USCE 2023: Please let them shove a camera up your butt

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Leon Trotsky 2012: Aug 27, 2009; YOU CAN TRUST ME!*

_{*Israeli Government-affiliated poster}

Test scores and measures of student learning have continued to fall since the pandemic.

The latest data shows a nearly 35-year low that has erased all progress for the average American student on math testing since 1990. Reading is down to 2004-levels.

Even before the pandemic, U.S. student achievement in math was progressing very slowly - but it was still progressing - and this collapse combined with 10+ years of slow progress has significantly damaged the average American student's math skills relative to other major countries.

Performance is down among every racial, geographic, and income group, but performance is disproportionately down amongst low-income students, black students, and native American students.

Interestingly, Hispanic students - who had previously been among the groups most vulnerable to learning loss - seem to have only done a little worse than average.

The amount of kids who say they never read outside of class is up nearly 50% from where it was 10 years years ago.

The amount of 8th graders taking advanced math classes is down by nearly 1/3 from 10 years ago (34% to 24%).

https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/1671490506100994049

quote:

The math and reading performance of 13-year-olds in the United States has hit the lowest level in decades, according to test scores released today from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, the gold-standard federal exam.

The last time math performance was this low for 13-year-olds was in 1990. In reading, 2004.

Why It Matters: 13-year-olds missed a crucial time in their schooling.

Performance has fallen significantly since the 2019-2020 school year, when the coronavirus pandemic wrought havoc on the nation�s education system. But the downward trends reported today began years before the health crisis, raising questions about a decade of disappointing results for American students.

The federal standardized test, known as NAEP, was given last fall, and focused on basic skills. The 13-year-olds scored an average of 256 out of 500 in reading, and 271 out of 500 in math, down from average scores of 260 in reading and 280 in math three years ago.

Achievement declined across lines of race, class and geography. But in math, especially, vulnerable children � including Black, Native American and low-income students � experienced bigger drops.

A large body of research shows that most American children experienced academic struggles during the pandemic. It has also been clear that low-income students of color were most heavily affected by school closures and remote learning, which in some districts lasted more than a year.

The latest NAEP results are the federal government�s final major release of data on pandemic learning loss. The scores add to educators� understanding of the challenges that lie ahead for children of different ages and demographic groups.

The 13-year-olds who took this version of the NAEP exam last fall were 10 years old � and in fourth or fifth grade � when the pandemic began. Many were old enough to participate in remote learning without minute-to-minute adult assistance, as younger children often needed.

But the ages of 10 to 13 are also a crucial period for mastering foundational skills, from multiplication to recognizing a character�s feelings in a short narrative passage.

�The bottom line � these results show that there are troubling gaps in the basic skills of these students,� said Peggy Carr, commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, which gives the NAEP exam. �This is a huge-scale challenge that faces the nation.�

Background: The test allows for comparisons across years.

In the highly decentralized American education system, NAEP is one of the few consistent tests given across states lines over many years, making the results easily comparable.

Scores on the exam do not result in any rewards or punishments for students, teachers or schools, making them especially useful for research purposes, since there are fewer incentives to cheat or teach to the test.

Still, some education experts believe there is too much focus on NAEP. They point out that the content of the exams, in many cases, has little overlap with the material that is actually taught in classrooms across the country.

What�s Next

A student survey given alongside the test turned up other interesting results that will keep educators buzzing. The percentage of 13-year-olds enrolled in algebra has declined to 24 percent from 34 percent in 2012. In some districts and states, notably California, there has been a push to equalize math education by placing fewer eighth graders into advanced math.

The percentage of 13-year-olds who reported reading for fun has also declined. Last fall, 31 percent said they �never or hardly ever� read for fun, compared to 22 percent in 2012.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:17

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# ? May 25, 2024 08:45

Alterian: Jan 28, 2003

This has been discussed in other threads but one of the reason for the reading drop was because schools adopted this really lovely way of how to teach kids how to read that did not work.
https://www.npr.org/2019/01/02/677722959/why-millions-of-kids-cant-read-and-what-better-teaching-can-do-about-it

Edit: Note this is from 2019 before the pandemic.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:22

Leon Trotsky 2012: Aug 27, 2009; YOU CAN TRUST ME!*

_{*Israeli Government-affiliated poster}

Alterian posted:

This has been discussed in other threads but one of the reason for the reading drop was because schools adopted this really lovely way of how to teach kids how to read that did not work.
https://www.npr.org/2019/01/02/677722959/why-millions-of-kids-cant-read-and-what-better-teaching-can-do-about-it

Edit: Note this is from 2019 before the pandemic.

That article is pretty wild.

quote:

Harper attended a professional-development day at one of the district's lowest-performing elementary schools. The teachers were talking about how students should attack words in a story. When a child came to a word she didn't know, the teacher would tell her to look at the picture and guess.

The most important thing was for the child to understand the meaning of the story, not the exact words on the page. So, if a kid came to the word "horse" and said "house," the teacher would say, that's wrong. But, Harper recalls, "if the kid said 'pony,' it'd be right because pony and horse mean the same thing."

