Level 1 (First Class) of the test consists of 50 items. The items are grouped into three subtests which collectively provide a balanced assessment of children’s emergent reading ability and allow for the early identification of reading difficulties. Part A contains 20 items, designed to assess the word recognition skills of First Class pupils. Part B is made up of 12 sets of nonsense words which are intended to tap children’s phonological awareness and decoding ability. Phonological awareness is an important skill domain that has been given particular emphasis in the English area of the revised Primary School Curriculum. Crucially, skill at decoding nonsense words has been shown to be an excellent predictor of later reading ability. The final section, Part C, is composed of 18 items which assess pupils’ reading comprehension.
The entire 50-item test, as well as practice items for Part C, can be easily administered by teachers in less than one hour.
Although not specifically developed for use with Senior Infants, Level 1 can nonetheless be used during the final term of Senior Infants in classes where the pupils are of average or above average ability.


Discover the latest elementary education methods with an online associate degree in early childhood development. With a two-year degree in the field, you can learn basic concepts to help pave the way for more advanced study, or how to turn your newfound credential into a rewarding career.
Associate degree in early childhood development
With early childhood education degree programs, you increase your job opportunities and expand your knowledge. Develop a strong foundation in the practice of effective child care and education, plus the theory behind that practice, with the following coursework:
- Child communication skills
- Child growth, development and psychology
- Children with special needs
- Health, safety and nutrition
- Infant and toddler care
While not all childcare careers require an associate degree in early childhood development, earning an education in the essential skills above can help your resume stand out from the rest.
Childcare careers for graduates of early childhood education degree programs
At the associate degree level, training in early childhood development helps prepare you for basic childcare and education positions. The Bureau of Labor Statistics provides the following salary information for childcare workers and early childcare educators:
- Child care workers can be found in businesses, schools, child care institutions, and private households. About one-third are self-employed. May 2014, mean annual salary for child care workers: $21,710.
- Preschool teachers can be found in day care centers, child developmental facilities, and schools, instructing students up to five-years-old in activities designed to promote growth. May 2014, mean annual salary for preschool teachers: $32,040.
- Teacher assistants work in preschools as well as primary and secondary schools, helping teachers with grading, teaching, lesson plan development and parent conferences. May 2014, mean annual salary for teacher assistants: $26,000.
- Child protection services assistants use their specialized knowledge in early childhood development to work with young children in potentially dangerous situations. May 2014, mean annual salary for social and human service assistants: $31,860.
Many graduates with associate degrees in early childhood development go on to earn a bachelor's degree, opening up more teaching opportunities and greater salary potential. While no degree program can guarantee a particular career or salary, hiring managers in childhood education fields often prefer or require formal education among applicants.
Earn an online associate degree in early childhood development
When you log on to complete your associate degree in early childhood development online, you expand your mind and boost your earning potential. What's more, you enjoy the freedom and flexibility of online education, which allows you to travel and keep work and family commitments. Many students even keep a full-time job while earning their degrees online.
The BLS reports that careers for child care workers are projected to rise 14 percent between 2012 and 2022. Make a commitment to future generations with an online degree. Explore early childhood development degrees and take your first steps towards being a part of a growing trend.
"Childcare Workers," Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2014, June 24, 2015, http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes399011.htm
"Childcare Workers," U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, June 24, 2015, http://www.bls.gov/ooh/personal-care-and-service/childcare-workers.htm
"Preschool Teachers, Except Special Education," Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2014, June 24, 2015, http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes252011.htm
"Preschool Teachers," U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, June 24, 2015, http://www.bls.gov/ooh/education-training-and-library/preschool-teachers.htm
"Teacher Assistants," Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2014, June 24, 2015, http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes259041.htm
"Teacher Assistants," U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, June 24, 2015, http://www.bls.gov/ooh/education-training-and-library/teacher-assistants.htm
"Social and Human Service Assistants," Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2014, June 24, 2015, http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes211093.htm
"Social and Human Service Assistants," U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, June 24, 2015, http://www.bls.gov/ooh/community-and-social-service/social-and-human-service-assistants.htm


Bohemia, NY (PRWEB) February 12, 2014
ArtSchools.com, the leading directory of art colleges, discusses how artists are encouraging schools to teach students more about music and other forms of art.
In a February 3rd article posted on The Spectrum titled, “Artists Encourage Music Education in Schools,” members of the Utah Opera are giving presentations in schools to help promote arts education in the classroom. The musicians hope to introduce the arts to students in ways they have never experienced before.
The article says that five members of the Utah Opera are a part of a program that helps educate school students of the different areas of the arts. The program, funded by the Utah State Legislature, is designed to help children build character and learn how to express their feelings. The article says the artists involved in the program are from all different disciplines and want children to see how valuable the arts can be.
Andrew Girard, a representative for ArtSchools.com, a directory of art colleges, says that this arts program should be a model for schools around the country. “Education of the arts is key in the success of children. The arts offer a way for children to express themselves that is hard to do otherwise,” says Girard. “Programs like this offer a way for new, blossoming artists to see the value of their craft. These programs introduce children to new forms of music and art that they would probably have otherwise seen.”
Girard also says art education can help people become more accepting of other cultures. “By exposing children to the arts at a young age, we, as a society, can become more receptive to other cultures and histories. The arts offer a way of expressing new ideas and views. It’s an essential portion of education that should not be excluded from any curriculum.”
ArtSchools.com is a comprehensive directory of art degrees, art schools and art-related programs listed and maintained by Monster.com, the leading platform for job seekers. ArtSchools.com is dedicated to assisting prospective artists, teachers, and students find schools, jobs, and programs best suited for their preferences. Whether you’re looking for a new job, a new school or a new direction, the ArtSchools.com directory offers insight into top degree programs in a variety of fields, including graphic design, fashion design, interior design, game design, web design, photography and film.
ArtSchools.com is an affiliate of CookingSchools.com, a similar directory featuring the best culinary colleges.


Examine the library catalog.
You are looking at the Basic Search screen.
There are many different search options and ways to limit your results. For the purposes of this tutorial we are going to show you the most direct way to find a book on your topic.
Proceed to the next step.
Think about how to best describe your topic.
Keyword searching gives you the power to combine two or more terms: where education will find all books on education, education and elementary will find primarily books on elementary education.
Connect your words with and and switch the search type to Boolean keyword (last in dropdown list).
In order to limit your search to circulating books only, click on the Limit to dropdown box.
You will see Circulating Books as the second option; select it.
You are now ready to search.
Did your search produce any results? If not, double-check the spelling of your keyword(s) at Merriam-Webster Online.
If you put in more than one word, did you use and to combine the terms? More than one word without and, or or not between them will not search, unless the words are placed in quotation marks " " in which case they are searched as an exact phrase.
Try different options until you have search results listed and then proceed to the next step. If you need more tips, take a look at a video on keyword searching.
Examine carefully the list of titles produced by your search.
You can click on each title to see more details and decide if each book is relevant to your topic.
You can also see its call number, location, and whether it is checked out or not.
If you want to use a book, write down the floor and call number to look for it on our shelves.
1. Go to the correct floor in the library, usually 3rd floor for circulating books.
2. Follow the alphabet until you reach the call number you are looking for.
3. Take your book to the circulation desk to check it out (located next to the entrance). You'll need your OU SpiritCard. See how long you can keep books.


The Macedonian Minority in Albania
The part of Macedonia known as Mala Prespa was given to Albania by the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. This treaty finalized the partition of Macedonia between Serbia, Greece, Bulgaria and Albania and began the era of denationalization and forced assimilation of the Macedonian people. Today, the Macedonians in Albania have limited freedom and human rights in compartment to the Macedonians in Greece and Bulgaria. However, there are still numerous human rights violations in Mala Prespa.
European and other international sources, owing to Albania's isolation during the regime of Enver Hoxha, indirectly estimated that there were 30,000-50,000 Macedonians living in this country. However, the real number of ethnic Macedonians in Albania is estimated as exceeding 200,000. Their greatest concentration is in the border regions of Golo Brdo and Mala Prespa. There are also a large number of Macedonians who live in Tirana (about 20,000), Pogradec, Korce, Kavaje, and Elbasan.
Albania is the only neighbouring country which recognizes the status of the Macedonian ethnic minority, but restricts it to the region of Mala Prespa. There has been instruction in this region since 1945 in elementary education up to the fifth form, for which textbooks have been issued by the state. It is expected that the right to instruction in their mother tongue, according to international standards, will also be extended to pupils of Macedonian ethnic affiliation in the other parts of Albania. The introduction of instruction in Macedonian in secondary education is also expected. Albania must respect the cooperation agreements in the field of education signed four years ago.
There are several organized and active associations of Macedonians in Albania, but the opportunities for political activity are small because the state does not financially support their organization. It was as late as 1993 that the first periodical in Macedonian, the journal Mir (Peace), appeared. Albanian Radio and Television still do not broadcast programs in Macedonian.
The position of ethnic Macedonians in Albania is far from that of ethnic Albanians in Macedonia. While in Macedonia ethnic Albanians appear as Representatives in Assembly and their major party is a Government coalition partner, the Macedonians in Albania still have no opportunities for genuine political participation. At present, there are no ethnic Macedonian Members of Parliament, nor are Macedonians represented in the institutions of state authority and local self government.
When dealing with the question of the status and position of ethnic Albanians in Macedonia and those of ethnic Macedonians in Albania, Macedonia has never insisted on reciprocity as it considers the rights of the Albanian minority as one of the key factors of its democracy. But everyone must understand that Tirana cannot indefinitely demand the impossible from Macedonia while the rights of ethnic Macedonians in Albania remain below the most elementary level. A census carried out with the participation of European and international institutions is expected, which will present the true ethnic composition of the population in this country.
In March 1996, the organization for the protection of the rights of Macedonians in Albania, "Prespa", sent an open letter to president Sali Berisha, stating that "it is time for us too to have our own representatives in the Albanian Parliament and Government, and to be granted rights to study and cherish our language, culture, and tradition". As far as the number of ethnic Macedonians in Albania is concerned, it will be known "as soon as a population census is carried out according to European and world standards".
Makedonski Icelenuchki Almanac '97, Matitsa na Icelenitsite od Makedonija; Skopje: 1997; p.60-61
Copyright © 2001-2013
Copyright © 2001-2013 historyofmacedonia.org All rights reserved


