30 hours later...

This past weekend, I completed my 30 hours of mandatory Gifted and Talented training that was held over 5 saturdays for 6 hours each day.



I am now certified to teach gifted and talented children.



I am also certified (from taking a test that I studied 0 hours for) to teach bilingual education.



I have not been required to do any training on bilingual education.



...For too long, the nation’s education system has neglected the needs of its high-potential students.

Education policy has been shaped for decades by the fallacy that gifted and talented students do not need specialized support, resulting in a severely underresourced and highly fragmented collection of policies and services.

Parents and teachers of gifted and talented children have long recognized this neglect, and now a nationwide survey released this month by the National Association for Gifted Children and the Council of State Directors of Programs for the Gifted makes clear the depth of the problem and the consequences it will have for the nation if unaddressed....


I also am a product of a "gifted and talented" program, having gone to a "gifted and talented" elementary and GT classrooms in a "Regular Ed" middle school till 8th grade. What is the deal with GT? My archtype elementary school is what I'm familiar with- my elemtary school, and I dont' think of it as a GT school. I think of it as what ALL children should be offered. Art, Music, Projects, Themes, Challenges, Research, Recess, Art, Drama, Art, Problemsovling etc... Why is this a GT thing? Why isn't this an ELEMENTARY thing?



Thoughts on GT programing?

1 hour 6 minutes!

I drop kicked my first 10K this weekend with my roommates! International Friendship Run: We started at the Rio Grande River and ran north 6 miles to the finish line where we ate breakfast tacos and watched some people in cowboy hats dancing all fancy on stage.

Next up: 1/2 marathon in Spring?

On extrinsic rewards: for students AND teachers

...In 1972, when I began teaching as a mathematics resource specialist in San Jose, Calif., I was required to coordinate an individualized math program, kindergarten through grade 6, that included an elaborate system of rewards. The program was divided into specific objectives, and as each child mastered four of these, he or she was rewarded with a certificate of achievement. After mastering 16 objectives, the student received a small trophy. At each successive set of four objectives, students were awarded increasingly fancy certificates and trophies until they completed all the program objectives and received a trophy three feet high.

This system caused students to rush through their math in order to earn the rewards. When asked what they had learned, they would respond with the number of objectives they had finished, not with the content of the math they had learned. And what happened when these students went to junior high? They refused to do math. Parents begged the school system to extend the award system to the junior high level. They said that their children had “loved” math in elementary school, but wouldn’t do it in junior high without the awards. What had been a well-meaning attempt to motivate students undermined, in the long run, students’ motivation to learn. ..." -Sternberg

How does this idea tie in with tying teacher pay with test scores? Is it all bad? Can tying pay to test scores be a postive thing?

The family is OFFICIALLY getting bigger :)

random buy... a little guitar in our citrus orchard

Inspiration for a day of planning and grading. cheers.

Life is good!

Obama in Wisconsin: 'Now the Race Starts'

Obama in Wisconsin: 'Now the Race Starts'

I agree with the motives- tactics? I'm not 100% there.

Happy Lefse Day!

It's that time of the year again! First weekend in November marks the day when the Hayes/Knudtson/Powell clan gets together and makes that oh so good Norwegian goodness known as Lefse.

The morning report: First batch, too salty, and the lefse is a little to0 'tortilla' like so far... Hopefully things make a turn for the better- I'm in need of some quality lefse in 3 weeks when I'm home!

job security vs student achievement

Wisc. Teachers Couldn’t be Fired Over Test Scores

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Wisconsin schools could use student test scores to evaluate teachers, but they still couldn't use the information to discipline or fire them under a bill moving quickly through the Legislature.

Lawmakers must remove a ban on using test scores in evaluations for Wisconsin to compete for about $4.5 billion in Race to the Top stimulus money for education. Race to the Top is intended to improve student achievement, boost the performance of minority students and raise graduation rates.

Republicans and the Wisconsin Association of School Boards say Doyle and Democrats who control the Legislature are still giving teachers too much deference even as they work to qualify the state for the program.

Wisconsin and Nevada are the only states that don't allow test results to be used to evaluate teachers. A similar prohibition in New York expires next year, and California removed its ban earlier this year to compete for the federal stimulus money.

Doyle and Democratic lawmakers are moving quickly to get Wisconsin's ban removed with a vote this week. There is urgency because applications for the Race to the Top money will likely be due in a couple of months and the Legislature ends its session for the year on Thursday.

Doyle supports a proposal that would lift Wisconsin's restriction on tying test scores with teacher evaluations. However, it would keep in place a ban on using the scores to fire, suspend or discipline a teacher.

It also would require the creation of a teacher development plan to be part of the collective bargaining process between school districts and teachers.

Both the Doyle administration and the head of the state teachers' union told the Assembly Education Committee on Monday that the bill would qualify Wisconsin for Race to the Top money.

If it doesn't, the administration is prepared to return with a bill that would broaden how the student data could be used, including to discipline teachers, said Tim Casper, executive assistant with the state Department of Administration.

Should that happen, it would put Doyle and the powerful teachers union at odds.

The teachers union opposes using student test results to discipline teachers, said Mary Bell, president of the Wisconsin Education Association Council. The goal of the bill as it currently stands, as well as the Race to the Top program, is to find ways to improve teachers' performance, not punish them, she said after Monday's hearing.

But Sheri Krause, a lobbyist for the Wisconsin Association of School Boards, said preventing schools from using the information to remove ineffective instructors from classrooms goes too far in protecting teachers. She testified against the bill.

"We have no interest in setting up an evaluation system which, from the get go, would preclude the ability of the board to remove an ineffective teacher from the classroom," Krause said.

Test results should be allowed to be one of several factors in an evaluation that can lead to discipline, she said.

Two Republicans on the Assembly Education Committee, Reps. Stephen Nass of Whitewater and John Nygren of Marinette, said removing the ban will have little effect unless the data can be used to remove poor teachers.

Despite the opposition, there is a lot of momentum to get the bill and others passed quickly so Wisconsin can qualify for Race to the Top. Coincidentally, the Legislature is considering the bills the same week that President Barack Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan plan to visit Madison.

They are scheduled to speak Wednesday at a middle school about education reform.

Duncan didn't want to speak Monday about the specifics of Wisconsin's legislation but said Race to the Top is not intended to punish teachers.

"This isn't about punishing. It's about being really honest about where we're making a difference in students' lives," he said in an interview with The Associated Press. "There are places doing this in an extraordinarily innovative way."

He said states like Wisconsin should look to Louisiana, where officials can link student achievement to teachers and those teachers' performance to the colleges where they were educated.

"The goal is to create a cycle of continuous improvement and to create feedback," Duncan said.

On language and teaching.

bilingual education is crazy and I am right in the middle of it. No Education Policy class could prepare me for what I'm living right now. I mean...college doesn't really prepare you for real life, so I guess that can be expected. But college does teach you how to think about things- which I have been doing a lot lately.

It is possible, I found out today, that not only my language of instruction may change in the coming days....but also my students, and the subjects I teach.

The only thing I can do is roll with the punches and do my darndest to fight for my kiddos.

Austin, Tx