Harper was shocked. First of all, pony and horse don't mean the same thing. And what does a kid do when there aren't any pictures?

quote:

This advice to a beginning reader is based on an influential theory about reading that basically says people use things like context and visual clues to read words. The theory assumes learning to read is a natural process and that with enough exposure to text, kids will figure out how words work.

Yet scientists from around the world have done thousands of studies on how people learn to read and have concluded that theory is wrong.

That seems like it could have definitely played a role in the loss, and since it happened right before the pandemic it would be difficult to figure out how much it was responsible for.

The math scores were even worse than the reading scores, so there is something there beyond even the impact of new teaching styles. Maybe math is just especially vulnerable to compounding problems with learning loss?

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:29

FlamingLiberal: Jan 18, 2009; Would you like to play a game?

Wow that�s an awful way to teach

That�s just going to make things worse for them in the future

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:31

Fork of Unknown Origins: Oct 21, 2005; Gotta Herd On?

Alterian posted:

This has been discussed in other threads but one of the reason for the reading drop was because schools adopted this really lovely way of how to teach kids how to read that did not work.
https://www.npr.org/2019/01/02/677722959/why-millions-of-kids-cant-read-and-what-better-teaching-can-do-about-it

Edit: Note this is from 2019 before the pandemic.

Ugh. My kids just finished K and 1st grade and they used this stupid method. Thank god we did a ton of work with them before sending them to school and have continued to do a ton of work on reading because I can see it isn�t working at all.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:32

Robviously: Aug 21, 2010; Genius. Billionaire. Playboy. Philanthropist.

Alterian posted:

This has been discussed in other threads but one of the reason for the reading drop was because schools adopted this really lovely way of how to teach kids how to read that did not work.
https://www.npr.org/2019/01/02/677722959/why-millions-of-kids-cant-read-and-what-better-teaching-can-do-about-it

Edit: Note this is from 2019 before the pandemic.

My mother-in-law taught 1st grade through the pandemic and the stories of what schools expected kids to do vs what they actually have the capacity to do at that age was absolutely insane. There has been an abject and utter failure in how we teach our children going back decades but the pandemic and the misunderstood use of remote learning for a wide swath of the country is going to absolutely destroy a generation that was already starting from behind due to what their grandparents are doing to the world at large.

Remote learning as a tool can be used and used well but the lack of general planning and execution makes results like what's been posted above normal given how shoddy testing and follow through in this country is to begin with.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:33

Liquid Communism: Mar 9, 2004; коммунизм хранится в яичках

Remote learning is loving hard for me as a grown-rear end adult professional to be successful in. Most kids without extremely engaged parents able to effectively serve as teachers didn't stand a chance.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:36

Judgy Fucker: Mar 24, 2006

Fork of Unknown Origins posted:

Ugh. My kids just finished K and 1st grade and they used this stupid method. Thank god we did a ton of work with them before sending them to school and have continued to do a ton of work on reading because I can see it isn�t working at all.

Same, I can only assume. We have our oldest read to us every night and it's been a challenge to deprogram him from guessing an unfamiliar word based on the pictures on the page. Just literally guessing anything he sees regardless of the actual letters in the word. Funnily (and unsurprisingly) enough, once he figured out to actually look at the word itself, he started guessing less--really, less guessing and more reasoning it out--and got less frustrated from reading.

Liquid Communism posted:

Remote learning is loving hard for me as a grown-rear end adult professional to be successful in. Most kids without extremely engaged parents able to effectively serve as teachers didn't stand a chance.

It's this, even with traditional in-person learning. Children spend way more time with their parent(s) or guardian(s) usually than teachers, if parents aren't doing anything to continue learning at home then their kids ain't got no shot.

And of course, if your parent(s) are working three jobs just to pay the rent and you're a latchkey kid, you're absolutely SOL. Great example of how the problems in education go way beyond funding, pedagogy, and teacher accreditation. If you want to fix education you need to fix the socioeconomic inequities that plague our society.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:42

BonoMan: Feb 20, 2002; Jade Ear Joe

I think it's been brought up before? But that's the premise behind the "Sold a Story" podcast which I def recommend listening to.

*Thankfully* my kid's school didn't use that method and she is a superior ranking reader.

Her math skills however are right down the middle average. Need to work on those during the break.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:43

GlyphGryph: Jun 23, 2013; Down came the glitches and burned us in ditches and we slept after eating our dead.

The way many schools have been teaching math is absolutely horrible as well.

The problems, in my experience, is three fold (plus the serious and what will be long term and ongoing effects of the COVID home learning stint) - teachers are being taught like poo poo (I went to college for teaching and the classes were some of the most idiotic wastes of time I ever encountered, very little in the way of useful fact based information or actual skill development) ad passing that on to their students, institutional support for children and teachers both is continuing to be ignored, and anyone who is actually good at teaching is basically being told to go gently caress themselves and get out of the industry if they have a shred of self respect.

We've made lots of ground in terms of understanding what effective pedagogy looks like, and have apparently decided that we absolutely do not, under any circumstances, want that poo poo in our schools.

I'm honestly surprised students are still learning as well as they are.