Regulations for teaching music are included in the new national curriculum for state primary and secondary schools in England, which was published on 11 September and comes into force in September 2014. Music is one of seven ‘foundation subjects’ at key stages (KS) one and two (ages five-11) and nine at key stage three (ages 11-14) that must be taught in addition to the three ‘core’ subjects of English, maths and science. It is not compulsory beyond KS3.
With its requirement for pupils from KS2 onwards to ‘understand staff and other musical notations’ and at KS3 to ‘perform, listen to, review and evaluate music across a range of historical periods, genres, styles and traditions, including the works of the great composers and musicians’, the new music curriculum reflects the rigorous, some would say old-fashioned, approach to academic standards of the current secretary of state for education, Michael Gove.
Music education blogger Jonathan Savage of Manchester Metropolitan University says that the development of a national curriculum for music, first introduced in 1992, has always been affected by the dichotomy in the minds of policy-makers between ‘a view of music as factual knowledge set against the idea of music as a practical activity (involving no knowledge)’. The 2014 version is weighted towards the former view, although it does reflect the recommendations of the government-commissioned Henley report on music with an insistence on all children being given the opportunity to sing regularly and to learn to play a musical instrument.
Some amendments to the initial draft curriculum have been made as a result of the consultation process that has taken place since its publication in February. The Incorporated Society of Musicians (ISM) was a major player in the consultation, having first surveyed its many teacher members to establish their views, and was quick to produce an analysis of the changes. They consist mainly of the inclusion of references to creativity, which had been at the heart of the previous curriculum, and the use of music technology.
‘This curriculum will not hamper excellent teaching; we are grateful that musicians have not been micro-managed in the way that – for example – historians have been,’ commented ISM chief executive Deborah Annetts. ‘But sadly, it gives little scope for challenging less good teaching, and risks doing nothing to improve our world class music education. Teaching as a profession needs to be promoted and protected and a genuine commitment to professional development is needed if we are to see this slim curriculum have any value.’
The curriculum has been criticised for not setting specific assessment levels or attainment targets, but some teachers have welcomed the increased flexibility that this allows. Others have pointed out that the government’s enthusiasm for setting up independent academy schools in both the primary and the secondary sectors makes the statutory curriculum increasingly irrelevant. Either way, music teachers in KS1 and 2 are free to teach what they please for the next 12 months as the previous curriculum programmes have been ‘disapplied’, according to the Department for Education, and are no longer mandatory.


"Teacher" means a classroom teacher or other similar professional employee required to hold a license from the Board of Teaching.
"Board" means the Board of Teaching.
(a) "Comprehensive, scientifically based reading instruction" includes a program or collection of instructional practices that is based on valid, replicable evidence showing that when these programs or practices are used, students can be expected to achieve, at a minimum, satisfactory reading progress. The program or collection of practices must include, at a minimum, effective, balanced instruction in all five areas of reading: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary development, and reading comprehension.
Comprehensive, scientifically based reading instruction also includes and integrates instructional strategies for continuously assessing, evaluating, and communicating the student's reading progress and needs in order to design and implement ongoing interventions so that students of all ages and proficiency levels can read and comprehend text, write, and apply higher level thinking skills. For English learners developing literacy skills, districts are encouraged to use strategies that teach reading and writing in the students' native language and English at the same time.
(b) "Fluency" is the ability of students to read text with speed, accuracy, and proper expression.
(c) "Phonemic awareness" is the ability of students to notice, think about, and manipulate individual sounds in spoken syllables and words.
(d) "Phonics" is the understanding that there are systematic and predictable relationships between written letters and spoken words. Phonics instruction is a way of teaching reading that stresses learning how letters correspond to sounds and how to apply this knowledge in reading and spelling.
(e) "Reading comprehension" is an active process that requires intentional thinking during which meaning is constructed through interactions between text and reader. Comprehension skills are taught explicitly by demonstrating, explaining, modeling, and implementing specific cognitive strategies to help beginning readers derive meaning through intentional, problem-solving thinking processes.
(f) "Vocabulary development" is the process of teaching vocabulary both directly and indirectly, with repetition and multiple exposures to vocabulary items. Learning in rich contexts, incidental learning, and use of computer technology enhance the acquiring of vocabulary.
(g) Nothing in this subdivision limits the authority of a school district to select a school's reading program or curriculum.
Copyright © 2015 by the Revisor of Statutes, State of Minnesota. All rights reserved.


A Field at Risk: The Teacher Shortage in Special Education: A Shortage of Special Education Teachers Existed in 1983, and the Problem Persists Today. the Authors Emphasize That There Is a Pressing Need Not Only to Recruit and Retain Qualified Special Education Teachers but Also to Diversify the Special Education Teaching Force
Cooley Nichols, Sandra M., Bicard, Sara C., Bicard, David F., Casey, Laura Baylot, Phi Delta Kappan
FOR DECADES, the supply of qualified special educators has been critically low. In 1983, the shortage of special educators was highlighted in A Nation at Risk. It is still with us 25 years later and shows no signs of disappearing, and in the coming decades it could well worsen.
Although the production of teachers in special education increased during the 1990s, the most recently available data indicate that just .86 teachers were prepared for each available position in special education, while more than twice as many teachers were produced for each available position in elementary education. (1) This limited production has clearly contributed to the overall shortage of special education teachers in the United States. An analysis from the late 1990s showed that because there were so many positions to be filled, some 10% of special education teachers were less than fully licensed in the area of their primary assignment. (2) Consequently, some students have never been taught by fully licensed special education teachers. (3) While the shortage of qualified special educators is evident, it is exacerbated by the need to diversify the field.
DIVERSITY ISSUES IN SPECIAL EDUCATION
An adequate pool of ethnically diverse, high-quality educators is needed in all fields, but that need is particularly acute in special education. The reason is that minority students, in particular African American and Hispanic males, are overrepresented in special education.
Teachers influence children's attitudes toward school, their academic accomplishments, and their views of their own and others' worth. The members of a teaching force that is ethnically diverse can serve as role models of successful, contributing members of society for all students, not just students who share a particular teacher's ethnic background. The very presence in the classroom of teachers from racial and ethnic minorities reflects the growing diversity of professionals and authority figures throughout society and lets all students know what is possible. Finding such teachers in the required numbers is a problem, and finding them among qualified special educators is an even more serious problem.
STRATEGIES FOR ADDRESSING THE LACK OF QUALIFIED TEACHERS
Providing a high-quality education for students is an enormous undertaking, which increases in difficulty when less than fully prepared teachers assume this responsibility. William Sanders and June Rivers found large differences in achievement between students taught by high-quality teachers and those taught by low-quality teachers for a period of successive years. (4) Thus teacher educators and district administrators must make every effort to provide training for unlicensed special education teachers so that they may acquire the knowledge and skills they need to meet the educational and societal demands of teaching.
Two strategies are frequently adopted to address the lack of qualified teachers.
Alternative licensure. In response to the need for larger numbers of qualified teachers, as highlighted in A Nation at Risk, the alternative teacher licensure movement grew rapidly. New Jersey's plan, for example, was first announced in September 1983. Many other states and private organizations subsequently moved to develop programs of this kind.
While there is tremendous variation among current alternative licensure programs, one of the most common is the fast-track program, which delivers all preservice preparation in one summer. These programs are intended to accommodate individuals from other careers who want to become teachers. Such summer programs include abbreviated coursework and a field experience that involves either student teaching or classroom observations. Participants in fast-track programs are attracted by the fact that training is brief and inexpensive and offers rapid entry into a paid teaching position. Despite the premium they put on efficiency, however, candidates still expect programs to provide them with focused preparation in pedagogy, including generic teaching strategies, subject-specific methods of instruction, and a useful practice teaching experience. …


