Ever wanted to read quality adolescent books with Deaf Characters?
Need to recommend books to reluctant readers?
Ever hoped to find contemporary books with a variety of Deaf Characters?
Then you might consider taking:
ENG 295: Special Topics
Deaf Characters in Adolescent Literature
Sharon Pajka, Ph.D.
This course provides a forum for intense reading, discussion, and exploration of the texts and issues associated with deaf characters in adolescent literature.
The course will introduce students to quality adolescent literature and it will examine issues relevant to the reading and teaching of the genre. The course
will also explore the history, characteristics, and benefits of deaf characters in adolescent texts.
As educators, parents, librarians, and advocates of literacy development, we often try to hook young people on reading by presenting books with characters
to which they can relate. Such books can help increase their overall knowledge of the world, open their minds to multiple realities and variations of the
human experience and provide scenarios in which they can live vicariously. The benefits of reading literature with diverse characters are extensive
especially for reluctant readers who seldom find characters like themselves in novels. While acquiring fictional books that include deaf characters has
historically been time-consuming and challenging, the goal of this course is to introduce students to books and research that contributes to the ongoing
dialogue and debate supporting adolescent literature including deaf characters.
When: May 17-July 9
Where: Gallaudet University Online!


Every school’s goal is for all children to grow and learn. Just as we use a tape measure to mark a person’s physical growth, in schools we use a variety of assessments to measure learning. Teachers use these results to help plan instruction and provide appropriate support.
AIMsweb allows for quick assessment of basic skills: letter naming, letter sounds, sounding out letter combinations, as well as reading fluency and math computation. Students in kindergarten through fifth grade are assessed using AIMSweb in the fall, winter, and spring.
NWEA Measures of Academic Progress (MAP)
The MAP assessment measures each student’s reading and mathematical achievement level and growth throughout the year and from one year to the next. It also compares student performance to students in the same grade in District 205 and across the nation. The computer individualizes the test for each student; a question’s difficulty is based on how well the student has answered all previous questions.
The MAP assessment is aligned to the Common Core State Standards. The assessment of reading measures skills in understanding and using both literary texts and informational texts. It also includes foundational skills such as vocabulary. The math assessment measures skills such as algebraic thinking, mathimatical operations, measurement, geometry, statistics and probability.
The tests are administered on-line three times a year in fall, winter, and spring. All 2nd - 8th grade students are assessed in reading and math in both the fall and the spring. Some students may also be assessed in the winter.
For more information:
Illinois Standards Achievement Test (ISAT)
ISAT is a State mandated achievement test that measures a student’s learning in relation to the Illinois Learning Standards . Assessments in reading and mathematics are administered over several days to grades three through eighth grade at the beginning of March. Science is tested in fourth and seventh grades.
Explore, the first in three measures used in combination to focus on meeting academic standards across the entire secondary school core program of studies, measures achievement in English, Mathematics, Reading, and Science. The high school uses the results as one measure in determining course placement and as a baseline in monitoring student achievement. Students take the assessment in November / December of eighth grade.
PLAN, a “pre-ACT” test, helps tenth graders measure their current academic development, explore career/training options, and make plans for the remaining years of high school and post-graduation years. Students take the test during the fall of their sophomore year.
Prairie State Achievement Examination (PSAE/ACT) is required by the State of Illinois for high school graduation. All students classified as juniors take the ACT and PSAE. The ACT assessment is the final test in the series of Explore-Plan-ACT. It measures the skills necessary for college coursework in reading, mathematics, science, and writing. The Workkeys assessment measures a student’s learning in relation to the Illinois Learning Standards in reading, writing, mathematics, science and social science. Students take the tests in early April.


"When I saw this, I said, 'That's just upside down juggling.' "
He became a physical education teacher in 1995 and decided to use a sport stacking unit in his classes.
"The kids loved it," Fox said.
Because sport stacking was so popular at his school, Fox started a home business in 1998, developing products and a curriculum for other physical education teachers.
Children of all fitness levels are on equal playing fields when it comes to sports stacking, Fox said.
One major benefit is that sport stacking teaches children to use both sides of their bodies. This helps them develop a greater percentage of the right side of the brain which houses awareness, focus, creativity and rhythm, according to the company Web site, www.speedstacks.com.
Children who are not necessarily athletic can excel. They benefit by the movement they get during practice and competition and through increased awareness of how to move their bodies in other sports.
Children who typically excel in athletics also benefit because they learn how to better use both sides of their bodies.
"The best basketball players can dribble with both hands," Fox said.
Musicians, particularly budding pianists, can benefit as well because as children become more proficient at sport stacking, they learn to isolate their fingers, releasing them one at a time, a skill that is important for musicians.
Some occupational therapists and special education teachers have begun using sport stacking to help their clients' motor skill development, Fox said.
The competition involves upstacking and downstacking. At the start of the competition, the cups are much like they would be in your kitchen cupboard, upside down, nesting inside each other in a stack, Fox explained.
Then competitors make 3-3-3 stacks - three pyramids of two cups on the bottom and one on top - or 3-6-3 stacks - two pyramids of two cups on the bottom and one on top and one pyramid of three cups on the bottom, two in the middle and one on top.
Downstacking involves returning the cups to their original nesting position.
When a child first learns how to stack the cups, he or she might take six or seven seconds to do 3-3-3 stacks, Fox said. The world record is 2.31 seconds.
The 3-6-3 stacks might take a beginner 10 to 15 seconds, Fox says. The world record is 2.72 seconds.
Children as young as 3 or 4 years old can learn how to sport stack, Fox said. "It's fun, and we believe it's downright good for kids."
A Speed Stacks Stackpack costs $30 to $40. The packs are available at the Web site, www.speedstacks.com, or at Target, Wal-Mart and Toys R Us.
More information about sport stacking can be found on the World Sport Stacking Association Web site, www.worldsportstackingassociation.org.
Emmanuel Baptist Temple, 16221 National Pike, west of Huyett's Corner, uses sport stacking as part of its Master Club program. Master Clubs seek to teach children about Christian principles and provide opportunities to perform Christian service. According to the Master Clubs' Web site, www.masterclubs.org, each club meeting includes a combination of Bible games and just-for-fun games such as sport stacking to keep kids engaged.
For more information, call the church at 301-582-0378.
Lisa Tedrick Prejean writes a weekly column for The Herald-Mail's Family page. Send e-mail to her at firstname.lastname@example.org.


Primary School Curriculum
This section features the nutrition education curriculum developed by the Cristine M. Trahms Program for Phenylketonuria. Materials were developed for and tested by school-aged children (ages 6-12).
Each activity includes a list of objectives, lesson plan, and an activity or worksheet that can be reproduced. Information developed for parents and families of children is also included.
Most of the books used in the activities can be found at public libraries or book stores. Ordering information is provided for books that might be difficult to locate.
Please credit the Cristine M. Trahms Program for Phenylketonuria when making copies of activities.
Activities are organized by topic:
- Alligator's Allergy
- Detective Dawg and the Package
- Kevin's New Friend
- My PKU Story
- Protein and Amino Acids
- The Body Engine
- The Protein Train
- You and PKU
- Alexander the Elephant Who Couldn't Eat Peanuts
- Don't Feed the Monster on Tuesdays
- My Best Friend Is Me
- People Talk
- Role Playing
- Why Am I Different?
- Learning to Keep a Food Record (for older school-age children)
- My Food Record (for younger school-age children)
- Rate Your Own Food Record
- Back to School: School Lunch Options
- Let's Go To Camp!
- Sleeping Over At Fred's House
- Treats to Bring to Parties
Just for Fun: Holiday Scrambled Food Fun
Just for Fun: Food Funnies


(PhysOrg.com) -- Many children, when learning to read, are encouraged by their teachers to retell all they remember about a story in order to build their comprehension skills. But can similar comprehension strategies be applied to mathematics? Researchers at North Carolina State University say that when teachers work with kids to talk through math problems, kids do a better job of absorbing and understanding the content.
“Current methods of teaching math - with examples and activities - are important, but we’re neglecting the communications component around it,” says Dr. Paola Sztajn, professor of mathematics education at NC State. “Helping children verbally work through math problems and articulate problem solving is an important aspect of their understanding.”
However, according to Sztajn, in order to reinforce this aspect of learning, you first need to reach the teachers. “We need to educate teachers how to do ‘math talk’ in classrooms and create ways for them to integrate it into their curriculum,” Sztajn says.
Sztajn and her team recently received a five-year, $2.9 million grant from the National Science Foundation to launch the program - Project AIM: All Included in Mathematics - and explore this new method of teaching. The researchers will develop a “math talk” curriculum for second-grade teachers across Wake County, and then work with the district’s math coaches to provide professional development to all second-grade teachers. The teachers will undergo approximately 40 hours of professional development over the course of a year to prepare to incorporate “math talk” into lessons.
“We specifically chose second grade because it has been shown to be a pivotal time in children’s development - especially in the areas of math and literacy,” says Dr. Ellen McIntyre, head of the Department of Elementary Education at NC State and a researcher on the project. “After second grade, students go from doing simple math - addition and subtraction - into more complicated areas such as multiplication. We need to make sure our students have a strong foundation before moving forward. However, the idea is to apply the ‘math talk’ concept to other grade levels and other types of math content.”
Working with Sztajn and McIntyre are Dr. Angela Wiseman and Dr. Steve Amendum, both assistant professors of literacy education at NC State.
“What makes this research unique is that we’re taking experts who specialize in elementary math education and experts in elementary literacy education and combining the knowledge from both groups to help kids learn how to talk about math that will ultimately help them learn more mathematics,” McIntyre explains.
Explore further: Heat distributions help researchers to understand curved space