GlyphGryph fucked around with this message at 14:50 on Jun 21, 2023

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:47

Alterian: Jan 28, 2003

My oldest is just finishing up 4th grade. He wasn't required to memorize times tables. Despite that, he's doing great in math. We are going to make him memorize times tables over the summer because we could see him struggling when he had to learn long division because of it.

Reading has been a struggle for him because he was taught that way. He is also (recently diagnosed) autistic and has ADHD. That way of teaching for a neurodivergent kid absolutely doesn't work. Wanting to play video games and having to read menus and his insistence on keeping captions on everything he watches on tv has probably helped him more than some of the school instruction he's gotten.

They also don't have spelling tests. He's clever like a weasel so he figured out pretty quickly during remote learning during covid which started for him in 1st grade how to get around typing out words.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 14:58

Fork of Unknown Origins: Oct 21, 2005; Gotta Herd On?

We thank god missed out on the remote learning nonsense. My kids missed a year of pre-k which was a bummer but we worked through a curriculum with each of them and they were both further along than their classmates when they started.

I haven�t noticed any issues with how they teach math yet. But again, K and 1st grade. They both seem to be where they should be though and we�ve worked way less on math than we have reading at home. But math also comes very easily to me and they might have that too.

Alterian posted:

Reading has been a struggle for him because he was taught that way. He is also (recently diagnosed) autistic and has ADHD. That way of teaching for a neurodivergent kid absolutely doesn't work. Wanting to play video games and having to read menus and his insistence on keeping captions on everything he watches on tv has probably helped him more than some of the school instruction he's gotten.

This is great. At the end of the day a kid having a reason they want to learn something makes it stick 100x better than just powering through it. I learned to read on Sonic comics.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:05

Oracle: Oct 9, 2004

The absolute best thing you can do for your kids reading ability is read to them. Every night. Doesn�t matter if they�re three months or three years. Let them look over your shoulder or sit on your lap, do funny voices, trace your finger along the line as you read, let them �read� the pictures, ask them questions. Read the same book over and over if that�s what they like (I think I have still have �Goodnight Moon� memorized and my kids are in high school). Utilize your local library and let your kid pick out whatever they like (there are so many amazing kids books out there now, well beyond Harry Potter and Rick Riordan).
And even when they start reading for themselves, read to them. Read books that are just above their level and explain what the big words mean, or let them guess from the context. And I always used to limit them to a chapter a night; if we stopped on a cliffhanger oh well, that�s for tomorrow night. They�d invariably sneak the book and read ahead to find out what happened next. Once that started happening regularly (about 4th grade for us) I left off reading to them every night; they�d gotten bit by the reading bug. But they�ll still occasionally ask me to read to them, if they�ve had a bad day or don�t feel well or are just feeling nostalgic. And they still read, though not nearly as much once they got phones. School librarians do gods own work at getting the right book to the right kid as well. I can think of several lgbt kids whose lives were likely saved by the right book at the right time.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:14

Main Paineframe: Oct 27, 2010

Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:

That article is pretty wild.

That seems like it could have definitely played a role in the loss, and since it happened right before the pandemic it would be difficult to figure out how much it was responsible for.

The math scores were even worse than the reading scores, so there is something there beyond even the impact of new teaching styles. Maybe math is just especially vulnerable to compounding problems with learning loss?

I have a lot of issues with that article (for example, suggesting that a five-year-old would be more correct to interpret "horse" as "house" rather than "pony"), but in the context of this discussion, the most important part is that you're dead wrong in interpreting it as something that "happened right before the pandemic".

The decline of phonics in favor of whole language learning is at least half a century old, and the past decade or two has been characterized by a move back toward phonics, as the so-called "Reading Wars" have raged throughout academia. So whatever you think of this article, the stuff described in it absolutely, definitely does not explain declines in academic performance since 2019.

Even if you don't think remote learning and social isolation from the pandemic are enough to explain the decline, there's been way bigger changes to kids' lives in the past decade or two than teacher training and curriculum shifts. I'd place a fair bit of suspicion on smartphones and the various things they've put in teens' pockets, such as social media sites and video content farms.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:14

Oracle: Oct 9, 2004

Internet access and the ubiquitous use of devices are definitely a pox on education holy poo poo. (And sleep habits and self-esteem and attention spans and self control and empathy and�)

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:18

Velocity Raptor: Jul 27, 2007; I MADE A PROMISE
I'LL DO ANYTHING

Alterian posted:

This has been discussed in other threads but one of the reason for the reading drop was because schools adopted this really lovely way of how to teach kids how to read that did not work.
https://www.npr.org/2019/01/02/677722959/why-millions-of-kids-cant-read-and-what-better-teaching-can-do-about-it

Edit: Note this is from 2019 before the pandemic.

This was a really interesting article. I had no idea that they started changing how reading was being taught. I guess phonics is no longer a thing?
I can't help but wonder, though, what is it that happened that caused a major change in how teachers taught math and reading? Like, genuinely curious. Who saw what was being taught and decided that it was all wrong?

I graduated HS in 2005 so I was taught the "old" way of reading and math. Phonics and long division and all that. And I get it that there are some students that will take to learning that method more easily, and others that would struggle to understand it, and would need extra help. But surely that can't be the entire reasoning between changing to sight reading, and simply "grasping the ideas" of what text is trying to convey, and adopting common core math?

