friend home. The girls asked if the friend could stay and play longer but it was explained that she had to get home to finish homework, eat dinner, and do some other things they had to do. They seemed disappointed.

So on those days when my school-reluctant daughter moans about "doing school", I can reminder her how good she has it with late starts, long recesses, early finishes, no homework, and lots of field trips.