Listening to Soundscapes, playing with sounds
This workshop is based on the pilot project “Sound Hunters: Towards a Pedagogy based on Listening and Sound Exploration in Early Childhood”, that the authors are implementing in a non-formal educational context in Portugal.
The workshop aims to sensitize participants to sound phenomena and discuss the meanings that are usually attributed to music and “music making”, by inviting participants to do a Soundwalk in the Conference Venue (inside and outside).
This workshop emerges from “a double call” that has recently been made to educators and researchers in the field of music education. A call that asks, on the one side, for a new perspective on the concept of “music” - that might include the entire soundscape that surrounds us (Landy, 2007; Solomos, 2020) - and, on the other side, for more inclusive and democratic practices in music education, that might create learning opportunities for all children (Benedict et al. 2015; Hess, 2017; Wright, 2015).
Departing from a roadmap previously prepared, and divided in 4 small groups, participants will be asked to pay close attention to the sounds surrounding them and to “capture” these sounds, using a set of audio recorders specifically designed to be used by children and adults that are not familiarized with music technologies. These tools will be explored previously by all participants with the guidance of the authors, during an introductory moment of the workshop. In the end, participants will share and listen together to the recordings made by the group. After this listening moment, the facilitators will introduce an activity in which participants will have the opportunity to engage in a musical improvisation, using not only the sounds previously recorded, but also diverse sounding objects related to the contexts in which the workshop is being developed. The workshop will end with a brief discussion about the activities and the ways in which they might have affected participants’ ideas about their sonic worlds and about music.
At the end of the workshop it is expected that the participants might be able to: (i) Identify sound as part of each person's sensory experience; (ii) Identify, describe and compare different sounds and soundscapes; (iii) Explore, in a creative way, different sound sources and tools related to the perception and appropriation of sound; (iv) Explore the idea of Sound Ecology, relating sounds with the diverse environments in which they usually participate.
This process, that seeks to emancipate participants from aprioristic conceptions of what is considered musically valid, is based on two essential premises: The idea that all people are capable of engage with sound and music, regardless of age, gender, physical or social condition; and the idea that music pedagogy should converge towards a practice that includes the entire sound spectrum that surrounds us, in the search to create meaning for the diverse sound worlds that we inhabit and to which we give life.
Target audience: Children (2-5 years old), their families, educators, musicians, researchers and general public.
Copyright (c) 2023 Music for and by children
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.


Perhaps you could allow them to interweave two different colors with the cross
hatching to build up a rich complementary surface. To me the interplay of two
or three colors in the cross hatching is visually exciting and motivating.
Also for those students who do not seem to have the diligence and patient work
ethic required you might suggest that they try a variety of different drawing
techniques such as hatching, pointilism, blending, toning. I often like to
tone an area with powder color pencil. This requires taking a piece of sand
paper and sanding the color pencil over an area and then drawing back into it
with unsandpapered color pencil. Also, suggest they experiment on pieces of
paper to invent their own processes of blending using a multiple combination
approach. I also like to do rubbings in areas where I want texture and value.
Alas, this is a challenging subject. I applaud your diligent efforts.
Dr. Diane C. Gregory
Director, Undergraduate & Graduate
Studies in Art Education
Texas Woman's University
Denton, TX 76204
> Hi guys, me again...
> We just started back after an unplanned week and a half vacation thanks to
> Hurricane Wilma. My middle school students tried to pick up where they left
> off...working on a value still life. They are trying to finish these up.
> of my students are really getting it, and some are really struggling. I find
> that if I give them individual help, a light often goes off. I'm trying to
> them to make objects look 3-D by noticing the value changes, the highlights
> and the shadows. They are trying to use crosshatching. I feel as though
> is a better way of really getting the idea across. It's hard to do a demo on
> the board or on an overhead. I'm trying to create a handout to explain that
> they need to work slowly and carefully, overlap their strokes, build layers,
> that sort of thing. Some of them want to smudge, and I'm not sure if I
> allow some slight smudging with a q-tip or paper towel or not allow it at
> I plan to move into color next, and I want them to use colored pencils to
> build colors and values. I'm also making a handout for this.
> Do you guys have any suggestions or good sources from which I could draw to
> create a really good handout: one on creating value with drawing pencils and
> one on colored pencils?
> Thanks a lot!
> To unsubscribe go to
To unsubscribe go to


Mohammed Kaleemur Rahman
2 August 2013
Toilets play a key role in the overall functioning of a school. It is hard to imagine a school functioning efficiently without a set of toilets. According to UNICEF, “education for girls can be fostered by something as basic as a girls-only toilet”. Even in cases where schools have toilets, they will be unusable unless they are clean, private and functional. Currently, there is an extensive database on elementary education in India called District Information System for Education (DISE). It has school ‘report cards’ of more than 1.3 million schools providing qualitative and quantitative information about them. However, these only mention whether the school has toilets for boys and for girls. This can be misleading because even if a school has separate toilets for boys and girls, they could be unusable due to various reasons.
In an initial set of informal visits to 8 schools in the Shivajinagar, Frazer Town and KG Halli areas of Bangalore, we got the impression that toilets were an integral part of the school’s infrastructure. In some cases, the poor condition of toilets affected attendance and enrollment at the school, especially for girls. One of the school headmasters (HM) complained that parents are reluctant in sending their daughters to school if there are no separate toilet facilities for them. The boys at the school would urinate in open-air at a corner of the school ground.
In order to get a deeper understanding of the toilet infrastructure in government schools, we worked with the Akshara Foundation to carry out a survey of 36 schools in Bangalore. 16 of these schools were located in the urban Kaval Byrasandra cluster and 20 in the rural Sarjapura one. The goal of this investigation is to document the challenges and opportunities in providing usable toilet infrastructure in government schools in Bangalore. We found that:
These findings have been described in detail in this document, along with pictures when applicable. Due to the diverse context of each school, there are exceptions in our generalizations. We hope that this document will be useful to those working in the government school space in Bangalore, specifically in the area of infrastructure and sanitation.


KMS Philosophy Statement for Reading
The teachers of Keene Middle School view literacy as dynamic and ever-changing. Traditionally, reading, writing, speaking, listening, and viewing, have been identified as the critical skills in literacy development. However, as information and technology shape our society, the definition of literacy and its relationship to education also must change. The goal of literacy instruction at KMS is to support students by teaching them the tools to construct and share meaning in a variety of contexts in today’s world. This development extends beyond the school and impacts all aspects of the student's life.
Reading is an integral part of lifelong literacy and therefore must be formally taught. It is a cornerstone of learning throughout all subjects and is a part of all instruction. The International Reading Association's position statement on adolescent literacy states that the reading, writing, and language development of adolescents is just as important and requires just as much attention as that of beginning readers.
Reading instruction at Keene Middle School in all grades levels will provide:
- an opportunity to foster a love of lifelong reading and a mastery of reading skills.
- a culture that strongly supports reading, and expands literacy experiences and resources through the integration of readers and writers from our community.
- an environment that supports critical learners, who are prepared for lifelong learning, and who read and write for a variety of purposes.
- the opportunity for direct instruction regarding all aspects of reading: informational texts, literary texts, comprehension strategies, and word identification skills.
- practice, remediation and extension of the skills used in reading.
- integrated and interdisciplinary literacy instruction in conjunction with English and content area teachers who support comprehension skills through teaching paraphrasing, summarizing, identifying main idea, vocabulary, and the application of reading strategies.
- daily access to technology supporting readers for future literacy needs.
- data-driven instruction.
Components of School Wide Reading
6th, 7th and 8th Grade Programming
This year long reading course is a developmental program which takes place every day and will be heterogeneously mixed. KMS has adopted the three tier concept when addressing reading instruction:
Tier One includes all students
Tier Two includes students who are two or three grades below grade level.
Tier Three includes students who are significantly below grade level.
Teachers will work closely with the special education teachers to develop a team teaching approach for tier two and three students. Teachers will also work closely with the English teachers to scaffold their instruction to jointly address all language arts GLE's and ELA standards. The reading teachers will communicate with other core teachers to employ meaningful strategies and activities for the students.
Reading in the Content Classes
In 2003-2004 Keene Middle School adopted the Landmark Master Notebook System. This is a school wide initiative supporting students in the organization of content material: note taking, summarizing, main idea development, and study methods. It is expected that all teachers throughout all subject areas incorporate these practices when feasible. The most widely used practices include the notebook system, two column note taking and vocabulary cards referred to as Smart Cards. Training in the KEY3 method expands and supports instruction in the above.
Formal reading intervention is prescribed by special education services and addresses the needs primarily of Tier 3 readers: students who are significantly behind their peers who need very intensive instruction that addresses specifically determined needs in order for them to learn. The level of support is often small group instruction in a pullout classroom taught by the team’s special educator. KMS had adopted Language! as a comprehensive program focusing on all aspects of language arts. This program is directed towards Tier Three readers with special educators responsible for instruction.
Students who qualify for special education services but not identified as needing small group instruction receive support within the regular reading classroom by a tutor who is shared by other special education students.
Recreational reading opportunities vary from year to year. In the past, sixth grade students have been invited to participate in selecting Great Stone Face winners as well as similar opportunities for 7th and 8th graders. A reading incentive program, Accelerated Reader, has been used to encourage recreational reading. Periodically after school groups meet to discuss current popular series.
Recreational reading varies within clusters with some teachers requiring students to complete a specific number of books outside of class and others requiring students to read a specific amount of time each night. Recreational reading may or may not be tied to an additional written assignment.