Anecdote: I used to help my niece with math when she was in highschool, and she would show me the problems she was given, and I would ask her to start solving it and I would guide her if she got stuck and correct her where she stumbled. A few times, she would start solving a problem and I would stop her just to ask what she was doing, not recognizing the method. She would explain it, and every time it would seem like nonsense to me. And more than once, after I showed her how I was taught to solve those problems, she would comment on how my way was much easier and intuitive. :corsair:

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:28

Leon Trotsky 2012: Aug 27, 2009; YOU CAN TRUST ME!*

_{*Israeli Government-affiliated poster}

Velocity Raptor posted:

This was a really interesting article. I had no idea that they started changing how reading was being taught. I guess phonics is no longer a thing?
I can't help but wonder, though, what is it that happened that caused a major change in how teachers taught math and reading? Like, genuinely curious. Who saw what was being taught and decided that it was all wrong?

Here's a good NYT overview on the situation.

The tl;dr version is: Some studies showed that kids would read more on their own when taught that way and that phonics was breaking down reading into a mechanical process that didn't foster a love of reading in students. The best way to improve at reading is to practice, so a program that resulted in kids reading more on their own would lead to better results than teaching phonics.

It didn't pan out that way, though. And the philosophy was based on a study that turned out to be somewhat dubious.

quote:

Sounding Out a Better Way to Teach Reading

Schools are returning to phonics and other evidence-based literacy methods, and already there are signs that the switch is paying off in improved scores.

RICHMOND, Va. � The student in Cassie Gilboy�s first-grade class stumbled over the word �pig.� Instead of looking at a picture for clues, she tapped out the sound of each letter with her fingers to break the word apart�/p/ /i/ /g/. She then exclaimed �pig� with a big smile.

This fall, the students at Broad Rock Elementary School in Richmond are learning to read using their fingers to break down words sound by sound and mirrors to watch how their mouths move when they say specific letters.

The central Virginia school district is placing a big bet on an evidence-based approach to teaching children to read, one that many districts and states are embracing this fall. The approach, known as the �science of reading,� relies on helping students decode the words on the page by understanding the sounds that letters make.

For the moment, at least, this is the method that researchers, educators and classroom teachers, especially, seem to agree on. After several decades of so-called reading wars, where dubious theories led educators to abandon the phonics method in favor of a variety of divergent � and often unsuccessful � literacy learning techniques, a growing number of states and districts are right back where they started. And there seems to be growing consensus, and evidence, that this is a solid path to improving literacy at an early age.

Researchers identified the need to focus on phonics and phonemic awareness as early as the 1950s. Nevertheless, the education field shifted to other curriculums in recent years, which has been linked to a crisis in early literacy, with barely a third of students nationwide mastering reading by fourth grade.

Remote learning and missed school days during the pandemic have only made the problem worse, with the biggest drop in reading scores for 9-year-olds in 30 years, new national data shows. But the pandemic also brought billions in federal Covid relief aid to school districts, allowing Richmond and others to accelerate the adoption of evidence-based curriculum and training.

�If we can get this right, our kids go to third grade as strong readers, which allows them to go into middle school ready for whatever,� said Tyra Harrison, executive director of teaching and learning at Richmond Public Schools. �It really is about what we are trying to accomplish with kids.�

This recent literacy push in Richmond and across the country reflects the immense and conclusive research supporting explicit phonics instruction. Once students learn the alphabetical code � letters and sound recognition � they can decode words, improve their fluency, build their vocabularies and begin comprehending text.

Nineteen states have passed legislation requiring this sort of evidence-based reading instruction, including Tennessee, Alabama and North Carolina, with many more districts, like Richmond, using the extra federal dollars to overhaul their reading curriculum and train teachers.

Some places are already seeing success.

Mississippi, the first state to pass legislation in 2013, saw its fourth-grade reading scores jump strikingly over the past decade, moving the state to 29th in the nation by 2019, from 49th in 2013. North Carolina, which has trained thousands of teachers on the instructional approach, recently released scores showing students in the primary grades made gains greater in reading proficiency than those in other states.

Still, many districts continue to teach what�s known as balanced literacy, which relies heavily on a technique known as �cuing,� which encourages students to guess unfamiliar words based on context or pictures rather than learn the underlying structure of words.

�Once you do that, you put decoding in the back seat and students don�t learn how to crack the code of language,� diminishing their reading skills, said Sue Pimentel, co-founder of StandardsWork and one of the nation�s top K-12 literacy experts.

The other weakness of such literacy programs, experts say, is assigning texts based on a student�s reading level rather than exposing them to challenging, grade-level books that build knowledge and vocabulary in a range of subjects.

�There�s no real knowledge-building going on,� Ms. Pimentel said, �which keeps them behind.�

Critics of the science of reading deride the approach as �drill and kill,� boring children with an exclusive focus on foundational skills, a concern that Ms. Pimentel and others reject. That�s where good teachers come in, said Claude Goldenberg, an emeritus education professor at Stanford.

�We need to help train, mentor and monitor teachers to help them do it in a way that�s effective,� he said.