An early education teacher’s broad challenge is have systematic and strategic methods that will prepare students and give them tools to be successful later in their academic life. Those children that aren’t adequately prepared will face an uphill battle. The conceptual framework in which we educate children must translate into the skills they use to learn. In addition, the strategies by which we teach children to learn must be a part of a flexible continuum where they are taught critical reasoning capabilities. Educators need to discuss how to process information so what the children learn isn’t rote memorization.
Children should be taught how to interpret a concept, but not loose the accuracy of the facts. The discursive practices should also highlight problem solving skills and ways to interpret abstract information into knowledge. This path of interpretation is essential and early educators need to build the foundation to ensure academic success, as well as success in life. Getting your degree online can save time and money so that you can launch a successful career as an early childhood educator.
Teacher preparation and professional development must enable the teacher to implement and design classroom environments that promote effectiveness and positive attitudes toward learning. The instructional implementation and support system for elementary education must include the combined efforts of the community and the parents and the educators. The learning assessment of the lesson plans should include evaluation of the problem solving model of instruction, the application of concept and inquiry, and processing skills. Elementary school instruction should also reflect the application and implantation of educational research. Furthermore, educational research should become the premise for change or innovation in elementary school curriculum.
Most schools require a bachelor’s degree and participation in student teaching internships. Common courses in elementary school teaching degree programs include: elementary mathematics, elementary science, elementary social studies, children’s literature, teaching principles, educational psychology, diversity in the classroom, and student assessment. Licensure requirements vary from state to state; aspiring public school teachers not only complete a bachelor’s degree program, but they also have a supervised teaching experience assessment exam. Private schools don’t always require licensure. Check with the state board of education for specific requirements. Median annual wages of kindergarten, elementary, middle, and secondary school teachers ranged from $47,100 to $51,180 in May 2008; the lowest 10 percent earned $30,970 to $34,280; the top 10 percent earned $75,190 to $80,970.
For information about the available online degrees in education, please click: http://www.onlinedegreenavigator.org/component/option,com_find_degrees/DegreeLevel,Any/Programs,Any/section,17/


Teach how to play violin for kids with our easy violin lessons for kids.
***Comes with online access to free audio demonstrating all examples. Hear how each one is played by a teacher, then play along with the backing band.***
"The [audio which] came with this book is great. The violin accompanied by piano is beautiful and it really encourages my daughter to play. It is great for beginners." - A Customer [Amazon]
Progressive Violin Method for Young Beginners - Book 1 contains all you need to know to start teaching kids to play violin - in one easy-to-follow, lesson-by-lesson children’s violin tutorial. Suitable for children aged 4 to 8 years and all types of violins. No prior knowledge of how to read music or playing the violin is required to teach a child to learn to play violin from this book.
Teach your child:
• How to play violin notes for kids
• All the fundamental techniques of violin playing including correct posture, hand position, arco and pizzicato, and fingering technique for playing 5 beginner violin notes
• Basic violin theory for kids to learn how to read music including time signatures, note values and rests
• Violin tips for kids that every child should know when learning violin
• Shortcuts for how to learn violin fast by getting the most from violin practice sessions
Contains everything you need to know about how to teach a child to play violin today.
• Progressive step-by-step easy violin lessons written by a professional children’s violin teacher
• Beautifully illustrated in full color throughout
• Easy-to-read violin music for kids, with chord symbols for piano or guitar accompaniment
• 21 great sounding violin exercises containing popular easy violin music for kids
Kids violin lessons have never been this easy for parents and teachers who want to teach children to learn how to play the violin, fast.
LearnToPlayMusic.com's violin lessons for kids are used by children’s violin teachers worldwide to teach how to play violin for kids. For over 30 years, our team of professional authors, composers and musicians have crafted music lesson books that are a cut above the rest. We offer a large selection of music lessons for kids that cover many different instruments in print, eBook and app formats. Awarded the 'Quality Excellence Design' (QED) seal of approval for eBook innovation, LearnToPlayMusic.com continues to set the standard for quality children’s music education resources.


Science is one of the fields of education that is easy to get your children interested in. It naturally appeals to their curiosity. In this article, we’ll go over science for kids websites. This is by no means a complete list, but will give a good idea of some of the more popular sites out there.
I remember watching the Discovery Channel when I was a child. I still watch it to this day. If you are looking for educational and fun sites, then this is a good one. It offers games, puzzles, facts, and much more. Many of Discovery’s signature shows are represented in some way on the pages. Your children will have a fun time combined with a comprehensive learning experience.
This website is not only interesting for your children, but you may find a lot of cool stuff here too. This website would probably be less useful for very young children. There is a portion of the website completely dedicated to science topics. Pretty much any question you have about the inner workings of things can be answered here. The amount of information here is staggering, and it is easy to get lost for hours while reading. While not specifically for children, this site should still be given a look if you are searching for educational resources.
This is obviously a good site for children. PBS has been around for ages. There is a whole section dedicated to educational science games. Many scientific topics are covered here in the form of games. Check out the “zoom” section of the website for science projects and activities.
This website is really good. It covers pretty much everything. It has several educational games. There are also lessons on many different topics. There are also many images and videos, as well as quizzes to test your child’s knowledge. Probably the most impressive part of the site, is the experiments. There is a large section of science experiments that can be done at home. The experiments include step by step instructions. Most of the experiments can be done with standard household items. Don’t pass this website up.
Another interesting website. Featured here is a science blog, research help, experiments, and science fair ideas. This is the website for “Science Bob” Pflugfelder. Science Bob is a passionate person about science, and has appeared on many national television shows conducting experiments. This website also has an online store where you can purchase all types of educational toys and “experiments in a box”. The store has an impressive array of items.
National Geographic Kids is another good site on the list. This website has a lot of educational value. There is a small, but unique section dedicated to science experiments and tricks. There are also games, videos, and recent news.
TIME for kids deserves a small mention here. There is a news section with a science category. There are several interesting stories and facts to read here.
Thank you for browsing this list of sites. The amount of educational sites out there is in the thousands. I hope you and your child find these sites just as interesting as we do.


Dr. Neil J. Anderson, professor of Linguistics and English Language at Brigham Young University, recently presented at the Reading Horizons distributor seminar in Salt Lake City, Utah. He shared some interesting information about how English Language Learners (ELLs) benefit from systematic phonics instruction. Two of the reasons he cited include the following:
- reading fluency increases as students learn to decode words; and
- oral reading improves when students can decode words correctly.
Reading fluency, as defined by Dr. Anderson, is "reading at an appropriate rate with adequate comprehension" (Anderson, 2008, p. 3). This definition of reading fluency is important as teachers consider what an "appropriate reading rate" is for their students. Remember that reading at a quick pace (an "appropriate rate") without comprehending what is being read is not fluent reading. Additionally, reading super slowly and understanding everything being read ("adequate comprehension") likewise is not fluent reading. The balance between the two--reading rate and comprehension--is important to fluency.
So what constitutes an "appropriate rate"? During the presentation, Anderson referenced national averages for optimal silent and oral reading rates by grade level (Hasbrouck & Tindal, 2006). Since I've talked to several people who were interested in having access to this information, I thought I would include the information in this blog post below:
Silent Reading Rates & Oral Reading Rates | Words Per Minute [WPM]
Notice that oral reading rates beyond the 8th grade level are not listed. This is due to the fact that when we read aloud, we generally do not read faster than what we can read at an 8th grade reading level.
These silent and oral reading rates can be used as a guideline when discerning appropriate reading rates for students. Adjustments to these reading rates could be made to accommodate English Language Learners and students with reading difficulties.
Anderson, N. J. (2008). Practical English language teaching: Reading. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Hasbrouck, J., & Tindal, G. A. (2006). Oral reading fluency norms: A valuable assessment tool for teaching teachers. The Reading Teacher, 59, 636-644.


policies would mean for our society's youngest members. For example, research highlights the need for early childhood programs that balance their focus on literacy and numeracy skills with comparable attention to the emotional, regulatory, and social development of all children, including those with special needs. Investments in child care should ensure that all early care and education settings are safe, stimulating, and compatible with the values and priorities of their families. Nurturing and sustained relationships between preschoolers and qualified caregivers are essential, and the time for greater skills, compensation, and benefits for child care professionals is long overdue. This comprehensive study calls for a federal-state-local task force to review public investments in child care and early education and develop a blueprint for a high quality, locally responsive system for the new decade.
Eager to Learn: Educating Our Preschoolers explores what it will take to provide early education and care for children that would develop their impressive learning potential. The report integrates recent research findings on how young children learn and the impact of early learning on later development and school achievement. Reinforcing many of the findings in From Neurons to Neighborhoods, it highlights the importance of warm emotional relationships with adults in fostering a child's cognitive as well as social development. It includes findings about the interplay of biology and environment, and variations in learning preparedness among children from different social and economic groups. The report probes a number of key issues:
The importance of a responsive teacher-child relationship in a child 's cognitive, social, and emotional development.
The substantial variation among children in developmental pathways, temperament, and environmental and cultural influences.
The learning needs of disadvantaged children and children with disabilities.
Evidence regarding the features of preschool programs, curricula, and teaching style that produce positive outcomes for children.
Preparation and continuing development of teachers.
Eager to Learn issues a range of recommendations to parents, educators, and policy makers. It calls for a substantial investment in a high-quality system of child care and preschool on the basis of the convergence of scientific and practical considerations. And it calls for systematic and widespread public education to increase public understanding of the importance of stimulating early learning experiences in the lives of young children.