Most children begin learning phonics by sounding out letters and learning what items represent that sound and that letter, i.e. A is for apple; A sounds like “aaaaaaaaaaaaaa”. Children begin learning phonics from parents, siblings, videos, and music at a very early age (2-4 years old) even before entering school.
Phonics and phonemic awareness are comingled when teaching children in this manner. Phonics involves the relationship between sounds and written symbols, whereas phonemic awareness involves sounds in spoken words. Therefore, phonics instruction focuses on teaching sound-spelling relationships and is associated with print. Most phonemic awareness tasks are oral.
Even though parents are the initial teachers, it will take a professional to instill all of the rules of phonics and to teach students decoding skills as they begin to read. Hiring a tutor with experience teaching early learners will ensure a student’s success as they begin elementary school. A professional tutor can also reinforce phonics for those students that were taught the Whole Language approach to reading and are still struggling in 2nd and 3rd grades. Hiring an Advanced Learners tutor is a guarantee that you will receive a professional tutor that can make a difference in a child’s ability to read.
High School Tutors
Is your high school student college bound? Does every grade count towards a scholarship or a college application? High school students are inundated with grades, sports, work, volunteering, activities, and sometimes a little old fashioned teenage fun. When a high school student shows signs of struggling it is important to get them the help they need as soon as possible. Our high school tutors are available when and where you need them the most…in-home and on your schedule! Whether your high school student simply needs a boost of confidence with study skills, some test preparation and encouragement, or on-going semester long subject help, we have just the high school tutors that can help.
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Technology in Kindergarten
Every early childhood teacher extols the value of creative experiences that allow young children the opportunity to explore and manipulate a variety of materials. Physical interaction with the world and the involvement of all five senses—taste, touch, smell, hearing, seeing—is the way young children learn. We can begin to know what they understand and how they perceive their world through their constructions and we use that understanding to design a program that will build their skills. For the young child, the concrete and visible is real. Being able to hold and direct a pencil or paintbrush is not just about being able to form specific shapes that can then be turned into particular letters, but it’s also about gaining control of one’s own movements and making connections to others. It’s also a starting place for literacy and for the knowledge that speech and words are tools for mastering our reality.
It's not clear how manipulation of strokes on a keyboard to produce letters, lines, and graphic images connect to the child's manipulation of real objects. Do children at this concrete stage of development even understand how they can create and participate in a "virtual" world? Or, perhaps the printed paper and screen image is real enough for them. After all, young children are very comfortable with the reality of television and the printed images around them. For this reason, among others, it's important for teachers of young children to ask: What role can technology play in the development of young children’s literacy? Where can computers and other technological devices fit into a kindergarten writing program?
In this collection we feature two stories of good early childhood classroom practice. In one of them, the teacher starts with her own inquiry question about creating digital stories in a kindergarten classroom. The focus is on using technology and learning how it can enhance literacy development. In the second story, the teacher explores using inquiry as a teaching strategy for her kindergartners. For her, technology is an add on.
The first teacher, like other teachers in research cited below, explored computer use with children who are already familiar with computers and technology from experiences in the home. We don't know whether the children in the second story have similar home experiences with technology. We assume that children from low-income families do not have the same exposure to technology. And, thus, we are concerned about using time to teach keyboarding skills or operating basics that would take away from actually using the tools to create, learn, communicate and produce. An important reason for introducing technology at this stage is to begin to even the playing field for all children. If we don’t want to add to the digital gap, we should consider incorporating exposure to technology and basic tech skills at the earliest stages of education.
There are resources that can help us do that. One is The Early Connections website that offers guidelines for using a range of technology in the earliest years. Another is the NAEYC's statement on technology and early childhood. The outlined pointers can serve as useful guidelines for incorporating technology into your instructional program.
However, using computers in kindergarten is not a new issue. Teachers have been asking questions about what this means ever since computers were introduced to the early childhood classroom in the late 1970s. (Shilling 1997). For a look at how a few teachers are exploring the use of technology, particularly computers, with our youngest learners and finding where technology matches up with emerging literacy practices, check out these links to studies carried out with kindergarten students as well as a link to one teacher's experience:
Other print references on using technology in kindergarten include:
Shilling, Wynne. 1997. "Young Children Using Computers to Make Discoveries About Written Language." Early Childhood Education Journal, 24 (4): 253-259.
Young, Dianne and Lynn Behounek. March, 2006. Kindergartners Use PowerPoint to Lead Their Own Parent-Teacher Conferences, Young Children, 61 (2): 24-26.


We recently stumbled across this great article about parents roles in their children’s development: how parents keying in to their progress in school during this crucial time is “a determining factor in [the child’s] success as an adult.” They stress the importance of actively aiding a child’s progress:
“Parents … should also take the time to learn what’s being covered under the lesson plan and what’s up next on the curricular agenda. Make a point of working on those skills at home, too … Remember, education and learning don’t stop the minute your child walks out the door of her preschool or child development center.”
Keep your kids’ brains active with playful learning games and toys with foundational skills. Melissa and Doug offers great supplements for providing educational fun in the home.
Block play is a great foundational skill for stacking, counting, and sorting.
Plugging in shapes is great for hand-eye-coordination skills.
Whether they are building predetermined patterns or exploring with shapes, they will learn about space


- Our Work
- Country Development Cooperation Strategy
- Agriculture and Food Security
- Democracy, Human Rights, and Governance
- Economic Growth and Trade
- Environment and Global Climate Change
- Promoting Peaceful Political Transitions
- Water and Sanitation
The quality of Lebanon’s public school system suffered with the outbreak of the civil war in 1975 and the system continues to face significant challenges. Approximately two-thirds of Lebanese children now attend costly private schools, and public schools have become the last resort for families without means. The quality of private education is higher than public education, resulting in increased gaps between more economically advantaged youth and their poorer peers who cannot afford quality private education. Lebanese public schools suffer from a severe shortage of qualified English and French speakers who can teach math and science in these languages. In addition, a large number of public schools have infrastructure problems, such as broken windows and leaking roofs.
USAID works in coordination with the Ministry of Education and Higher Education (MEHE) and American Educational Institutions to improve the quality of basic and higher education in Lebanon. The aim of our elementary education programs is to enhance student achievement by improving educational environments with repairs and equipment; increasing learning opportunities through teacher training and extra-curricular activities; and increasing stakeholder engagement in public schools. In higher education, USAID helps to prepare talented, low-income public school students from across Lebanon for careers in high-demand fields and to make contributions as leaders in their community, region and the world.
Our impacts in this sector include:
- Rehabilitating the Lebanese public school system by upgrading buildings, providing resources, promoting community engagement in schools and training teachers.
- Providing merit-based scholarships to public high school graduates from across Lebanon who need financial assistance.
Last updated: October 30, 2015


In an argument already almost two centuries old, some people claim that classical music is stuffy, old fashioned, and appeals only to a cultural elite. Popular music is new, up to date, and broad based. Opera seems to appeal only to a subset of the aging classical music crowd. School children know nothing of such philosophical arguments. They only know what they like. They like classical music, and even opera, just fine.
I have written several posts about distinctions between classical and popular music, but I’d like to use “popular” in a broader sense for a while. It’s something a lot of people like. The Beatles are popular. Al Jolson used to be popular, but discovery of a new picture of him won’t cause the same stir as a 50-year-old picture of the Fab Four recently did. In classical music, Beethoven has always been popular. Schoenberg never was.
And opera? When flame wars over the relative merits of classical and popular music first erupted in the early nineteenth century, contemporary Italian opera (new works by Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti) were definitely at the popular end of the spectrum in Europe.
In England and the US, it was only popular music when translated into English and with the recitatives replaced with spoken dialogue. Early attempts to establish a permanent theater for Italian opera in Italian in New York foundered on a snobbishness unknown in Europe.
The New York upper crust sought to reserve this more sophisticated entertainment for itself. It built theaters in neighborhoods that made the lower classes uncomfortable. It put ticket prices beyond their reach. The effort soon failed. There weren’t enough rich snobs to support such an expensive art form.
At least partly for that reason, New York’s earliest Italian opera companies went out of business almost as soon as they opened. Meanwhile, when opera companies toured the rest of the country, a mixed class of people thoroughly enjoyed their performances of opera in Italian.
P.S. 58, Brooklyn, 2011
Music education has taken a beating in this country in recent decades. Programs in many schools have been gutted or eliminated altogether as a misguided cost-cutting effort.
A few generations ago music educators generally disapproved of popular music and sought to educate children’s tastes. That worked about as well as the older generation of rich New Yorkers trying to keep opera to themselves. Popular music is now everywhere in such school music programs as still exist. Not every school gives their children much chance to experience classical music at all.
One school that still fosters an appreciation of the arts is Brooklyn’s P.S. 58. In 2011 music teacher Stephen Cedermark earned a Blackboard Award. Among other things, his classes of kindergarteners through second graders enthusiastically learned to sing Italian opera in Italian. Not only that, they learned the meaning of the words.
Cedermark points out that opera combines singing and stories. Children love both singing and stories. Why would they not love the combination?
The same article that announced Cedermark’s award mentioned that he was on the lay-off list for the end of the year. Why is that not surprising?
I suppose he wound up keeping his job. The NBC Nightly News broadcast of December 22, 2012 featured Cedermark’s class as they learned a number from Rossini’s Barber of Seville, attended a dress rehearsal of the opera at the Metropolitan Opera, and sang for the cast back stage.
Singing His Praises / by Linnea Covington. Blackboard Awards.
Opera on the Road: Traveling Opera Troupes in the United States, 1825-60 / by Katherine K. Preston (University of Illinois Press, 1993), pp. 99 ff.
Photo credit: Some rights reserved by stevendepolo.