Richmond Public Schools, a district where nearly 40 percent of first graders were identified as needing reading intervention in the spring before the pandemic � a rate almost twice that of Virginia as a whole � has started an ambitious five-year literacy initiative to get all students reading at or above grade level in third grade.

The district is taking a �systems approach to building a culture of literacy,� said Eboni Massey, manager of literacy across the district, that begins with the science of reading, but extends beyond the foundational skills. The district�s Lit Limo gave out more than 35,000 books to children over the last few years, and its book vending machines allow students to earn coins to buy books.

Teachers also incorporate other components of reading � vocabulary, comprehension and knowledge building � into their lessons.

But the core of the new initiative is the science of reading. �The difference between what we�ve been doing historically and what we�re doing now is that this is based on research,� Ms. Harrison said. �They�re proven to work for children.�

With more than half of its $122 million federal Covid allotment going toward the literacy plan, Richmond Public Schools has been able to accelerate its investments in evidence-based curriculum; reading interventionists and coaches in every school; extended learning opportunities; data systems; and perhaps most importantly, training for all educators.

That includes Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling, referred to as L.E.T.R.S., one of the most frequently used professional development options for effective literacy instruction. The program is intensive and costly, taking about 160 hours over two years to complete. But it teaches crucial concepts about language and the brain that can change how educators think about reading instruction.

For Ms. Gilboy, the new instructional approach enables all her first graders to be successful, particularly the 70 percent who are still learning to speak English.

�They can�t guess a word that they don�t know, but they can sound it out and then later apply the vocabulary,� she said. �With the science of reading every kid can be a reader. It really levels the playing field.�

During small group sessions, her students are using hands-on techniques with magnets, cubes, play dough or just their fingers to practice tapping out words.

Sometimes lessons will focus on specific sounds, and students will use mirrors to watch how their mouths move when pronouncing the sound and feel how different sounds vibrate their noses or vocal cords. Spelling, a favorite among Ms. Gilboy�s students, involves them segmenting words by their sounds and putting them back together. All these skills build upon each other, and lessons typically end with a decodable text.

After just one year using the new reading strategy, Richmond Public Schools raised its early literacy scores by seven points, the largest single-year gains the district has seen. If they continue their current trajectory, district leaders expect to close the reading gap between Richmond and the rest of the state.

�If we�re able to maintain the path that we�re on, I would predict probably in the next three to five years, we would be able to see those gaps closed,� Ms. Massey said.

Ms. Harrison was even more optimistic. �I�m going to say two.�

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/06/...they%20started.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:35

socialsecurity: Aug 30, 2003

I learned to read and read a bunch at like 4-5, purely because a kid who was horribly mean to me was a good reader and liked to throw it in peoples faces. What I'm saying here is we should introduce spite/rivalry based learning.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:37

Judgy Fucker: Mar 24, 2006

Velocity Raptor posted:

This was a really interesting article. I had no idea that they started changing how reading was being taught. I guess phonics is no longer a thing?
I can't help but wonder, though, what is it that happened that caused a major change in how teachers taught math and reading? Like, genuinely curious. Who saw what was being taught and decided that it was all wrong?

There's a cycle to how this works.

Education academics study learning, pedagogy, etc. because they're academics, that's what they do.
After years of study (because longitudinal studies are needed to assess learning outcomes), academics come up with New Way to Teach^TM
Some of these academics realize there's more money to be had in consulting and (non-academic) publishing than in academia, so they become authors and consultants peddling their new thing, and schools--few or many--adopt New Way to Teach because achievement needs to go up and they can't control the outside factors influencing outcomes and God drat it, Janie and Johnnie need to read!
Scores don't go up meaningfully because New Way to Teach may or may not be good but it has nothing to do with whether Janie or Johnnie live in broken homes or whether local charters are fleecing the state and district of tax money, etc. etc.
Schools bring in new crop of consultants with Ed.D.s and their freshly patented Newest Way to Teach^TM
and so on

One aspect of how new pedagogical theories percolate into school systems across the U.S. is it takes time. By the time schools are implementing some new way to do things, that research literature is already 10-20 years old.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:41

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

socialsecurity posted:

I learned to read and read a bunch at like 4-5, purely because a kid who was horribly mean to me was a good reader and liked to throw it in peoples faces. What I'm saying here is we should introduce spite/rivalry based learning.

Gaming, only it is for literacy? This might be monetized, call Elon RIGHT NOW

Oh wait, poo poo, they tried that with weird learning math games and I don't think those made any money (not that that'd stop Elon)

Maybe the Lemmings games? They taught a kid puzzle solving, sort of

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:43

Velocity Raptor: Jul 27, 2007; I MADE A PROMISE
I'LL DO ANYTHING

Leon Trotsky 2012 posted:

Here's a good NYT overview on the situation.

The tl;dr version is: Some studies showed that kids would read more on their own when taught that way and that phonics was breaking down reading into a mechanical process that didn't foster a love of reading in students. The best way to improve at reading is to practice, so a program that resulted in kids reading more on their own would lead to better results than teaching phonics.

It didn't pan out that way, though. And the philosophy was based on a study that turned out to be somewhat dubious.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/06/...they%20started.

Thanks for this. I find analyses like this fascinating.