“Tuning” – clarifying what students should know and be able to do to earn a degree in a discipline – will help students succeed, writes Michelle Kalina on GOOD. Colleges in Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Minnesota, Missouri, Texas and Utah are participating in the Lumina Foundation‘s Tuning USA initiative, which is led by the Institute for Evidence-Based Change.
Texas has tuned four engineering disciplines and plans to tune additional engineering fields, two science majors, mathematics, business, and computer and information science.
Because two-thirds of high school graduates in Texas who pursue higher education start at one of the state’s community colleges, Texas also convened representatives from more than 50 institutions to improve the transfer process. Community-college students who want to pursue a baccalaureate degree in civil engineering receive detailed guidance on choosing courses and applying to transfer. Students are informed about the knowledge and skills they will acquire in each course and are provided information about career opportunities ranging from construction and aerospace to manufacturing and public works projects.
Similarly, in Kentucky, two- and four-year public and private colleges are working together to tune high-demand programs in biology, business, elementary education, nursing, and social work. In the state’s nursing programs, courses are being tuned to help pave the way for students to transfer from one program or college to another.
Tuning is based on Europe’s Bologna Process, which is “creating a great deal more transparency with respect to what, exactly, students who have earned credits from a given program or university have actually learned,” writes Education Sector’s Kevin Carey.


So You Want to Do a Project about Sky Measurement!
To use your hands to measure sky distances.
- Your hands
- Stand outdoors in a clear area so that the horizon, where the sky appears to touch Earth, is visible.
- Measure the distance from the point directly overhead to the horizon. Do this using the following steps:
- Make a fist with one hand and hold this hand at arm's length over your head.
- Make a fist with your other hand and put this fist under the first as shown.
- Keeping your arms extended, lower your fists to the horizon by moving one fist under the other, counting each one until the bottom of one fist appears to touch the horizon. How many fists did you use?
Nine fists are generally needed to make the measurement.
You used your hands to measure the angular distance from the zenith (the point directly overhead) to the horizon (an imaginary line where the sky seems to meet Earth). Angular distance is the apparent or observed distance between distant objects, usually measured in degrees. For measuring angular distances in the sky, the width of a person's fist held at arm's length measures about 10°. A person with longer arms generally has wider hands, so generally everyone's fist measures an angular distance of 10°. Thus, a measurement of nine fists from the zenith to the horizon is an angular measurement of 90°.
For Further Investigation
Other parts of the hand can be used to measure larger or smaller angular distances, such as distances between stars. Do the distances between stars in a constellation (a group of stars that form a pattern in the sky) change? A project question might be, How do the distances between the stars in the Big Dipper (part of the Ursa Major Constellation) compare from one hour to the next during the night?
Clues for Your Investigation
- On a clear, moonless night, and as early in the evening as possible, use the hand measurements shown here to measure the angular distance between the end stars of the Big Dipper or between any two stars. Decide on a consistent method of measuring. For example, you may wish to measure the distance between the centers of the stars, as shown here.
- Repeat the measurement every hour for 3 or more hours.
- For the most accurate results, make four or more measurements, recording them in an Angular Distance Data table like the one shown. Average the measurements for each observation time and compare them.
- You may wish to make a drawing indicating the stars and hand measurements used, similar to the figure shown for clue 1.
References and Project Books
- Berry, Richard. Discover the Stars. New York: Harmony Books, 1987.
- Couper, Heather, and Nigel Henbest. How the Universe Works. Pleasantville, N.Y.: Reader's Digest, 1994.
- Dickinson, Terence. Exploring the Night Sky. Buffalo, N.Y.: Firefly Books, 1987.
- Estalella, Robert. The Stars. Hauppauge, N.Y.: Barron's, 1993.
- Rey, H. A The Stars. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1976. Ridpath, Ian. Stars and Planets Atlas. New York: Facts on File, 1997.
- VanCleave, Janice. Janice VanCleave's Constellations for Every Kid. New York: Wiley, 1997.
- janice VanCleave's Solar System. New York: Wiley, 2000.
- Wood, Robert W. Science for Kids: 39 Easy Astronomy Experiments. Blue Ridge Summit, Pa.: Tab Books, 1991.
Warning is hereby given that not all Project Ideas are appropriate for all individuals or in all circumstances. Implementation of any Science Project Idea should be undertaken only in appropriate settings and with appropriate parental or other supervision. Reading and following the safety precautions of all materials used in a project is the sole responsibility of each individual. For further information, consult your state’s handbook of Science Safety.


Manford, Penelope Ann
Literacy at transition : an exploration of the continuities and discontinuities in literacy practices across secondary transfer and their implications for literacy development.
The Open University.
Full text available as:
Literacy at Transition, an interpretative study adopting the sociocultural perspective of literacy as a situated social practice, offers an “experiential” (Murdoch, 1986) examination of commonalities and differences in cross-phase literacy practices. Designed as a small ethnographic case study set in four multiethnic inner city schools, it draws on the research traditions of sociolinguistics and classroom literacy research to look qualitatively at literacy practices in Years 6 and 7 (for pupils aged 10-1 1 and 11-12, hereafter Y6 and Y7). Data collection methods include observation and interview, with data recorded in open-ended fieldnotes and research journal. Progressive focusing and content analysis are used to identify themes and develop a new analytical framework.
Eight key characteristics of the literacy practices are identified. Literacy is an “autonomous” and “ideological” models (Street, 1984), and fulfils an important function as meaning maker. In Y6 literacy is at the centre of the curriculum as an object of study, whereas in Y7 its value is as a tool to “get something done”. Pedagogical approaches differ but in both phases teacher literacy occupies the dominant position within the classroom literacy practices.
Contributing to the fields of classroom literacy research, primary-secondary school transition and research methodology, this study fulfils a research need for a study which examines the teaching and learning experiences of pupils at the stage of transition from primary to secondary school (DfEE, 1999a). Its description of particular literacy practices adds to the collection of studies of classroom literacy practices. Its analytic framework foregrounds What is literacy?, Whose literacy? and How is literacy developed?, discussing issues of subject positions, literacy and power, and the relationship between teacher understanding and beliefs about literacy and the pedagogical approaches adopted. In addition the study provides a synthesis of the literature relevant to school literacy practices at the stage of primary-secondary transition. Issues of reactivity to changing researcher status and the value of informant contributions are also highlighted.
Further experiential studies of aspects of primary-secondary literacy practices and implications for practice are suggested, including the need for enhanced teacher understanding and experience of cross-phase literacy practices; literacy training for secondary subject teachers; valuing and building on pupils’ existing literacy skills; explicit explanation of cross-phase differences to pupils; “planned discontinuity”, and greater recognition and responsiveness to the multiple literacies operating within the educational arena.
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The heydays of figuration are back. Ever since the silk brocades of the academy faded a century ago, the body has been trumped in favour of Mother Abstraction and her bastard children, Pop, Minimal and Conceptual. Figuration never really left the building. It was simply holding its ground at stage left. From Picasso to Freud, painting the human form remains entrenched in the history of art making. Every foundation art education requires time with a model, and even self-trained artists of masterful figuration including Francis Bacon, no matter how fervently they denied the fact, took pencil to paper and improved with age. Giacometti, arguably the twentieth-century’s most important sculptor of the human body, understood that timelessness could be represented in its gaunt essential form.
Jamie Salmon works in a long tradition that extends from Franz Xaver Messerschmidt (1736-1783) to Ron Mueck (1958- ). Messerschmitt was born in the age of enlightenment where the physiognomy of the face, and its extreme expressions were a science. Salmon’s bronze offers to the viewer a fragmented stoicism, a portrait bust of statuesque vulnerability. In Mueck, Salmon has a peer in modern medium and intent. Salmon has replicated the visage of the imitable filmmaker David Lynch, earmarking a mascot for the strange, disturbing, and quietly uncanny. To find out more about Jamie Salmon and his work on Your gallery click here.
Steve Pulimood, an intellectual historian based at Oxford, is currently writing a book on Leonardo da Vinci and the history of anatomy.


There's been a lot of talk lately about the benefits play provides young children. It's being talked about on blogs, in research, in libraries, and in early childhood education centers. Parents are certainly encouraged to make sure their children are getting plenty of time to just PLAY (although, as a child's brain develops, it's never JUST play, is it?)
Entering the arena is a great new resource for parents, caregivers, educators and librarians alike: Playopedia. Created by the blogger behind the great Childhood 101 site, Playopedia pulls together the "best of the best play ideas on the world wide web." Ideas are organized in useful categories such as "moving", "creating", and "outside" (each of these categories is explained; check the link at bottom).
How can this site be useful to librarians? I know that I've already found early literacy development ideas to share with parents in my workshops (check out "Hide and Seek Word Fun" and "Alphabet Secret Agent"). However, there are also lots of craft projects that can be adapted for library use - how about the spinning pinwheels or coffee filter flowers? And as bloggers can submit their ideas, the site will be continuously growing - so check back often!


Resources created by Robin Smathers
- Women in flight: Using music to study American women pioneers in flight
- As North Carolina's 97-98 Christa McAuliffe Teaching Fellow, I designed this plan to musically enhance the 5th grade social studies of American heroes, focusing on women pioneers in flight. It is intended to utilize singing and rhythmic activities to compare and contrast the lives of Amelia Earhart and Christa McAuliffe. Amelia Earhart was the first woman to successfully complete a solo trans-Atlantic flight and tragically disappeared while attempting to fly around the world in 1937. Christa McAuliffe was selected for NASA's Teacher-in-Space program and tragically died in the 1986 Challenger space shuttle disaster. I traditionally use this plan close to the January 28 anniversary of the shuttle disaster.
- Format: lesson plan (grade 5 Music Education and Social Studies)
- By Robin Smathers.