Discovering The Power Within
Published in TC Today - Volume 35, No. 1
By Lisa Farmer
“In school, I was taught to paint things as I saw them. But it seemed so stupid. If one could only reproduce nature, and always with less beauty than the original, why paint at all?”
Today the world knows Georgia O’Keeffe as the creator of works such as “Blue and Green Music”, “Ram’s Head White” and “Poppy 1927”, which synthesize abstraction and representation. Yet at age 25, O’Keeffe—who had already studied at the Art Institute of Chicago and the Art Students League in New York City and won prizes—was on the verge of abandoning her dream.
Fortunately, O’Keeffe was not the only American artist who was fed up with imitative realism. At TC, Arthur Wesley Dow, who had become enamored of the shadowless space and stylized drawings of Chinese and Japanese artists, had begun preaching the Modernist idea that the subject of an artist’s work should be his or her own ideas and feelings.
“Art is decadent when designers and painters lack inventive power and merely imitate nature or the creations of others,” wrote Dow, founding chair of TC’s art education program, in his seminal textbook, Composition: A Series of Exercises in Art Structure for the Use of Students and Teachers. “Then comes realism, conventionality and death.”
O’Keeffe first learned of Dow during the summer of 1912, when financial concerns prompted her to take a teaching course at the University of Virginia. Her instructor was a visiting faculty member, Alon Bement, Dow’s colleague at TC.
By 1914, O’Keeffe had enrolled at TC and was working with “Pa Dow,” as she called him. Together with her classmates Anita Pollitzer and Dorothy True (believed to be the model for O’Keeffe’s painting, “Lady With Red Hair”), she visited Gallery 291, run by the photographer and art impresario Alfred Stieglitz, who gave Americans their first public display of Cezanne watercolors and works by Matisse and Picasso. The following year, O’Keeffe—now teaching in South Carolina—sent True drawings she had done in a new, abstract style. Unbeknownst to O’Keeffe, Pollitzer brought the work to Stieglitz, who was instantly impressed. “Finally, a woman on paper,” he is reported to have said.
Over the next several years, Stieglitz exhibited O’Keeffe’s work at 291. The pair married in 1923, and Stieglitz continued to sponsor and promote O’Keeffe throughout her life.
Today it is O’Keeffe, far more than Dow, who is revered as a major artist. Yet Dow’s belief in the importance of artists’ personal vision helped unleash a wave of creativity in American art—and at Teachers College as well. Among the many other well-known artists who have attended the College over the years are the abstract painter Ad Reinhardt; the minimalist Agnes Martin; the ceramic artist William Daley; the Harlem Renaissance painter and sculptor Charles Henry Alston; and the sculptor Greg Wyatt. Victor D’Amico, founding director of the Education Department at the Museum of Modern Art and creator of the Art Barge, also taught at TC.
Their styles run the gamut. But their work is testimony to Dow’s belief that “The power is within—the question is how to reach it.”


MN Standards Assessments
I collaborated with the Perpich Center for Arts Education and the State of Minnesota to create various standards-based (Minnesota) assessments for music education that were technology (with a focus on the iPad) based. These are works in progress, and you have the right to use and adapt any or all of these assessments.
All of the documents are in PDF format, if you need a DOC version, please e-mail me.
A summary of all the standards appears at the bottom of this page; please note that these are the high school standards and a full version of the Minnesota Standards can be found at http://www.pcae.k12.mn.us/pdr/standards/ArtsStandards.pdf.
If you are from another State, these assessments could be altered to meet your requirements. To see your state, see the wonderful resource provided by MakeMake Music (Music Education Standards and Assessments).
And take a moment to examine the wonderful resources for assessment created by Dr. Wendy Barden for Kjos publications.
Score Analysis Strand 1 Foundations 1:1
SmartMusic Strand 1 Foundations 2:1 and 2:3
Arranging in GarageBand Strand 1 Foundations 2:3 and Stand 2 Create or Make 1:3
Recorder Master (iPad) Strand 1 Foundations 2:3
SmartMusic Solo Prep, Performance, and Revision Strand 1 Foundations 2:2 and 3:3 and Strand 3 Perform/Present 1:1 and 1:2
Health Issues Related to Music Stand 1 Foundations 1:3
Meanings and Functions of Music Strand 1 Foundations 3:3
MusicRoom Beginning Music Theory (iPad) Strand 1 Foundations 2:3
Piano DustBuster (iPad) Strand 1 Foundations 2:3
Recorder and SmartMusic Strand 1 Foundations 2:1 and 2:3
Wild Chords Guitar (iPad) Strand 1 Foundations 2:3
The Minnesota Arts Standards
Strand 1: Artistic Foundations
- Demonstrate knowledge of the foundations of the arts area.
- Analyze how the elements of music including melody, rhythm, harmony, dynamics, tone color, texture, form and their related concepts are combined to communicate meaning in the creation of, performance of, or response to music.
- Evaluate how the elements of music and related concepts such as repetition, pattern, balance and emphasis are used in the creation of, performance of, or response to music.
- Analyze how the characteristics of a variety of genres and styles contribute to the creation of, performance of, or response to music.
- Demonstrate knowledge and use of the technical skills of the art form, integrating technology when applicable.
- Read and notate music using standard notation system such as complex meters, extended ranges and expressive symbols, with and without the use of notation software in a variety of styles and contexts.
- Play an instrument alone and in small and large groups, a variety of music using characteristic tone, technique and expression.
- Use electronic musical tools to record, mix, play back, accompany, arrange or compose music.
- Demonstrate understanding of the personal, social, cultural and historical contexts that influence the arts areas.
- Analyze how the personal, social, cultural and historical contexts influence the creation, interpretation or performance of music including the contributions of Minnesota American Indian tribes and communities.
- Synthesize and express an individual view of the meanings and functions of music.
Strand 2: Artistic Process: Create or Make
Create or make in a variety of contexts in the arts area using the artistic foundations
- Improvise, compose or arrange new musical compositions in a variety of styles and contextsusing available technology to preserve the creations.
- Revise a musical composition or arrangement based on artistic intent and using multiplesources of critique and feedback.
- Justify an artistic statement, including how audience and occasion influence creativechoices.
Strand 3: Artistic Process: Perform or Present
Perform or present in a variety of contexts in the arts area using the artistic foundations.
- Rehearse and perform an existing single complex work or multiple works of music from avariety of contexts and styles alone and within small or large groups.
- Revise performance based on artistic intent, and using multiple sources of critique andfeedback.
- Justify artistic intent, including how audience and occasion influence performance choices.
Strand 4: Artistic Process: Respond or Critique
Respond to or critique a variety of creations and performances using the artistic foundations.
- Analyze, interpret and evaluate a variety of musical works or performances by applying self selected criteria within the traditions of the art form.
- Justify choices of self-selected criteria based on knowledge of how criteria affects criticism.


Piano Course for Christians
Reviewed by Marcia Washburn
As an experienced piano teacher with a master's degree in music, I confess to some skepticism about most teach-yourself-to-play-the-piano courses. As I examined this resource I found, however, that the author makes no wild claims about learning to play proficiently in “ten easy lessons.” Using a methodical approach, she teaches students to read and play music in incremental steps. Using the traditional Middle C approach to music reading, Woods also offers additional resources for those who want to play by ear or do gospel-style playing.
Her friendly way of explaining basic musical concepts makes this a series that would be useable while studying with a trained piano teacher or under the supervision of a non-pianist parent. She employs familiar songs and hymns as the basic repertoire for the series. The cassette tapes feature the author explaining the various concepts and demonstrating the skills so the student knows how the music should sound.
The levels of the books are designed to correlate with levels in standard piano education series, so a student who has completed Level 3 in another series would be ready to begin Level 4 in this series, for example. In the early levels, it is possible to use either a piano or an electronic keyboard.
The piano is considered the best instrument to use in starting a child's music education. It provides experience in melody and harmony, treble and bass clefs, and hand-eye coordination. It provides a foundation for all the other instruments. Research exploring the link between music and intelligence reports that music training—specifically piano instruction—is far superior to computer instruction in dramatically enhancing children's abstract reasoning skills necessary for learning math and science. These children scored 34% higher on tests measuring spatial-temporal ability used in math, chess, science and engineering. (MTNA Newsletter, Spring/Summer 1997)
Although there is no substitute for a piano specialist teaching your child the instrument, this course offers an inexpensive alternative for homeschooling families who cannot afford or do not have access to a piano teacher. Since the materials are non-consumable, all of the children in the family can use the same books. And the teaching parent has the opportunity to learn along with the children. Additionally, the Christian content is a refreshing alternative for those wishing to avoid the pop-rock pieces increasingly found in many other series. Madonna Woods' Piano Course for Christians has a lot to offer homeschooling families who want to learn to play a keyboard instrument.
At a glance:
|Piano Course for Christians|
|Reviewed by Marcia Washburn|
|$99.00 for complete course with books and cassettes|