I used to love reading as a kid, but honestly what killed it for me was mandatory reading in middle- and high-school, complete with summer reading assignments where I had to read 5 books from a list of nothing that interested me.

Anytime I found a book that I wanted to read, I usually couldn't because I was required to read something else like "Johnny Tremain" and usually didn't have time to read what I wanted, or simply didn't have the desire after forcing my way through a number of chapters of a boring character study.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:49

cat botherer: Jan 6, 2022; I am interested in most phases of data processing.

There's a good thread/OP in CSPAM about K-12 education:
https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=4029992

GlyphGryph posted:

The way many schools have been teaching math is absolutely horrible as well.

New Math is something that never dies, and always comes back dressed up in different ways. It's unfortunate how un-rigorous a lot of education research is. There's been this repeated pattern of wide rollouts of disastrous new methodologies. I imagine it school administrators and education policymakers feel useful.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:51

I AM GRANDO: Aug 20, 2006

A problem with math education is that the underlying logic of what you�re doing and why the school�s way and the parent/other adult who�s helping�s way can be different and both work isn�t taught or understood until many years into one�s education. Kids are probably not even capable of grasping the underlying logic of what�s going on for many years.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 15:59

Fork of Unknown Origins: Oct 21, 2005; Gotta Herd On?

Rappaport posted:

Gaming, only it is for literacy? This might be monetized, call Elon RIGHT NOW

Oh wait, poo poo, they tried that with weird learning math games and I don't think those made any money (not that that'd stop Elon)

Maybe the Lemmings games? They taught a kid puzzle solving, sort of

There are a ton of �edutainment� games now, especially on tablets and phones.

I actually thought the Hooked on Phonics app did a good job. It was less game and more �hooked on phonics with mini games.� But I�ve also seen a ton of lovely ones.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:00

Oracle: Oct 9, 2004

Rappaport posted:

Gaming, only it is for literacy? This might be monetized, call Elon RIGHT NOW

Oh wait, poo poo, they tried that with weird learning math games and I don't think those made any money (not that that'd stop Elon)

Maybe the Lemmings games? They taught a kid puzzle solving, sort of

They gamified literacy and math like fifty years ago dude.

Oracle fucked around with this message at 16:04 on Jun 21, 2023

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:01

Ghost Leviathan: Mar 2, 2017; Exploration is ill-advised.

cat botherer posted:

There's a good thread/OP in CSPAM about K-12 education:
https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=4029992

New Math is something that never dies, and always comes back dressed up in different ways. It's unfortunate how un-rigorous a lot of education research is. There's been this repeated pattern of wide rollouts of disastrous new methodologies. I imagine it school administrators and education policymakers feel useful.

If it's like literally any aspect of government policy and procurement, what gets chosen and rolled out is what gives the buddies of politicians and the employers of the most lobbyists the most money, and none of it goes to actually helping teachers learn to teach better.

And also doesn't help with the pandemic it's become more and more clear that schools are first and foremost considered warehouses for children while their parents work.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:02

cat botherer: Jan 6, 2022; I am interested in most phases of data processing.

I AM GRANDO posted:

A problem with math education is that the underlying logic of what you�re doing and why the school�s way and the parent/other adult who�s helping�s way can be different and both work isn�t taught or understood until many years into one�s education. Kids are probably not even capable of grasping the underlying logic of what�s going on for many years.

Yeah, I've only taught math to (non-math major) undergrads, but even with them it's mostly a matter of drilling, with a sprinkling of trying to connect it to underlying theory and concepts. The abstract reasoning capacity one needs to do understand "New Math" concepts just isn't something younger kids possess.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:04

SpeedFreek: Jan 10, 2008; And Im Lobster Jesus!

Velocity Raptor posted:

Thanks for this. I find analyses like this fascinating.

I used to love reading as a kid, but honestly what killed it for me was mandatory reading in middle- and high-school, complete with summer reading assignments where I had to read 5 books from a list of nothing that interested me.

Anytime I found a book that I wanted to read, I usually couldn't because I was required to read something else like "Johnny Tremain" and usually didn't have time to read what I wanted, or simply didn't have the desire after forcing my way through a number of chapters of a boring character study.

The better way to do that is read 5 books, they must be at least x pages long. Then you get free movie tickets or something like that.

Reading in class was always torture for me, so god damned slow I'd always be a few chapters ahead when it came around to my turn. Between that and some writing styles I'd go a year or more without picking up a book voluntarily. Making reading more enjoyable and accessible would probably help a lot. So would a parent willing to drive you 20 minutes to the closest library probably would too.

How's the guessing method supposed to work when your books don't have pictures and you come across new words?

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:11

Willa Rogers: Mar 11, 2005

Ghost Leviathan posted:

And also doesn't help with the pandemic it's become more and more clear that schools are first and foremost considered warehouses for children while their parents work.

It'd be great if we had free government-provided daycare & before/after school care but we don't, so I'm not sure what you'd have proposed for non-PMC parents who had to leave their homes for work in order to provide their families with food & shelter during the pandemic. Leave them alone at home? In my state, that's against the law unless the children are 12+.