Course Number: 333*/3.0 3L (Course Code Explanation)
Open To: B.Mus. and B.Mus./B.Ed. students, non-B.Mus. students
Area(s): Music Education
Instructor(s): Dr. Margaret Walker
Day(s) and Time(s): T: 10.30-11.30, Th: 8.30-10.30
Room: HLH 120
An historical overview and introduction to the philosophical and pedagogical views of Emile Jaques-Dalcroze, Zoltan Kodály and Carl Orff to teaching music.
This course is an introduction to the historical roots and philosophies, methods, materials, curriculum design, North American adaptations and issues of the music education concepts of Emile Jaques-Dalcroze (Switzerland, 1865-1950), Zoltan Kodaly (Hungary, 1882-1967), and Carl Orff (Germany, 1895-1982). The approaches of each will be compared, contrasted, and related to the scholarship of folk music. Many of these concepts and methods are used in studio teaching as well as elementary and secondary schools throughout the world.
Class activities include movement, singing, hand signing, creative projects, playing the recorder and percussion instruments (including the xylophone, glockenspiel and metallophone) small and large group discussion, and stimulation. Participation is mandatory due to the interactive nature of the class.


Drawing On Science For Kids
Water droplets are always rising in the atmosphere. When the droplets get cold enough they condense (turn to a liquid) on dust, pollen grains or other small particles in clouds. When they reach a temperature of 32o F (0 o C) they begin to crystalize forming a cover of thin ice. When ice crystals form they trap air making them light and fragile. This combination of ice on dust particles forms a snow crystal. As snow crystals grow they become heavier and fall to earth. Falling crystals will combine with each other to form a snowflake. About 2 to 200 snow crystals can form a single snow flake. There is no reason why we can call a snowflake a snow crystal. They are really the same. A symmetrical, six-sided snowflake is perfectly formed. All sides are exactly alike. But most are asymmetrical (not the same on all sides).
There are four basic types of snow crystals. The shape depends on the temperature at which it was formed. The simplest type is needle-shaped, which is formed at temperatures between 27o F and 23o F . All of the other crystals have six sides. One is shaped like a six-sided, hollow column formed at tempratures between 18o F and 23 o F. One is shaped as a thin, flat six-sided plate formed at temperatures between 10o F and 18o F. And then there are very complex six-pointed star shapes formed between 3 o F and 10 o F.
Crystals grow as more and more water molecules settle on them. If a crystal has small branches sticking out, water molecules will combine with them. When more and more water molecules reach the branches they grow larger and larger. If the large branch has smaller branches the crystal becomes complex. It seems that the higher the temperature, the slower a snow crystal grows.
The many surfaces of snow crystals tend to reflect light in all directions. Our eyes see this light as white, so that snowflakes will always appear white to us. If you've ever seen glacial ice it appears blue. This is because the ice is so fully packed that there's little or no air in the crystals. When impurities in the air are trapped in the formation of snow crystals the snow will, of course, become discolored.
We all like it when it snows; especially if the weather conditions are not very severe. The life of a snowflake depends on the temperature, which must be at least 32o F both in the high atmosphere and on the ground. If the temperature is warmer near the ground the snowflakes will melt and it will rain instead. But even though snowflakes are fragile, there are times when they can be dangerous. High winds and falling snow result in a snowstorm. And when the storm is a blizzard then the danger is increased.
Blizzard conditions occur when the winds reach a speed of at least 35 mph. But the blizzard does not have to be falling snow. It can be snow that is being lifted from the ground - snow that has fallen previously. Or it can be a combination of falling and ground snow. In any case the visibility must be ¼ mile or less and the conditions must last for at least three hours.
In some areas the falling snow can reach ground layers of 3 to 6 feet. Winds can increase the depth by piling up masses of snow in selected areas.
When rain falls during conditions where the ground temperature and the air just above the ground is below freezing, the water droplets will freeze into small ice pellets before they reach the ground. This results in sleet. Freezing rain occurs when the rain water does not freeze until it actually touches the ground.
Whenever such storms or severe cold weather is predicted, you have to consider the Wind Chill Index. We experience a greater loss of body temperature on a windy, cold day than we do on a windless, cold day. This loss of temperature makes us feel colder. This is what is meant by wind chill.
Something to think about: 1) Snowflakes as large as 15 inches fell in Montana during a snow storm. 2) The average yearly snowfall in Stampede Pass, Washington is 430 inches. 3) Snowflake High School is in Snowflake, Arizona. 4) Even when snow is white and looks clean, you should not eat it. Especially if it falls in an area with air pollution. 5) Can two snowflakes be exactly the same? Studies have shown that small crystals may be alike, but larger crystals are different in shape.
Questions/comments? E-mail Steve: Drawingonscience@aol.com


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Directions for Research on English as a
Second Language Instruction
• Experiments to identify effective instructional practices for different groups of language learners (with varying first languages, knowledge of English, first language literacy skills, educational backgrounds, and reasons for attending instruction) to help instructors differentiate instruction.
• Studies to specify the length, type, and intensity of instruction that is the most effective for different language learner groups.
• Systematic and longitudinal analyses of language teaching practices (integrating language structures with language use and meaningful content) and documentation of outcomes for adult language learners.
• Comprehensive description and analysis of the components of effective programs at multiple levels (instructional content, teaching practices, student interactions, and so on) using quantitative and qualitative methods that link components to outcomes.
• Background variables that have an impact on outcomes and that are important to assess at program entry and for differentiated instruction.
• Characteristics of learners and aspects of language exposure (both inside and outside the classroom) that predict learning and a range of other desired outcomes that include persistence, continuation with further education, finding employment, and lifelong learning.
• The relation between first language skills and the development of spoken and written English skills and identification of opportunities for transferring skills and strategies.
• Ways to provide effective multimodal language instruction (speaking, reading, writing, visual presentations) and technology.
• Ways to integrate classroom instruction with informal learning opportunities provided by interactions in communities and through the use of technology.
• The most effective ways to integrate language and literacy development with content instruction.
• Development and evaluation of “integrated instruction” models that combine language and literacy education with academic and career education.
• Assessments that (a) provide enough information about language and literacy skills and progress to be useful for planning instruction and providing feedback to learners, (b) are valid measures of practically important language and literacy competencies, and (c) measure affective, cultural, and psychological factors that affect learning.
• Teacher knowledge and professional development to effectively administer and use assessments and flexibly adapt the curriculum to meet learners’ needs.


The Mughal emperors were patrons of literature and they did much to remove the barriers between Hindus and Muslims to promote a happy fusion of t..wtures. In this connection, we may mention the name ot' 'Malik Muhammad Jayasi who in his Padmavat describes the story of Padmini, and Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan whose exquisite dohas are still read and admired all over northern India. It was Akbar's patronage that gave a vigorous stimulus to literary activity. The Persian literature of his reign comprised historical works, translations and poetry. The great historical works of his reign are the Akbarnamah and Ain-i-Akbari of Abul Fazal, the Muntkhab-ul-Twarikh by Badauni and Tabaqat-i-Akbari. by Nizam-ud-din Ahmed. Akbar was a keen student of Hindu culture and so by his orders many Sanskrit works wer~ translated into Persian. Badauni translated Ramayana and Faizi the Lilavati. The Mahabharata was translated and renamed Razm-namah. The translator of the Atharva Veda was Hazi Ibrahim Sarhindi. Other works translated were Rajatarangini and Panchatantra. Among the important poets of the period were Ghizali, Faizi and Muhammad Hussain Naziri. Jahangir also had a fine taste for literature and his memoirs are second only to that of Babur. During Shah Jahan's period many historical works were composed i.e. Padshahnamah by Abdul Hamid Lahori, Shah-Jahan-namah. by Inayat Khan etc. Aurangzeb was a learned man but he disliked history and poetry. His taste was for Muslim theology and jurisprudence of which he was a critical writer. It was under him that the Fatwahi-Alamgiri was written. The most famous history of his reign, the Muntakhab-ul-Lubab of Khafi Khan, was prepared in secrecy.
This period has been described as the "Augustan Age of Hindustani Literature" as Akbar gave impetus to Hindi poetry. Persons like Birbal, Raja Man Singh, etc. were poets of no mean order. Among the most notable poet was Tulsidas who wrote the famous Ramcharitamanas. Surdas, the blind bard of Agra, wrote numerous verses in Brij Bhasa, the most important being Sur Sugar. The two famous poets of Shah Jahan's time were Sundar, the author of Sundar Srinagar, and Bihari Lal, the author of Satsai. In Bengal there developed in this period remarkable literature dealing with the life of Chaitanya Deva.
The Mughals did 'not have any systematic organisation for imparting education. Some sort of elementary education was imparted in maktabs and pathsalas. Further it was mainly confined to the upper sections of society and the clergy. Most Mughal emperors were educated and so were their ladies. Gulbadan Begum was an accomplished lady. She wrote the Humayun namah. Nur Jahan, Mumtaz Mahal, Jahanara Begum and Zeb-un-Nisa were highly educated ladies.