The Reality of STEM in the Classroom
Victoria Lovejoy | Teaching
STEM is an acronym for science, technology, engineering, and math. Educators, legislators, and business leaders have long been concerned with the state of science and mathematics in our schools. In a comparison of international scores for 4th and 8th graders, results show that the American students are still lagging behind our major global competitors including Japan, China, Russia, and Singapore (TIMMS 2007). As these countries outcompete us in academic assessments, they are also outcompeting us in capturing the global markets particularly in the area of information management.
The purpose of STEM initiatives at the national, state, and local levels is to bring together the resources of government in support of improving our educational system, the private sector in making alliances to support authentic learning applicable to what is needed in the workforce, and educational institutions in collaborating on the best pedagogy and curricula to develop students who are prepared to meet the challenges of their futures. This initiative is applicable not only to the disciplines of science and math, but to all other disciplines as teachers continue to develop a 21st century approach through cross-curricular integration. In real world work and interactions, we don’t have clear cut divisions between disciplines. Learning through STEM gives students tools to develop creative and systemic problem solving, collaborative networks, leadership abilities, and long-term strategic outlooks.
This all sounds terrific and on-point, but what is the reality we each experience back in our classroom? At a recent department chair meeting, our assistant head passed on a parent request that we teach more specifically to the SATs so that our students can earn the numbers they need to get into some of the colleges they want. Among the department chairs, we all agreed that our focus in the classroom certainly included foundational skills but our goal was to prepare our students to be the independent thinkers and problem solvers described in current literature and certainly included in the STEM initiatives. By the times students reached our high school classes we all felt that the we did not have extra time to teach to a standardized exam. But we are in many ways also a service industry so that if colleges need a “number” through which to filter applicants and parents expect us to get their children into colleges and those same colleges require a certain score on a standardized test, where do we spend our energies?
Quiz: Test Your Science Savvy
How well do you know science? Take the quiz, created by the National Science Foundation for research purposes, to test your science savvy.
Clearly, this opens up all the old discussions and heated arguments we have about standardized testing and student evaluation. However, the reality when we are in our classrooms is that we are often torn between teaching lifelong skills for the future and teaching the “tricks” a student needs to score well on a test that may determine their future. Certainly there is overlap. We can teach critical reading skills and information filtering while we work on reading comprehension. We can develop foundational math skills in the context of higher order problem solving. We can decode the cues and clues embedded in tests and which can help us select the right answer as well as learn subtleties of communication. But can we really serve two masters – standardized test mastery and 21st century lifelong skills?
The reality in our classrooms as we make our way through another academic year does not always match the vision that many of us continue to carry in our minds for education. The answer, for now, is what it has always been – dedicated teachers doing their best to support the development of those skills that will best support lifelong learning and success and throwing in a few test-taking strategies to help our students jump through the hoops. It is not a perfect system but if we can keep the talk going maybe we’ll get everyone on the walk!
Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, 2007. http://nces.ed.gov/timss/table07_1.asp retrieved May 24, 2009
Visit http://podetc.com/ for upcoming courses in STEM strategies, Research and Information Fluency, Building Knowledge Management Systems, and a Survey in Emerging Technologies. Taking registrations now.


Free Education Montreal’s mandate is based on principles of social justice and stems from Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which states in part:
(1) Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.
(2) Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.
Although the Declaration insists on free education primarily at the elementary levels, it is impossible to make higher education equally accessible to all without eliminating fees for education at all levels. It is also impossible for education to be geared towards the full development of the human personality if less wealthy students must choose their course of study based on the burdens of poverty and the need to pay back student debt.
Free education benefits not just young people, but all members of society, as it fosters innovative, creative and unbiased research of benefit to everyone, as well as students who leave their institutions not just with new skills, but as critical thinkers with a fuller understanding of humanity and their role in society.
What do we mean by ‘free‘?
Learn, teach and research creatively:
Everyone should have free access to high quality education and lifelong learning. Educators and researchers should have resources, institutional support and academic freedom.
Study for educational fulfilment:
Everyone should have the freedom to pursue education for personal growth and the common good.
Govern our educational institutions:
Educational institutions should be governed by those who study and work there in cooperation with the community.
Students should be able to pursue their studies without the physical and emotional burdens of poverty and debt.
Students should be able to pursue their studies in an environment free from excessive marketing and profiteering on textbooks and class materials, foods, etc., and advertising on the university campus. Students, researchers and educators should be free from profit-driven influence on grants, funding.
Students, researchers and educators should be free from corporate interference in governance, academic and student life.
Our purpose and objectives
The purpose of Free Education Montreal is to encourage students and other community members in the Montreal area to think critically and hopefully about education and the role and responsibility of educators and students, as well as tosupport and bring together student and other community groups fighting the rising costs and deterioration of education.
Our short-term goals are to prevent further tuition and fee increases and profit-driven influences at our educational institutions in Quebec, and to have more accessible grants and supports for students, greater transparency in our educational institutions’ budgets and participation in their governance.
Our long-term goals are to eliminate tuition and fees in educational institutions and increase the quality of education through public re-investment in and the democratization of Canada and Quebec’s education system, as well as to strengthen educational institutions’ positive impact on social justice through research, teaching, and community involvement. In the pursuit of this goal, we will join with other groups across Canada and throughout the world fighting for social justice, equality of opportunity and properly-funded networks of public goods and support them in their work whenever possible.
Who We Are
We are a group of students, researchers, professionals, artists, parents, workers and community members who believe that education is a societal right and responsibility, not a business. We are open to people of all linguistic backgrounds, and to those who may not prioritize the abolition of tuition but oppose the immediate program of increases planned by the Quebec government.
We came together in June 2009, when Concordia University’s Board of Governors decided to increase tuition for international students once again and without notice, resulting in great hardship for many of our fellow students. As a response, members of the Concordia Graduate Students’ Association called for help to students across Montreal – CEGEP and University, anglophone and francophone, graduate and undergraduate, including the Concordia Student Union (for undergraduates), the Association for Solidarity among Student Unions (ASSÉ) and the Quebec Federation of University Students (FEUQ) – to demonstrate outside Concordia’s Board of Governors meeting. We then formed Montreal Students Against Tuition Increases (MSATI), which became known as Free Education Montreal (FEM) in January 2010. Since then we have been working to expand our membership to include other educational institutions and community members in Montreal.


Your child can hone his weaving skills by making this fun paper basket! Woven baskets have been created since the beginning of time - made for carrying and holding items. Your child can use colorful construction paper to make an easy paper basket to hold some of his special things!
What You Need:
- 2 sheets of construction paper
What You Do:
- Start by taking a look at woven baskets online or at your local library. Woven baskets have been made for years, with artisans using materials such as reeds, twigs, bark and even paper!
- Invite your child to select two colors of construction paper to use for creating his woven paper basket. He can use one as the main color for the base of his basket and the other for making strips for weaving.
- Now your child can fold the base color of construction in half vertically and use the ruler to create several lines, about an inch apart, that go from the fold to just about an inch from the edge of the open edge of the paper - and are an inch from the outside edges of the paper.
- Invite your child to use his scissors to cut along the lines, which will become the loom for his woven paper basket. Not only is he honing his cutting skills, he’s encouraging his hand-eye coordination!
- Now your child can use the ruler to create several lines on his other sheet of paper, about an inch apart, creating long strips to use for weaving into his basket. He can also use one for making his handle!
- Invite your child to begin weaving his basket using the basic over-under technique. Once one strip has been woven, he can add another, making sure he starts opposite from his last length. If his last strip ended over, the next strip should be under!
- Encourage your child to continue weaving strips until his sheet has been filled with strips.
- Now he can use a small amount of glue to secure each one in place and the scissors to trim any paper strips that are too long.
- Now your child can fold his paper in half and glue the outside edges together, leaving an opening at the top.
- Once the glue has dried, your child can attach the paper strip handle for his woven paper basket using a couple of drops of glue! Now your child can use his paper basket to collect items he finds around the house!
Sarah Lipoff has a K-12 Art Education degree and enjoys working with kids of all ages.