I grew up when most women stayed home to take care of their kids but that's no longer economically nor socially feasible for most families. As it was, the pandemic led a lot of women with children to drop out of the workforce; do you think that was a net positive?

I get a bit rankled when I see working parents who needed childcare summarily dismissed as "warehousing their children" in order to provide for them, but if you meant something else, please do elaborate.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:13

cat botherer: Jan 6, 2022; I am interested in most phases of data processing.

Willa Rogers posted:

It'd be great if we had free government-provided daycare & before/after school care but we don't, so I'm not sure what you'd have proposed for non-PMC parents who had to work to provide their families with food & shelter during the pandemic. Leave them alone at home? In my state, that's against the law unless the children are 12+.

I grew up when most women stayed home to take care of their kids but that's no longer economically nor socially feasible for most families. As it was, the pandemic led a lot of women with children to drop out of the workforce; do you think that was a net positive?

I get a bit rankled when I see working parents who needed childcare summarily dismissed as "warehousing their children" in order to provide for them, but if you meant something else, please do elaborate.

I think that's a bit uncharitable of a read. Of course parents want their children to receive a good education, but the warehousing aspect is what is most important to capital.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:14

Kalli: Jun 2, 2001

SpeedFreek posted:

The better way to do that is read 5 books, they must be at least x pages long. Then you get free movie tickets or something like that.

This still exists: https://www.bookitprogram.com/

Books into Personal Pan Pizzas, the greatest transactional reading program imaginable.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:15

Judgy Fucker: Mar 24, 2006

Willa Rogers posted:

It'd be great if we had free government-provided daycare & before/after school care but we don't, so I'm not sure what you'd have proposed for non-PMC parents who had to leave their homes for work in order to provide their families with food & shelter during the pandemic. Leave them alone at home? In my state, that's against the law unless the children are 12+.

I grew up when most women stayed home to take care of their kids but that's no longer economically nor socially feasible for most families. As it was, the pandemic led a lot of women with children to drop out of the workforce; do you think that was a net positive?

I get a bit rankled when I see working parents who needed childcare summarily dismissed as "warehousing their children" in order to provide for them, but if you meant something else, please do elaborate.

The simple act of using school as surrogate childcare so parents can work is not wrong. Parents viewing and treating school as nothing more than childcare--which, in my anecdotal experience, is a good number of them--is what's wrong.

Parents can need childcare and be anti-intellectual about it, too.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:19

Leon Trotsky 2012: Aug 27, 2009; YOU CAN TRUST ME!*

_{*Israeli Government-affiliated poster}

Not really that surprising, but Arkansas continues the trend of every single law banning gender-affirming care being struck down in federal court.

Every single state bill banning gender-affirming care that had made it to federal court has been overturned or injuncted so far.

Montana, Texas, Idaho, and South Dakota are the only states that still have bans on gender-affirming care making their way through the court system. They haven't had an injunction to block them because they haven't gone into effect yet. If the case in Texas is not resolved by September 1st, 2023, then they can ask for an injunction until the case is resolved.

https://twitter.com/cnnbrk/status/1671281339327303681

quote:

Federal judge strikes down Arkansas� ban on gender-affirming treatment for trans youth

A federal judge on Tuesday struck down Arkansas� ban on gender-affirming treatment for transgender youth, dealing the strongest blow yet to a state prohibition on such care.

In an 80-page ruling, Judge James M. Moody Jr. said that the state�s �Save Adolescents from Experimentation Act� violated the US Constitution and that the 2021 law cannot be enforced by state officials.

�Rather than protecting children or safeguarding medical ethics, the evidence showed that the prohibited medical care improves the mental health and well-being of patients and that, by prohibiting it, the State undermined the interests it claims to be advancing,� the judge wrote.

�Further, the various claims underlying the State�s arguments that the Act protects children and safeguards medical ethics do not explain why only gender-affirming medical care � and all gender-affirming medical care � is singled out for prohibition,� he continued. �The testimony of well-credentialed experts, doctors who provide gender-affirming medical care in Arkansas, and families that rely on that care directly refutes any claim by the State that the Act advances an interest in protecting children.�

Under the now-blocked law, young people would have not been able to access puberty-blockers, a treatment option for transgender youth that is used to prevent the onset of puberty. The measure also banned so-called cross-hormone therapy, a gender-affirming treatment that allows for trans people to change their physical appearances to be more consistent with their gender identities. The legislation made what it calls an �exception� for some intersex people with unspecified chromosomal makeup and hormone production, and those with difficulties resulting from previous gender-affirming treatments.

Gender-affirming care spans a range of evidence-based treatments and approaches that benefit transgender and nonbinary people. The types of care vary by the age and goals of the recipient, and are considered the standard of care by many mainstream medical associations.

Though the ruling only applies to Arkansas� ban, it represents a significant victory for LGBTQ advocates, who have been bringing legal challenges over the last few years to similar laws that have been enacted in GOP-led states.

The case marked the first time a federal judge has had the chance to receive extensive evidence and briefing in a challenge to a ban on gender-affirming care. Moody had temporarily blocked the law from going into effect in July 2021, and an eight-day trial took place last year in the case. Similar suits have been brought in Alabama and Tennessee.