Action Jackson Lines: Free Lesson Plan Download
Grade Level: K-2 Art Education Lesson Plan
Art Elements: Color, Line
Art Skills: Fine motor, painting
Making Connections: Art History
* Get more free lessons like this, on our Lessons Page
I love seeing how the fine motor skills develop, and how kids learn to make marks on the paper. The objective of this lesson is that students can MAKE 5 or more line types. I also do want them to know the names of the lines, but it’s more important for me to see how they can use a tool to create these different lines. They can choose to arrange them anywhere on their paper.
One other strategy I use is to relate each line type to something in their everyday life. The dashed like is like the lines in the road. The curved lines are like a curvy road. The dotted lines remind us of how we use the glue in the art room. The zigzag line is like a z on it’s side, getting it’s “zzzzzz’s” and the straight line is like a robot, very rigid. We have fun acting these out drawing them in the air and talking about them.
I also relate the artwork to Jackson Pollack. “Action Jackson” is a fun way for kids to remember Pollack, and the different lines they make relate to his splatter painting. They really do not forget this. I am hoping by connecting the artwork to real life situations, practicing the line types and connecting it to art history, the students will have a deeper understanding of the project instead of “just drawing lines.”


Posted In: Educator Voices, Kids Not Cuts, Moving in Congress, States, Virginia
By Amanda Litvinov
Educators across the country are celebrating the many positive outcomes of Election 2012 for public education in federal, state and local races. And they should! Teachers, support professionals, professors, students and retired educators made a difference by educating voters about what was at stake for students and schools.
Take Action ›
Sign our pledge to speak up for kids in the budget fight. Tell Congress: Kids Not Cuts! ›
Now educators, parents, and all advocates of public schools are turning their focus to the budget battle that will resume when Congress returns next week. Anita Jackson, who taught K-12 special education students for 30 years in Virginia, is one of them.
“When school funding is cut, it could be the decision that makes or breaks a child’s progress,” she said. Jackson, who is now a library tech in a middle school, has witnessed first-hand how budget cuts affect the services schools are able to provide.
Nearly $1 billion for special education programs and $5 billion in overall federal education spending will evaporate if lawmakers can’t agree on a budget solution and across-the-board cuts go into effect on January 2.
Should those cuts happen, roughly 13,400 educators serving special needs students would likely lose their jobs according to an NEA analysis.
Expecting schools to serve the needs of all students while cutting their funding again and again just doesn’t add up, said Jackson. “When it comes to special ed, personnel is needed to provide individualized aid—all of that is crucial.”
All federal education programs are at stake, including those that support early childhood learning, rural schools, children living in poverty and English language learners. Millions of students will lose services and nearly 80,000 educators will lose their jobs.
But the budget proposals lawmakers have brought to the table to prevent across-the-board cuts have so far focused on cutting essential services and public education while ignoring the obvious need to stop giving massive tax breaks to the wealthiest corporations and individuals.
Paul Ryan’s budget would cut $2.2 billion dollars from IDEA, which makes up the bulk of special education funding in schools, over the next two years. The Ryan Budget—which NEA President Dennis Van Roekel has referred to as an “American Dream killer”—also proposes drastic cuts to early childhood education, would reduce or eliminate services to 4 million low-income K-12 students, and grants that help students attain a college education.
Although Ryan was not elected Vice President, he is the current chair of the Budget Committee in the U.S. House of Representatives and will be a leader of those looking to cut their way to a balanced budget.
President Obama realizes this approach is not only impossible, but irresponsible, and has called on Congress to ask the nation’s most fortunate to pay their fair share.
Anita Jackson has her own message to Congress: “It’s going to cost America in the long run to go cheap on public education. It is not wasteful to provide adequate funding. American children and their public educators that work with them and serve them do so much on a dime, all they’re asking for is a quarter, not a dollar.”
“Can we get a quarter?”
You can help stop these devastating cuts to public education funding. Take the first step today by signing our Kids Not Cuts pledge to hold your members of Congress accountable and urge them to stand up for kids and working families by rejecting a bad budget deal.


As LACMA's curatorial and exhibition programming continues to expand and connect the dialogue between art and film, the museum's education and public programming works in tandem to offer opportunities for the public to create connections between art and film in their own vision.
The educational component of Art+Film is critical to the mission of the initiative. These programs, sponsored by OneWest Bank, recognize the power of media today and the importance of visual literacy in an age when moving images dominate. The Art+Film Education Initiative LACMA offers both students and teachers hands-on opportunities to use technology for personal expression. Informed by the works of art in the galleries, the offerings—such as Frame x Frame, Through Your Lens, and the Art+Film Teacher Institute—help cultivate media literacy through both looking, analyzing, and making.
Funding for art classes and after-school activities have been dramatically cut in Los Angeles. LACMA is an important resource in Los Angeles for art education and hands-on learning. In Frame x Frame: Reimagining the Everyday, teaching artists lead seventh-grade students on a tour of the museum's galleries. This exploration provides insight into how artists see ordinary objects in a new light. Students are then given an opportunity to reconsider everyday objects from their own lives by exploring the traditional art of drawing and activating it with creative technology.
In Through Your Lens, an after-school program that takes place at school sites, middle-school students can explore the practices and strategies used by artists and filmmakers to create works of art. The eight-week-long course provides students with an opportunity to create experimental films inspired by works of art in LACMA’s collection using what they’ve learned throughout the course. In the process, students develop their awareness of the power of the moving image.
For teachers, the Art+Film Teacher Institute advances interdisciplinary connections between visual art, media literacy, and the core curriculum. Teams work together to create a short film inspired by a work of art from LACMA’s collection. The production process explores the parallels between reading, writing, and filmmaking, emphasizing independent and collaborative art making.
The education department’s outreach expands beyond the boundaries of LACMA’s campus. One example of this is the LACMA9 Art+Film Lab, which launched in the city of Redlands in June 2013 with support from The James Irvine Foundation. Through this initiative, LACMA brings to nine cities throughout Southern California free film screenings and hands-on workshops. The lab, designed by artist Jorge Pardo, continues to travel to local cities through September 2014. LACMA9 is currently on hiatus, but returns in January, when it will set up shop at East Los Angeles County in Monterey Park. Through LACMA9, the museum is able to serve the larger Southern California community through film and workshops that harness the creative spirit.
The Art+Film initiative will continue to evolve through education and public programs at LACMA. From film series to workshops to community-outreach events, LACMA is fully committed to highlighting importance of creating a dialogue between works of art and the moving image.
Linda Theung, editor


Date of this Version
NEBRASKA POLICY CHOICES 1989, ed. Miles T. Bryant, Patricia O'Connell, and Christine M. Reed (Omaha: Center for Public Affairs Research, 1989).
Art education has traditionally been of low priority in Nebraska's-and the nation's -schools. Discipline-Based Art Education (DBAE) is a new approach that integrates the various facets of art education throughout the general curriculum. DBAE attempts to teach students critical reasoning skills so they may learn to make their own judgments rather than be manipulated through "technological image management." It also enhances the traditional art curriculum through multicultural study. Nebraska's Prairie Visions project can serve as a model to other states, which are increasingly recognizing the value of DBAE.


To work as an elementary school teacher, patience is a requirement. You should be able to use audiovisual aids in order to help teach lessons and lectures. Duties include preparation and correction and grading of assignments and tests, ability to counsel students when there are classroom issues, keep up with attendance as is required by the school, coordinate educational field trips, and maintain order of a large group of children in and outside of the classroom while on school property. Minimum requirements include certification from the state in elementary education and a Bachelor’s degree in Elementary Education. Elementary school teachers are required to be able to listen and speak for long periods of time and spend hours walking, standing and occasionally sitting. This is a physical and mental job. Most company will include a classroom of students grades 6 or below and on occasion other teachers or school principal. This job is 5 days a week in the classroom from morning to mid afternoon and requires time spent at home to be focused on work, grading, and creating outlines of study plans as well. Elementary school teachers may be employed in elementary schools only and should have prior experience in dealing with children, especially for long periods of time. Special knowledge in certain subjects such as English and early education mathematics is also necessary for this job. Teachers are also expected to keep track of grades and have open communication with both students and their parents and be able to maturely address any issues that may arise with behavioral problems or grades.
Elementary School Teacher Tasks
- Maintain accurate student records as required by laws and administrative regulations.
- Instruct elementary students individually and in groups.
- Maintain classroom discipline.
- Evaluate students and communicate progress with parents, guardians, and administrators.
- Plan, assign, and evaluate lessons, projects and tests.


Note: To protect the privacy of our members, e-mail addresses have been removed from the archived messages. As a result, some links may be broken.
[ Thread ][ Subject ][ Author ][ Date ]sandra may cheung
Tue, 20 Oct 1998 15:39:46 -0700 (PDT)
This is in response to the question about whether Leonardo da vinci was
the inventor or the perfector of scissors. I actually have no idea, but I
just want to let people know that there is a huge exhibition of Leodardo
da vinci's stuff and the Royal Victoria Museum in Victoria B.C. which is
supposed to be amazing. It is also either going to or has gone to Boston,
the only other destination. I think looking into the inventors and
contexts of the tools and equipment for art making can be really
important. By learning about how inventions came about, we can really
encourage students to think of themselves as possible inventors of some
really important things. I think it would be great to get kids to look at
tools of art making in this contextual way too.
sandra from UBC art education


Diagram of an iron atom
When a red giant star has changed all of its helium into carbon and oxygen, it then begins to turn the carbon and oxygen atoms into iron atoms. Iron is the heaviest kind of atom that a star can make, so when a star has made most of its carbon and oxygen into iron, it becomes a supernova and explodes.
When the supernova explodes, it shoots out carbon, oxygen, and iron atoms all over the Universe, and eventually gravity sucks these atoms into new planets like Earth. All of the iron on Earth was originally inside stars.
An iron meteorite
All living things - both plants and animals - also contain iron. Plants use iron to help them pull energy from sunlight through their leaves, and animals (including people) use iron to move oxygen through their bodies and bring energy to their cells. Because iron has only two electrons in its outermost ring, those two lonely electrons join up easily with oxygen atoms.
Iron looks black to us when it is on its own, and it looks red to us when it joins up with oxygen. That's why blood looks red (it has iron and oxygen in it), and it's also why rusty iron looks red (the rust is iron that has combined with oxygen from the air or water). And that's the way Greek black-figure and red-figure vase painting works.
Learn by doing - Iron
Another project with iron
Chemical reactions using iron
History of iron and steel
To find out more about atoms, check out these books from Amazon.com or from your library:
Science for Kids home page
Kidipede home page


Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art is an art museum. It is sometimes called The Met. It is found on the eastern edge of Central Park in New York City. It has a collection of more than two million works of art. It is divided into nineteen departments.
The main building is one of the world's largest art galleries, at about 2,000,000 square feet (190,000 m2) in area. The Met is the most popular art museum in the United States with more than 5 million visitors each year. There is also a much smaller second location, the Cloisters. The Cloisters museum and gardens, which opened to the public in 1938, is a branch of the Museum. It is located in Inwood, in northern Manhattan. It has medieval art. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which includes its Main Building on Fifth Avenue and the Cloisters in northern Manhattan, dates back to 1866.
People are asked to donate to the museum upon admission. However, one can choose not to donate. The museum suggests a $25 donation per person.
History[change | change source]
In 1866, a group of Americans in Paris, France, agreed to create a "national institution and gallery of art". Their goal was to bring art and art education to the American people.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded in 1870. The founders included businessmen and financiers, as well as leading artists and thinkers of the day, who wanted to open a museum to bring art and art education to the American people. It opened on February 20, 1872, and was originally located at 681 Fifth Avenue.
Art[change | change source]
The museum has art from classical antiquity and Ancient Egypt, paintings and sculptures from European artists, and a large collection of American and modern art. There is also a large number of of African, Asian, Oceanic, Byzantine, and Islamic artwork. The museum has collections of musical instruments, costumes and accessories, and antique weapons and armor from around the world.
References[change | change source]
- "The Metropolitan Museum of Art: The Permanent Collection and Special Exhibitions". http://www.metmuseum.org/Works_of_Art/noteToReader.asp. Retrieved 2007-04-17.
- "The Metropolitan Museum of Art at HumanitiesWeb". Humanitiesweb.org. 2012-01-13. http://www.humanitiesweb.org/human.php?s=g&p=a&a=i&ID=1138. Retrieved 2012-06-11.
- "Works of Art: The Cloisters". http://www.metmuseum.org/works_of_art/introduction.asp?dep=7. Retrieved 2010-03-21.
- "NYC art museum accused of duping visitors on admission fees". 25 March 2013 (Associated Press/Fox News). 2013-03-25. http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/03/25/nyc-art-museum-accused-duping-visitors-on-admission-fees/. Retrieved 26 March 2013.
- "Brief History of The Museum". Metmuseum.org. http://www.metmuseum.org/about-the-museum/press-room/general-information/2005/a-brief-history-of-the-museum. Retrieved 2013-02-18.
- Moske, James. "This Weekend in Met History: February 20". Museum Archives. http://www.metmuseum.org/about%20the%20museum/now%20at%20the%20met/features/2012/this%20weekend%20in%20met%20history%20february%2020. Retrieved 18 February 2013.
- de Montebello, Philippe (1997). Masterpieces of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art. pp. 6–7. .
- Pyhrr, Stuart W. (2003). Arms and Armor: Notable Acquisitions 1991-2002 - The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New Haven: Yale University Press. p. 6. .


Writers, Readers, and Reputations : Literary Life in Britain 1870-1918: Literary Life in Britain 1870-1918
Writers, Readers, and Reputations explores the literary world in which the modern best-seller first emerged. Writers were promoted as stars and celebrities, advertising both products and themselves. Philip Waller's detailed and entertaining study is a collective biography of literary figures, some forgotten, some enduring, over half a century. - ;Charles Dickens died in 1870, the same year in which universal elementary education was introduced. During the following generation a mass reading public emerged, and the term 'best-seller' was coined. In new and cheap editions Dickens's stories sold hugely, but these were progressively outstripped in quantity by the likes of Hall Caine and Marie Corelli, Charles Garvice and Nat Gould. Who has now heard of these writers? Yet Hall Caine, for one, boasted of having made more money from his pen than any previous author. This book presents a panoramic view of literary life in Britain over half a century from 1870 to 1914, teasing out authors' relations with the reading public and tracing how reputations were made and unmade. It surveys readers' habits, the book trade, popular literary magazines and the role of reviewers, and examines the construction of a classical canon by critics concerned about the supposed corruption of popular taste. Certain writers were elevated as national heroes, yet Britain drew its writers from abroad as well as from home. Authors became stars and celebrities, and a literary tourism grew around their haunts. They advertised products from cigarettes to toothpaste; they were fashion-conscious and promoted themselves via profiles, interviews, and carefully posed photographs; they went on lecture tours to America; and their names were pushed by a new professional breed: the literary agent. Some angled for knighthoods, even peerages, and cut a figure in high society and London clubland. The debated public issues of the day and campaigned on all manner of things from questions of faith and women's rights to censorship and conscription. During the Great War they penned propaganda. Meanwhile the cinema was developing to challenge the supremacy of the written word over the imagination. Authors took to that too, as an opportunity for new adventure. Writers, Readers, and Reputations is richly entertaining and informative, amounting to a collective biography of a generation of writers and their world. - ;the remarkable thing about this extraordinary book is that throughout its thousand pages it remains consistently readable, enjoyable, and informative... Waller's style is addictive and discursive...and the reader will gain greatly the more that she or he reads - William Whyte, EHR, cxxi 494;The richness of Waller's study is beyond question. This is an extraordinary mine of fact, detail, quotation, anecdote and reminiscence. Every reader, no matter how familiar with the literature of the period, will learn from the range of its excavations. - Dinah Birch, TLS;[A] serious achievement...It will prove an invaluable resource to scholars seeking a reference tool on a huge range of topics, not only because of its coverage, but because Waller produces the kind of scholarship on which one can rely. - The Cambridge Quarterly, Vol. 36, No. 1;...a magnificent study, one that will be recognised as a defining literary history of the period. - The Review of English Studies, Vol58, No. 233
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Thinking Northern: Textures of Identity in the North of England
Limited preview - 2007
Talking Books : Readings in Hellenistic and Roman Books of Poetry: Readings ...
G. O. Hutchinson
No preview available - 2008


If you've ever watched a pianist's fingers flawlessly glide over the keys during an intense performance, you've seen the ideal outcome of piano lessons: mastery of the instrument. If you felt drawn to the instrument but daunted by the amount of practice required for proficiency, you should know that current neurological research indicates that our brains are more adaptable than we thought. Except for a few specialized skills for which there is a limited window of learning opportunity, students of any age can master the piano. All it takes is practice and desire.
The brain learns best by learning. While that may sound circular, it's better to think of a positive feedback loop in which the brain's ability to learn is amplified every time that ability is used. There are many platitudes to describe this phenomenon, and this one is fitting: "The more you know, the more you grow."
However, the relationship between learning and the ability to learn is not a simple cause-and-effect chain. There are limits. There are well-known developmental windows wherein the ability to learn a specific skill, such as identifying pitch separate from scale, known as absolute pitch (AP), is increased and after which that skill is much more difficult or impossible to attain. However, those windows aren't as static or limiting as we once thought. In other words, the lines of demarcation for these developmental windows and the amount they limit our ability to learn specialized skills have often been drawn in the wrong places.
The initial learning experience with an activity such as playing piano is perhaps a more critical factor than the age you begin learning. During your first piano lesson, your brain creates its network of neural pathways for "piano playing." EEG imaging studies indicate that your brain will use the neural network it creates during the initial experience of this new activity every time you play the piano afterword (Bangert & Altenmüller, 2003).
Clearly, first impressions are important.
Once your brain lays down a physical framework for playing piano during your first lesson, that neural network becomes a foundational part of how your brain will engage in playing piano for the rest of your life. This finding shows that learning a new skill such as piano playing requires the brain to make a permanent commitment to the physical hardware of performing that skill that cannot be easily altered at any point during your piano lessons, so clarity and correct technique are critical during your initial experiences of playing piano.
The scope of brain involvement in music creation and appreciation extends far beyond this instrument-specific network. Early brain imaging researchers found that nearly every region of the brain was activated by melodic listening (Mazziota, 1988). Different areas of the brain light up in response to different elements of music, such as melody, rhythm, duration and tone. Neuroscientists widely believe that the neural systems for processing various elements of music are spread out throughout the brain, "with different aspects of music processed by distinct neural circuits" (Parsons 2001, p. 211).
Furthermore, the notion of music processing as a right-brain activity is misleading. Although there are many cases of right-hemispheric dominance during brain-imaging music research, a number of studies have shown that subjects with musical training who engage in music listening are more likely to display left-hemispheric dominance or no dominance, rather than right-hemispheric dominance (Edwards, 2008). Learning piano is a whole-brain activity that strengthens your brain's ability to learn music.
As we learn more about the science of learning, many of our cultural attitudes toward music education are changing. You no longer need to begin piano lessons at 3 to attain proficiency. On the contrary; you can begin to study music at any age and benefit greatly from it.
Science has shown that although people respond to music in myriad ways, we all respond. Music is a universal element of human experience. Once you start to learn about it, your brain is designed to continue to learn. The more you know, the more you grow.
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Bangert, M., & Altenmüller, E. O. (2003). "Mapping Perception to Action in Piano Practice: A Longitudinal DC-EEG Study." BMC Neuroscience, 4(26), 14.
Edwards, Richard D. (2008). "The Neurosciences and Music Education: An Online Database of Neuromusical Brain Imaging Research." ProQuest UMI Dissertation Publishing, 1-85.
Parsons, L. M. (2001). "Exploring the Functional Neuroanatomy of Music Performance, Perception, and Comprehension." Annals of the New York Academy of Science, 930, 211-231.