A new scheme for primary schools, funded by Foras na Gaeilge and organised by Gael Linn. To view this page in Irish use the Google Translate widget at the top of the page.
1. The Vision
· To foster respect for the Irish language throughout the school To foster respect for the Irish language throughout the school
· To teach the Irish language through the medium of Irish
· To use the Primary School Curriculum to teach conversational Irish that serves the needs of the children
· To enable the children to spontaneously use the Irish language they learn in order to communicate with each other, within the school community and with the wider community outside
2. The Scheme
(a) This is a scheme aimed at mainstream primary schools where the language of instruction is English. Its purpose is to:
· Support the work of the teachers following the Conversational Course for the Irish language as laid down by the Department of Education and Skills and which forms part of the School Plan and the daily programme;
· Encourage use of conversational Irish as a natural part of school life;
· Ensure certain language functions relevant to school routine, e.g. roll call, lunch, clean up, lining up etc., are agreed in the school plan and used progressively from class to class and from year to year;
· Promote regular opportunities for the school community, both staff and children, to enhance their vocabulary in Irish and to use the language;
· Recognise the central role of the parents and encourage their support and participation by keeping them informed about the scheme and by providing material to help them.
(b) A Gaelbhratach will be awarded to be flown by the school to indicate their achievement in the use of Irish language as a living language by both staff and children.
· Feedback will be sought from time to time so that we can assess progress and ascertain what help is required and what difference or improvement schools have identified.
· Schools will apply for a Gaelbhratach when they consider that they can demonstrate they have achieved the appropriate goals.
· Having earned a Gaelbhratach a school will have it for a period of two years. They may then renew it by adding further goals to be achieved.
Throughout these pages we hope through video image and blogs to give a flavour of the activities undertaken in our school to try and attain Gaelbhratach status. Our quest is in its infancy but we are ready willing and eager
Ceolchoirm Seachtain Na Gaeilge
Ag céiliúradh seachtain na Gaeilge gach bhlian tá ceolchoirm againn sa scoil. D'oibrigh na múinteoirí agus no páistí go fíor dian. Seo mar a leanas cúpla físeáin beag ón Ceol SNAG 2015. Tá súil again gur bainigí taitneamh as.


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Add to GoodReads
J. Howard Garrett
Knowing when and how to plant a tree are crucial to its survival. But if you select the wrong tree for your particular area and conditions, the proper planting techniques will not make a difference. Because Texas is a big place with varied climates, soils, and water qualities, a wide variety of trees can be grown there.
, also known as the "Dirt Doctor," explores the wide-ranging possibilities in a book that will prove its value to homeowners, landscape architects, contractors, nurseries, gardeners, and others who want healthy trees.
includes a complete description of native and best-introduced trees and gives details on natural habitats and preferred sites, planting and maintenance, identification information, flowers, fruit and foliage, culture, problems, and propagation.
is for all Texas tree lovers, from the Red River to the Gulf Coast, the piney woods to the deserts and mountains.
Taylor Trade Publishing
978-0-89123-076-2 • Hardback • October 2002 •
978-1-4616-3600-7 • eBook • October 2002 •
Gardening / Landscape
For access to these
professor use only
then email us at
, the author of 12 books, writes a weekly gardening column for the
Dallas Morning News
and hosts a radio talk show called "The Natural Way" in Dallas, Texas, where he lives.
The book is full of practical information, like how to plant trees properly and how to protect and maintain them. This is a beautiful, as well as practical, book on Texas trees.
; Abilene Reporter-News (Texas)
Everything you need to know to identify over 100 varieties of Texas trees is here in this one source- along with easy easy-to-follow directions for selecting, planting, and maintaining your trees.
Tg Press- Texas Garden.Com
is the perfect resource for all Texas tree lovers.
Austin Home and Living
Rights and Permissions
National Book Network


Communities developing resources and competencies for using their languages
Foundational understanding for language development work of all kinds
Publications, fonts and computer tools for language development, translation and research
SIL offers training in disciplines relevant to sustainable language development.
7,105 languages are spoken or signed. CLICK for map of world languages & regional websites.
SIL's dedication to language development past and present
Primary education programs that begin in the mother tongue help students gain literacy and numeracy skills more quickly. When taught in their local language, students readily transfer literacy skills to official languages of education, acquiring essential tools for life-long learning. The results are the growth of self esteem and a community that is better equipped to become literate in languages of wider communication.
Victor, a bilingual primary school teacher in the village of Santa Maria Ocotán, Mexico, wanted to study the effect of mother-tongue education in his first grade class. He taught his students all of their subjects in Tepehuan, although most of the teaching materials were in Spanish. Another first grade teacher used only Spanish. At the end of the year, the test scores on the standardized government tests for the students taught in their mother tongue surpassed those for the students taught only in Spanish, even though the tests were in Spanish.
Like his nomadic father and grandfather before him, Yousif was a shepherd in the mountainous terrain of West Asia. And like his ancestors, the continual travels limited his access to primary education. Nomadic peoples are often illiterate because those wanting education for their children must either sell their flocks and settle in poor urban areas or send their boys away from home to attend school.
But Yousif and others in his family began attending an innovative mobile schooling program. Adults and children started reading and writing in their mother tongue and transferred their literacy skills to the national language and then to basic English. Evening classes were held only during the summer and winter grazing seasons due to seasonal migration. One season, when Yousif’s family was unable to migrate, he enrolled in a government school; the teachers were amazed that a nomadic child could read with such fluency. Even though Yousif had completed only the two-year mobile program, he was promoted to grade four.
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Reach Out and Read Program
What is the Reach Out & Read (ROR) Program?
ROR was created in 1989 by a group of pediatricians and nurses at Boston City Hospital to help parents nurture the love of reading in young children.
ROR integrates parent education about literacy development into regular pediatric care for children at their well-child visits between the ages of 6 months and 5 years. Parents learn ways to support their children's early experiences with books.
A study of ROR in 1991 found that parent who had been given a book and literacy counseling during a clinic visit were much more likely to choose book sharing as an activity with their children.
How does ROR work?
The Reach Out and Read program has been adopted by the Pediatric Department of Cheshire Medical Center/Dartmouth-Hitchcock Keene. During well-child visits, pediatricians and nurse practitioners give a book to every child, appropriate to their developmental level. The book is used to help parents understand their child's stage of development, and the doctor or nurse practitioner talks about ways to read with the child that nurture language and literacy. This supportive relationship between parents and healthcare professionals helps children learn to love books and shows parents how to foster love of books in the home.
- At all 6-month to 5-year well visits, the child is invited to take home a new appropriate children's book. Over time, the child acquires a home library of books to share with family and friends.
- At each visit, the pediatrician or nurse practitioner uses the book to comment on the child's abilities and to counsel parents on how to use books to support their child's healthy development.
- In the clinic waiting room, community volunteers read stories to children and model reading aloud techniques for parents.
ROR supports pediatric care by making literacy development part of every child's well-child visit. Programs are directed by a multidisciplinary team, and implemented in collaboration with local community organizations. National pediatric and literacy advisory boards have been created by the national training site in Boston to provide guidance to all programs.
There are currently over 1,000 Reach Out and Read sites across the country distributing over 2,500,000 books to families each year.
How to become involved
For more information, please contact the Pediatrics Department at CMC/D-HK at 603-354-6666.


Your child will be delighted to create a sweet painting in the style of Wayne Thiebaud! Tasty treats are one of the main subjects of Thiebaud’s colorful paintings. He also likes using bright colors and strong brush strokes. He'll learn more about still-life painting, and get to eat his subject when finished!
What You Do:
- Start by looking at examples of Thiebaud’s work online or by doing some research at your local library. Wayne Thiebaud is an American painter that liked using food as his main subject matter. And, Thiebaud is considered a pop artist, alongside other artists such as Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein.
- Invite your child to head to the grocery store to select something fun and colorful to use for his Thiebaud inspired still life. Thiebaud often used repeated items in his paintings, so encourage your child to select several of the same item to use.
- Now your child can set up his tasty food items in an arrangement and get out a paper and pencil to create a light sketch.
- It’s time to get painting! Encourage your child to use strong brush strokes—and even put the paint directly on the paper without mixing! He can blend colors together as he goes!
- Once your child’s finished painting his Thiebaud inspired food artwork, it can be displayed somewhere for others to enjoy—maybe even in the kitchen! Then he can dig in on his sweet still life!
Fun Fact: Wayne Thiebaud may have produces lots and lots of food art, but his favorite food is cheese!
Sarah Lipoff has a K-12 Art Education degree and enjoys working with kids of all ages.