�This victory shows that these laws, when tested by evidence, are indefensible under any standard of constitutional review. We hope that this sends a message to other states about the vulnerability of these laws and the many harms that come from passing them,� said Chase Strangio, an attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union who helped represent the plaintiffs in the case, in a statement.

Arkansas plans to appeal the ruling to the US Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit. Last August, a three-judge panel on the appeals court allowed Moody�s preliminary injunction to stand.

�I am disappointed in the decision that prevents our state from protecting our children against dangerous medical experimentation under the moniker of �gender transition,�� said Arkansas Attorney General Tim Griffin in a statement.

The lawsuit had been brought two years ago by four transgender adolescents in Arkansas and their families, as well as two doctors who provide gender-affirming care to trans youth in the state.

When Arkansas enacted the law in 2021, it became the first state in the nation to prohibit gender-affirming care for trans youth. The state�s then-Republican governor had initially vetoed the measure, but state lawmakers later overrode his veto.

In his ruling, Moody acknowledged that there were some �potential risks� associated with gender-affirming treatments, an argument that had been advanced by proponents of the law. But, he wrote, �For many adolescents the benefits of treatment greatly outweigh the risks.�

�There is nothing unique about the risks of gender-affirming medical care for adolescents that warrants taking this medical decision out of the hands of adolescent patients, their parents, and their doctors,� the judge wrote.

LGBTQ and medical advocates had strongly opposed the ban, which they feared could have significant negative impacts on trans youth, who have a much greater risk of attempting suicide, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Moody�s ruling seemed to recognize those fears.

�Conclusions cannot be drawn from any single study (in any area of medical research), but the body of medical research as a whole shows that gender-affirming medical treatments are effective at improving mental health outcomes for adolescents with gender dysphoria,� he wrote.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:20

Ghost Leviathan: Mar 2, 2017; Exploration is ill-advised.

cat botherer posted:

I think that's a bit uncharitable of a read. Of course parents want their children to receive a good education, but the warehousing aspect is what is most important to capital.

Yes, it's this. What the parents think is irrelevant to those making the decisions.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:20

Harold Fjord: Jan 3, 2004

I learned arithmetic from my VTech Socrates

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:21

Rappaport: Oct 2, 2013

Oracle posted:

They gamified literacy and math like fifty years ago dude.

What a wonderful insight this was. Do you think you might have a follow-up, which I am sure you do, being a doctor in your field?

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:33

Willa Rogers: Mar 11, 2005

cat botherer posted:

I think that's a bit uncharitable of a read. Of course parents want their children to receive a good education, but the warehousing aspect is what is most important to capital.

Using the word "warehousing" was what rankled me, given the lack of government-provided child care beyond the school day, imo. I saw a lot of judgment & scorn toward working parents, rather than toward capital, when parents experienced genuine distress at schools staying closed, and this initially struck me as more piling on.

But rereading GL's comment I see they weren't blaming the parents for the warehousing so I apologize for extrapolating that they were.

Willa Rogers fucked around with this message at 16:37 on Jun 21, 2023

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:35

Bar Ran Dun: Jan 22, 2006

Remote was a disaster. It was much worse if one earnestly tried to do the program. On top of that all the things outside school imploded during the pandemic all the extracurriculars went away. Following remote cost of living exploded. Schools are now often without adequate staffing.

It was much much worse if your child was special needs. Bunch of west coast districts had civil rights violations during the pandemic. It�s not much better now. Our district went from having an OT per school to a single one for six schools. They�re outright ignoring disabilities that affect academics because of the staffing levels. They have to use the time they have to deal with the kids that have acute emotional problems because of the pandemic.

The administration and the teachers are fighting about it because this pushes all of the issues into the teachers, who are not given the flexibility to deal with it because they have to rigidly stick to garbage purchased curricula.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:37

Willa Rogers: Mar 11, 2005

Bar Ran Dun posted:

Remote was a disaster. It was much worse if one earnestly tried to do the program. On top of that all the things outside school imploded during the pandemic all the extracurriculars went away. Following remote cost of living exploded. Schools are now often without adequate staffing.

It was much much worse if your child was special needs. Bunch of west coast districts had civil rights violations during the pandemic. It�s not much better now. Our district went from having an OT per school to a single one for six schools. They�re outright ignoring disabilities that affect academics because of the staffing levels. They have to use the time they have to deal with the kids that have acute emotional problems because of the pandemic.

Yeah; a lot of schools (as well as state governments & municipalities) pared back operations & never restored them, nor do they intend to. Entire government offices & services are never coming back, and many government workers are still WFH.

But I thought schools, in particular, were provided with supplemental funding under Biden to help stabilize them. I guess if the monies aren't earmarked or otherwise specifically allocated then they go into general funding for the schools and there's no accountability.

Not to mention that so many teachers have left the profession there are probably shortages for specifics like special ed.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:43

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# ? May 25, 2024 08:45

Ghost Leviathan: Mar 2, 2017; Exploration is ill-advised.

I'd be shocked if anything less than a vast majority of pandemic funding was flat out stolen. The system doesn't even know how to help people anymore even if it wanted to.

# ? Jun 21, 2023 16:52

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > USCE 2023: Please let them shove a camera up your butt

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