Follow these 10 LSAT Reading Comprehension tips during your LSAT prep to increase your LSAT reading comprehension speed, accuracy, and overall score.
Note: The LSAT Reading Comprehension Bible has more great RC tips!
LSAT Reading Comprehension Tips
- Read the RC passage first. Don’t read the questions first.
- Try and read the RC passage in about 3 minutes.
- When reading the RC passage, underline key words/phrases:
- List items (e.g., “1st”, “2nd”, “3rd”)
- Technical terms (especially those that are unfamiliar to you)
- Phrases indicating a shift in Point-of-View (e.g., “advocates argue”; “proponents believe”; “But”; “However”; “Nevertheless”)
- Other words indicating that important information follows: “According to…”; “Furthermore”; “For these reasons”; and other obvious indicators “Importantly…”, “Primarily…”, etc.
- Don’t get stuck reading a difficult sentence or paragraph over and over. Just try and understand it as well as you can, and refer back to it if a question regarding it appears.
- If you quickly realize that an entire passage is going to be particularly difficult, consider saving tough RC passages for the end of the section rather than burning through time. If you run into a particularly difficult reading comprehension passage, don’t let it have a negative impact on the remainder of your RC section. Crush out the ones that you are more comfortable with, then return to the difficult RC passage at the end of your time. The same thing goes for individual questions.
- Learn what passage topics you have trouble with (e.g., scientific, economic, history, etc.). Save those passages containing tough topics until the end of the section.
- When reading a passage, put yourself in the position of the author. How does the author feel about the subject matter? What position does the author take? Is the author’s point-of-view favorable? critical? neutral? What is the main point that the author is attempting to express? Does the author agree with proponents or critics? Specifically, what points does the author most strongly support/reject? You’ll find that many questions relate to these points.
- Each paragraph will generally have a specific function within the LSAT reading comprehension passage. Understand how each paragraph functions, and how the overall passage is organized.
- Flip through each passage and note the number of questions per passage. All else equal, work on passages with the greatest number of questions first, and the fewest number of questions last.
- To end this list of LSAT Reading Comprehension tips, I recommend working through The LSAT Reading Comprehension Bible and plenty of real LSAT preptests, following the tips outlined in this LSAT Reading Comp tip list. Drill. Review. Then drill some more.
- The LSAT Reading Comprehension Bible
- How to Improve your LSAT Reading Comprehension Score
- The Best LSAT Reading Comprehension Strategies


ART EDUCATION AND EARLY WORKS
The exact date of this first step on the road to fame is also still somewhat uncertain. Vosmaer believes it was in 1619, but the assertion of Orlers that when his parents allowed him to abandon the unloved Latin, they apprenticed him to a painter, is so precise, that it is unreasonable to suppose that his father should have returned to the attack. We may consequently assume that the final desertion of the Muses and enlistment in the cause of the Arts came after, not before, that enrolment at the University--that is to say, late in 1620 or perhaps early in 1621. Further facts go to prove this point. His first apprenticeship, in accordance with the rules of the Guilds of Saint Luke, lasted three years, and came to an end therefore in 1623 or early in 1624. He then went to a second master in Amsterdam, but remained with him only six months; so that in either case the date of his leaving Amsterdam and returning to Leyden would have been some time in 1624. Now there is no doubt that it was in 1624 that this took place, and the only obvious conclusion is that his first apprenticeship did not commence before 1620.
The painter who was then chosen for the honour of first guiding the hand of the young Rembrandt, by which honour he is nowadays almost alone distinguished, was Jacob van Swanenburch. A man of good position, the son of one painter, the brother of an


A Steiner Waldorf school aspires to a distinctive ethos that puts the needs of the developing child at the heart of its educational practice. This ethos crosses boundaries of ethnicity, gender, religion and nationality and affects every gesture in the school irrespective of its cultural setting. The curriculum and pedagogy is founded on the notion that lesson material and educational method must be in harmony with the developmental readiness and emergent capacities of the children. This awareness is a common thread that guides and binds the work in the school.
‘Formal’ teaching and learning begins in the Lower School, where the thread of rhythm, imagination and experiential learning introduced in the Early Years is picked up and extended. Teaching in the Lower School embraces the idea of integrated education in which the core skills of oracy, numeracy and literacy are woven together with a study of science and an immersion in the arts.
The two-hour Main Lesson, usually given in the morning, is an opportunity for the children to work with a range of themes over an extended period, and to engage with those themes via a variety of perspectives and learning styles. Topics introduced in the Main Lesson are varied and age-appropriate; for example, ‘Weighing and measuring’ in Class 3 (age 9/10 years) or ‘The Story of Rome’ in Class 6 (age 11/12 years).
These themes can be extended and developed in subject lessons, as appropriate, and represent an opportunity for an experience that embraces practical, aesthetic and cognitive learning styles, and for an education that is genuinely inter-disciplinary. Typical subject lessons in a Steiner Waldorf school include one or two foreign languages, music, games, handwork, landwork, religion and eurythmy (a movement-based activity that addresses coordination, concentration and spatial awareness, as well as social skills).
A further distinctive feature of the Lower School is the role of the class teacher, who works with a single class of children over an extended period (typically, between six and eight years), taking the children from the early stages of childhood into the throes of adolescence. This is an expression of the importance given to cultivating positive social relationships within the class and the school as a whole.
Main Lesson curriculum in the Lower School:
The introduction, consolidation and practise of literacy and numeracy skills are at the foundation of every Main Lesson throughout the Lower School. This work is supported and enhanced by the progressive introduction of age-appropriate themes and topics. These include:
Class 1: Fairy tales and legends
Class 2: Fables and animal stories, nature stories
Class 3: Traditional crafts and farming, measurement, Old Testament stories
Class 4: Myths and legends of northern cultures, animal study, local geography, mathematics (fractions)
Class 5: Ancient civilisations, Greek history, plant study, mathematics (decimals), UK geography
Class 6: Roman and medieval history, geology, mathematics (percentages), physics, European geography
Using SSP (Systematic Synthetic Phonics )
Our school use phonics as one of many tools for teaching literacy but we start with an `analytical` approach, beginning with the whole and moving to the parts, not the other way around. From a story will come a sentence, within the sentence there will be focus on certain words, within those words specific letters, sounds and blends will be explored. Letters are then learned as a picture or `shape`. They learn that some letters – particularly vowels – have more than one sound and will be able to identify which sound it is making in a given word but the rules as how this works come later. Once the children have mastered a few letters they will begin to write simple words and sentences and from this prior activity of writing they will begin to learn how to read.


Personalized Plaster Masks: Free Lesson Plan Download
Level: Middle School Art Education Lesson Plan
Art Elements: Form, Color, Shape
Art Skills: Plaster, Painting
Making Connections: History of Masks in Art, Cultural Mask References
* Get more free lessons like this, on our Lessons Page
Plaster masks are fun to make. Whether you use a plaster facial mold or a real face, students will love this lesson. It’s always amazing to me how involved students become in the designing and creating of their masks. Students bring in materials from home, share with their peers, and glow throughout this lesson. I’m always amazed at the unique themes they pick and how proud they are of their final products.
To introduce the lesson, I introduce the history of masks. Sometimes I have the local art museum bring in different masks and give a presentation to the students. If they’re unabailable, I give my own presentation using images. Once you create a presentation, you can use it again and again.
Be sure to check out this great presentation on the history of masks from The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The presentation is an excellent resource for you to use if you want to prepare a PowerPoint or other presentation for the introduction to masks. However, use the presentation with discretion. I personally wouldn’t show this video in my classroom due the nudity and commentary.
For more tips and tricks for a successful plaster lesson, check out the following two articles: Do You Dare? Plastering Students’ Faces for Amazing Mask Results and 9 Essential Tips For A Successful Plaster Mask Lesson