Stephanie David, Fletcher Elementary School literacy coach, recently met with reading teachers Lori Bird, Mindy John and Cassandra Monaghan during their weekly meeting to discuss and monitor students' progress in reading. The teachers use data to discuss students' strengths and challenges and to make adjustments in instruction. They work together to best place students in intervention programs.
Through a Response to Intervention pilot 5-year grant from New York state, Fletcher Elementary School was fortunate to be awarded a literacy coach. A literacy coach is trained to work effectively with peer colleagues to help strengthen the overall reading program. All district schools, however, are doing similar response to intervention for their students who are challenged.
"We work very hard to tailor and target instruction based on each student's specific needs," said the group. "We are constantly digging into the data to find out what the exact needs are and to then develop a strategy, as a group, that will help improve that skill. Students grow at different levels and we want to figure out what interventions will work best for each student."
The way students are studied in the weekly meetings is multi-fold. The Jamestown Schools assesses all students regularly on the big ideas of early literacy development using DIBELS, a standardized research-based assessment. From this information, literacy strengths and challenges are identified for each student. Based on an overall score, the students are placed in to one of three groups or tiers of literacy development: benchmark, strategic and intensive. To provide even more prescriptive instruction for students within these tiers, classroom and intervention data is also collected, shared, and analyzed during weekly grade level meetings as well. Individual student concerns are addressed, goals are set, goals are set, interventions are implemented, and students are continuously monitored. Instructional decisions are made based on all of this data.
All district elementary students receive a daily, uninterrupted 90-minute reading block that includes whole-group instruction and differentiated small-group instruction. Students are engaged in meaningful literacy practices in literacy workstations while the teacher meets with small groups.
In addition to the 90-minute reading block, students who are on track, or benchmark, also receive enrichment activities or help in a literacy "gap" they may have. For the "strategic" students who need support, an additional 30-minutes in skill groups, with a classroom teacher or a reading teacher, is provided. These students are monitored every three weeks with data to make changes.
The "intensive" or at-risk students, not only receive the 90-minute block and 30-minute support, but also an additional 15-30 minutes with a Fletcher reading teacher working on very specific skills that are challenging for the student. The intensive students are monitored weekly, often using out of grade level assessments.
After evaluating the students, the literacy coach, reading teachers, and/or classroom teachers may make changes in the current reading program in either the intervention used, the group size, and/or the amount of time for the intervention.
"We are working hard to track student growth, close literacy gaps, and help every student improve at an appropriate rate. We want parents to know that all students develop in literacy at different levels. Keep in close contact with your child's teacher to know how your child is doing and what skills they may need to develop," said the Fletcher reading teachers. "It is invaluable if parents continue to support in-school instruction at home by reading with child daily and working on developing those skills."


Please visit our grade level pages to learn more specific information. The following is an overview of Lower Dauphin’s K-5 curriculum.
A rigorous and integrated Language Arts program which includes reading, writing, speaking and listening is essential to ensure our students’ college and career readiness. All Lower Dauphin students in grades kindergarten through fifth grade receive daily English/Language Arts instruction which is aligned with the Pennsylvania Core Standards. Students are taught to successfully read and comprehend both Literature and Informational text and to use the traits of Focus, Content, Organization, Style and Conventions to strengthen their writing of those texts. Additionally, the skills and strategies of reading, writing, speaking and listening are consistently incorporated into all other curricular areas. Click here to view Pennsylvania's Pre K to Grade 5 Core State Standards for English Language Arts.
Our students learn science skills and concepts through an exciting hands-on curriculum that turns the classroom into a fun-filled science laboratory. Concepts are taught in the context of real life scenarios so that students are able to make the connection between science and their own lives.
In Social Studies, our youngest students study themselves and the people closest to them. In later years, study is expanded to cover the larger community which is beyond a student’s immediate surroundings. In fourth grade, the focus turns to Pennsylvania history followed by the study of the United States of America in fifth grade.
Our elementary math curriculum is fully aligned to the Pennsylvania Core Standards. Instruction is focused on mastery of grade level content as well as development of mathematical practices, including 1) making sense of problems and persevering at solving them, 2) constructing viable arguments, 3) reasoning abstractly and quantitatively, 4) using tools strategically, 5) looking for and making use of structure, 6) looking for and expressing regularity in repeated reasoning, and 7) attending to precision. Click here to view Pennsylvania's PreK to Grade 12 Core State Standards for Mathematics.
Please feel free to contact Douglas G. Winner, Director of Elementary Education, at firstname.lastname@example.org if you have any questions regarding our elementary core curriculum.


Education and Training
Nail art education and nail design training for nail art with tutorials
Nail design education, instructions, training, videos and nail art DVD movies from the leading manufacturer NDED. Nail designer is not an on-the-job training career, like so many jobs in the beauty industry, but is based on extra training. It takes more than a few short attempts to learn nail care, skin care and nail design - several weeks of preparation in the field are necessary as well as in-depth medical and hygienic knowledge regarding nail care and skin. However, training as a nail designer is not regulated uniformly and some studios have had to deal with unqualified applicants. Nail design training must provide the basics, which involve the hygienic and medical side of nail design as well as the various materials and equipment used. The handling of tools, instruments and material can’t be ignored and, furthermore, nail designers have to be strong when dealing with customers who aren’t always easy. Maintaining customer relations has to be learned as much as in any other service position. However, the focus of the nail design are the modelling instructions for artificial fingernails, in other words for acrylic nails. This is not that difficult to learn with a few tips and tricks, but just like UV gel modelling, it takes a bit of practice before you can actually start working on and for customers. Training materials such as DVDs, training hands and replacement fingertips are located in the following pages along with brochures that explain the individual steps in detail. These materials are also relevant for hobby nail designers because they provide an in-depth introduction to a complex subject. Manicure education and training and best nail tutorials for french pedicure.


Age Range: 3-14 years old
Cost: Contact for details
Phone: Williamsburg: 347-987-4450. Greenpoint: 718-384-2091
Address: Williamsburg: 60 Broadway. Greenpoint: 33 Nassau Avenue
Not many children want to study math, reading, and writing during the summer months. But parents know that children must continue to exercise their minds, or suffer “summer learning loss.” Fortunately, programs like Eye Level make learning core subjects fun and interesting.
Josh Gunsberger of Play Greenpoint runs Eye Level’s North Brooklyn program. (Eye Level has locations all over the United States.) Eye Level Greenpoint is located in the same building as PLAY Greenpoint, and the two programs work in conjunction. Once children outgrow PLAY Greenpoint’s play space and classes, they can “graduate” into Eye Level’s academic classes.
Eye Level is a math, reading, and writing program that runs during the summer, both as a camp and as an enrichment program that students take part in all year round. At Eye Level, young children work on fine motor skill development, basic math skills, and phonics-based English. Older children work on more advanced projects depending on their skill level.
Sessions are from 9-12pm or 1-4pm. The classes are designed so that children are able to retain and expand on knowledge they learned during school. “We’re trying to prevent brain drain,” explained Gunsberger. “The classes are fun and interactive; it’s not just them sitting for three hours. There are a lot of games involved, but at the same time, we’re developing their critical thinking skills.”
Kids get play multiplication bingo and other games that make learning math interesting. “The classes are also individualized. The kids have a lot of fun, and they’re learning at the same time,” Gunsberger said. He added that their math program is Korean-based, so it’s aligned with the common core standards. “It’s all about building a solid foundation,” explained Gunsberger.
In Eye Level Math, students concentrate on:
Basic Thinking Math: numbers, arithmetic, equations, relationships and functions.
Critical Thinking Math: reasoning, geometry, problem solving, depth perception and measurements.
In Eye Level English, students concentrate on:
Reading & Writing: motor skills, vocabulary, reading comprehension, writing mechanism.
Speaking & Listening: alphabet, phonics, active listening and recognition of similar sounds.


Example Activities and Courses
Special Interest: Process of Science
Results 21 - 30 of 85 matches
The Use of Cube Puzzle and Toilet Paper Roll Model in Teaching The Nature of Science
This is a hands-on activity in scientific method that uses inexpensive materials such as carton boxes, toilet paper roll tube, strings and toothpicks. It engages the students to conduct pattern observation, prediction, testing and ends up with a model construction. It also encourages thinking outside the box, group discussion and creation of individual cube puzzles.
Advanced Field Geology
This is a field-based course, taught during four weekends, spread out over the semester. Each trip generally visits a different locality in order to expose students to diverse types of geology, everything from ...
Using Scientific Data For Multi-Disciplinary Science Instruction (PD for K-12 Teachers)
Using Scientific Data is a professional development course for in-service K-12 teachers focused on climate change and Earth system science that also explores how climate concepts can be incorporated into courses ...
Earth Stories: Earth Science for Elementary Education Majors
This course is designed to help Elementary Education majors learn basic geological concepts. This is done in the context of the nature of science and basic scientific thinking skills.
An Interactive Study: Laws of Conservation of Mass and Definite Proportions
This activity seeks to have students model the process of science by recording quantitative and qualitative attributes of reactants and products in three separate experiments with the purpose of examining the relationship between the original reactant(s) to the final product(s). Students record the mass and volume of reactants and products and independently calculate mathematical relationships between the reactant(s) and product(s). They also record their observations of any physical changes that occur.
Rutherford's enlarged: A content-embedded activity to teach about nature of science
This activity can be used to help middle and secondary school students develop more informed understandings of some important aspects of nature of science in the context of teaching them about Rutherford's experiments and atomic structure.
Organizing Scientific Writing
I give writing assignments along with some explicit instructions about how to organize their writing. Drafts are reviewed by peers and the instructor.
Observations vs. Explanations
In small-group and class discussions, students learn to separate scientific observations from explanations.
6 classroom discussion starters to teach the process and nature of science
I have included slides here that were used to initiate a half dozen class discussions of about 10 students each. The topics were: Ownership and Sharing, Scientists as public figures, Intuition and pattern recognition vs. controlled experiments, Public engagement with vs. as scientists, Democratization of scientific information, and Data deluge (includes Understanding Sci flowcht).
Design a Paper Car: Exploring the Scientific Method
An engineering design project modified to teach the scientific methos, promote team-builing, and engage students at the beginning of a physics course.