|About this Recording
9.70179 - BARTÓK, B.: For Children, Vols. 1 and 2 / The First Term at the Piano (L. Kertész)
Béla Bartók (1881–1945)
The Hungarian composer Béla Bartók was born in 1881 in a region that now forms part of Romania. His father, director of an agricultural college, was a keen amateur musician, while it was from his mother that he received his early piano lessons. The death of his father in 1889 led to a less settled existence, as his mother returned to work as a teacher, eventually making her home in Pozsony, the modern Bratislava, where Bartók passed his early adolescence, counting among his school-fellows the composer Ernő Dohnányi. Offered the chance of musical training in Vienna, like Dohnányi he chose instead Budapest, where he won a considerable reputation as a pianist, being appointed to the teaching staff of the Academy of Music in 1907. At the same time he developed a deep interest, shared with his compatriot Zoltán Kodály, in the folk-music of his own and adjacent countries, later extended as far as Anatolia, where he collaborated with the Turkish composer Adnan Saygun.
As a composer Bartók found acceptance much more difficult, particularly in his own country, which was, in any case, beset by political troubles, when the brief post-war left-wing government of Béla Kun was replaced by the reactionary régime of Admiral Horthy. Meanwhile his reputation abroad grew, particularly among those with an interest in contemporary music, and his success both as a pianist and as a composer, coupled with dissatisfaction at the growing association between the Horthy government and National Socialist Germany, led him in 1940 to emigrate to the United States of America.
In his last years, after briefly holding teaching positions at Columbia and Harvard, Bartók suffered from increasing ill-health and from poverty which the conditions of exile in war-time could do nothing to alleviate. He died in straitened circumstances in 1945, leaving a new Viola Concerto incomplete and a Third Piano Concerto more nearly finished.
Bartók’s For Children originally consisted of 85 short pieces in four volumes, the first two volumes based on Hungarian folk-songs and the third and fourth on Slovakian melodies. These were written in 1908–09 and represent something of the result of Bartók’s investigations into folk-song. In 1943 he revised the work, writing thirteen new pieces. The revised work was published in 1945 with 79 pieces in two volumes. The forty pieces based on Hungarian folk-songs present the original material with great clarity, generally with the simplest of accompaniments, which, as with the later 44 Duos for violin, written in 1931 for Erich and Elma Doflein, do much to present the melody in an original and revealing light. It has been pointed out that many of the melodies presented may already well have been familiar to Hungarian children, a fact that added to their relevance for young performers.
In 1913 Bartók brought together 48 pieces for beginners, to form part of Sándor Reschofsky’s Zongoraiskola (Piano School). Eighteen of these were revised for publication in 1929 as Kezdök zongoramuzikája (The First Term at the Piano). These progressive pieces, starting with both hands together, playing within the range of the five fingers, find a place also for folk-song, where this is appropriate. Later editions have included five more pieces and some versions have given titles to each piece.
For Children and The First Term at the Piano, with the 44 Duos and Mikrokosmos, bear witness to Bartók’s commitment to national music education in Hungary, a goal shared effectively with Zoltán Kodály, who provided a comprehensive master-plan for music education in Hungary, as Hindemith was to do, with less obvious results, in Turkey. Bartók’s simple piano pieces serve a double purpose in their novel approach to learning the piano and their preservation of many of the melodies that he had collected at a time when folk-music faced the threat of extinction, as traditions changed.
For Children Vols 1&2:
Wenckheim Krisztina Városfejlesztési, Kulturális és Környezetvédelmi Közalapítvány / Krisztina Wenckheim Foundation
The First Term at the Piano:
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The mission of Tennessee Temple University is to provide Christ-centered
higher education that transforms lives academically and spiritually for the glory of God.
Department of Teacher Education
The Department of Teacher Education seeks to prepare professional educators to serve students and lead school.
The Department of Teacher Education believes that it has an obligation to God to equip prospective educators with a Biblical view of the child, a working knowledge of instructional strategies, and a sense of what is required of a professional educator. Prospective teachers should receive a broad base of general knowledge, a professional knowledge of teaching, and a thorough foundation in the Truth of God’s Word. Prospective teachers should have knowledge of varied methods for gaining truth and should be able to evaluate knowledge in the light of the Bible.
It is the purpose of the Department of Teacher Education to prepare competent Christian educators to minister in schools around the world. Believing that God may choose to use individuals as teachers in either Christian or public schools, Tennessee Temple University prepares its education graduates with a broad base of Biblical knowledge emphasizing moral beliefs and teaching competencies from which they may operate as professional educators.
1. The student will apply educational philosophies, instructional and assessment strategies, and classroom management techniques that reflect current trends in the discipline.
2. The student will conceptualize, plan, and produce effective instructional units, including daily lesson plans, based upon a given school curriculum.
3. The student will adapt instructional methods and materials to meet the needs of a diverse student population.
4. The student will integrate Biblical principles into educational philosophies, instructional strategies, and classroom management techniques.
The teacher education program at Tennessee Temple is a professional course of study designed to complement students' major studies in content fields of their choosing.
The academic fields in which teacher education students may major are the following:
- Early Childhood Education (grades PreK-3)
- Elementary Education (grades K-6)
- Secondary Education
- Biology (grades 7-12)
- English (grades 7-12)
- History (grades 7-12)
- Mathematics (grades 7-12)
The Teacher Education Program prepares its graduates to teach in Christian schools around the world. Its graduates receive immediate certification from the Association of Christian Schools International (ACSI). Teacher Education students are strongly encouraged to pursue a state teaching license. Contact the Department of Teacher Education to discuss options for obtaining a Tennessee teaching license.
Tennessee Temple University is a member of the Transnational Association of Christian Colleges and Schools (TRACS) [PO Box 328, Forest, VA 24551; Telephone: 434.525.9539; email: email@example.com] having been awarded Reaffirmed status as a Category IV institution by the TRACS Accreditation Commission on November 28-29, 2005; this status is effective for a period of ten years. TRACS is recognized by the United States Department of Education (USDE) and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA).
Graduate Studies in Education
If you would like more information about our Graduate Studies in Education program, please visit the Graduate Studies webpage.
Department of Teacher Education
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Ackerman, P.L., and Beier, M.E. (2006). Determinants of domain knowledge and independent study learning in an adult sample. Journal of Educational Psychology, 98, 366-381.
Ackerman, P.L., and Rolfhus, E.L. (1999). The locus of adult intelligence: Knowledge, abilities, and nonability traits. Psychology and Aging, 14, 314-330.
Ackerman, P.L., Bowen, K.R., Beier, M.E., and Kanfer, R. (2001). Determinants of individual differences and gender differences in knowledge. Journal of Educational Psychology, 93, 797-825.
ACT. (undated). College readiness standards. Iowa City, IA: American College Testing. Available: http://www.act.org/standard/ [Feb. 2010].
Adams, M. (1990). Beginning to read: Thinking and learning about print. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Adams, R., and Burt, M. (2002). Research on the reading development of adult English language learners: An annotated bibliography. Washington, DC: National Center for ESL Literacy Education. Available: http://www.eric.ed.gov/PDFS/ED467498.pdf [Sept. 2011].
Ainley, M., Hidi, S., and Berndorff, D. (2002). Interest, learning, and the psychological processes that mediate their relationship. Journal of Educational Psychology, 94, 545-561.
Ainsworth, S. (2008). How do animations influence learning? In D.H. Robinson and G. Schraw (Eds.), Recent innovations on educational technologies that facilitate student learning (pp. 37-67). Charlotte, NC: Information Age.
Ainsworth, S., and Loizou, A.T. (2003). The effects of self-explaining when learning with texts or diagrams. Cognitive Science, 27, 669-681.
Airasian, P.W. (1994). Classroom assessment (2nd ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.
Akamatsu, N. (2003). The effects of first language orthographic features on second language reading in text. Language Learning, 53, 207-231.
Akkus, R., Gunel, M., and Hand, B. (2007). Comparing an inquiry-based approach known as the science writing heuristic to traditional science teaching practices: Are there differences? International Journal of Science Education, 29(14), 1,745-1,765.
Al Otaiba, S., and Fuchs, D. (2002). Characteristics of children who are unresponsive to early literacy intervention: A review of the literature. Remedial and Special Education, 23, 300-316.
Alamprese, J. (2009). Developing learners’ reading skills in adult basic education programs. In S. Reder and J. Brynner (Eds), Tracking adult literacy and numeracy skills (pp. 107-131). New York: Routledge.
Alamprese, J., MacArthur, C., Price, C., and Knight, D. (2011). Effects of a structured decoding curriculum on adult literacy learners’ reading development. Journal of Research on Education Effectiveness, 4(2), 154-172.
Albert, M., Jones, K., Savage, C., Berkman, L., Seeman, T., Blazer, D., et al. (1995). Predictors of cognitive change in older persons: MacArthur studies of successful aging. Psychology and Aging, 10, 578-589.
Albin, M., Benton, S., and Khramtsova, I. (1996). Individual differences in interest and narrative writing. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 21, 305-324.
Aleven, V., Stahl, E., Schworm, S., Fischer, F., and Wallace, R. (2003). Help seeking and help design in interactive learning environments. Review of Educational Research, 73, 277-320.
Alexander, P.A. (1997). Mapping the multidimensional nature of domain learning: The interplay of cognitive, motivational, and strategic forces. In M.L. Maehr and P.R. Pintrich (Eds.), Advances in motivation and achievement (vol. 10, pp. 213-250). Greenwich, CT: JAI Press.


National Association for Music Education
National Association for Music Education (NAfME), among the world’s largest arts education organizations, is the only association that addresses all aspects of music education. NAfME advocates at the local, state, and national levels; provides resources for teachers, parents, and administrators; hosts professional development events; and offers a variety of opportunities for students and teachers. The Association orchestrates success for millions of students nationwide and has supported music educators at all teaching levels for more than a century.
Since 1907, NAfME has worked to ensure that every student has access to a well-balanced, comprehensive, and high-quality program of music instruction taught by qualified teachers. NAfME’s activities and resources have been largely responsible for the establishment of music education as a profession, for the promotion and guidance of music study as an integral part of the school curriculum, and for the development of the National Standards for Arts Education.
History of Their Name
They were originally called Music Supervisors National Conference, then Music Educators National Conference (MENC), then MENC: The National Association for Music Education. On September 1, 2011 they became simply National Association for Music Education.
For more information, go to their website at: http://nafme.org


HOW FACE WORKS
By focusing on the five key priorities, FACE brings together research-based programs and strategies that empower families, communities, and students in support of teaching and learning:
encourages parents and educators to take an active role in helping students achieve academically.
provides engaging and interactive programs, workshops, and resources for children to continue developing core language and literacy skills outside of school.
strengthens the cognitive and language skills that children need for school readiness and literacy development.
exposes children to various types of text while promoting independent reading.
establishes supportive and beneficial relationships that positively impact students’ academic achievement and their interest in future college and career opportunities.