Tom Roza on “American Revolution vs. the Civil War: Similarities and Differences”
The two most momentous events in the history of the United States of America occurred less than a century apart; the Revolutionary War occurred in 1775-1783 and the Civil War in 1861-1865. The objective of the Revolutionary War was to create United States of America; the objective of the Civil War was to preserve it. Being a student of history for over 60 years and having conducted extensive research into the root causes for each of these two conflicts, there are numerous social, economic, and political similarities – as well as some differences.
From a high level, people living in the Thirteen Colonies, because of the vast geographical distance from England and Europe in general, and the mixing of different ethnic cultures, with each passing day, were drifting further apart from their European ancestors. In the United States, the North had become more urban, industrialized, and its citizens were more migrant that produced a philosophy that America was a “Union of States”. Conversely, the South was more rural, agrarian, and its population was more sedentary; generation after generation grew up and lived in the same towns and counties; that produced a philosophy that America was a “Collection of Independent States”.
From a social perspective for the period leading up to the Revolutionary War, while most of the people living in the thirteen colonies were of English ancestry, cohabitating with other European ethnic groups as well as being in close proximity to Native American Indians produced a vastly different set of values from those living in England and other European countries. The American colonists saw themselves as more independent and were creating a more homogenous society. For the period leading up to the Civil War, American citizens living in the North had retained that homogenous society perspective that resulted in a more inclusive citizenry. American citizens living in the South sociologically had evolved into a more exclusive society that supported slavery and viewed non-Caucasians and those from non-Protestant religions as foreigners.
From an economic perspective, the British Parliament used its power to impose numerous trade tariffs, barriers and regulations that retarded the economic growth of the colonies. Similarly, the United States Congress imposed numerous trade tariffs, barriers, and regulations that retarded the economic growth of the Southern States.
From a political perspective, the thirteen colonies had no representation in Parliament and were denied the same individual rights that were granted to citizens living in England. With the abolitionist movement in the North attempting to prevent slavery from being allowed in the new states being formed in the western territories, Southerners feared they would lose political power in Congress that would both perpetuate the imposition of unfair economic laws but also eventually result in the abolition of slavery throughout the United States.
The presentation “American Revolution vs. the Civil War: Similarities and Differences” takes in-depth look at these two momentous events.
Tom Roza has been a student of history for over 60 years. His interest in both the Revolutionary War and the Civil War began with his elementary education in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and has evolved ever since. As an officer and the Secretary of the South Bay Civil War Roundtable, Tom has made numerous presentations on the topic of the Civil War to both his roundtable organization and other historical organizations in the Bay Area. Tom is also a published author of the book entitled Windows to the Past: A Virginian’s Experience in the Civil War, which has been accepted by the Library of Congress into its catalog. Tom is currently working on a sequel.


Over summer vacation, children typically read less than they do during the school year. During this time away from school, they are at risk of losing some of the literacy skills developed during the academic year. Children can lose upward of a month of skills or knowledge in math, reading and language arts each summer - this loss is referred to as the summer slide. This loss plays a significant role in a child's chances for future success in school and in life.
Building on strategies and practices already in place in the city, and working in collaboration with the Ottawa Public Library and Community Houses across the city, a pilot project was implemented to explore best practices in staff training and program delivery within a summer camp setting. The full pilot report can be found here. A small task group has been formed to build on the Summer Literacy Achievement Pilot Results. The group will be focusing on further development of staff training and program delivery.
The Lit Kit is the product of the Summer Literacy Task Group's hard work in the are of the summer slide. This "program in a box" is designed to help reduce a child's loss of literacy skill by helping summer camps, programs, and parents/guardians to integrate literacy into their daily activities. By thinking outside of the box (while using what's in the box) on how to support literacy and reading, we can can encourage a love of reading in all children all year long.
The contents of the Lit Kit can be worked into any program, camp, or home in assist in the development of five key literacy skills:
At this time, we are no longer distributing hard copies however, we are able to provide digital copies below for you to download at your leisure.
Divided by age group (4-6 and 7-12) and includes activities, games, and crafts which promote literacy development. (Contains tips for: implementing additional literacy measures in your program, and overcoming challenges and supporting children who are struggling with reading).
Includes templates for printing that accompany the suggested activities and crafts. (List of recommended books based on age, reading level and theme, developed by the Ottawa Public Library).
Thanks to funding received from the Community Foundation of Ottawa, last year we provided the Lit Kit free of charge and it is available in both French and English.


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Education majors enjoy teaching and working in educational settings. They may work in child care centers, assist in classrooms, or become teachers.
Education majors take coursework on the science and art of teaching. Students also learn how to teach diverse student populations while integrating technology and multicultural-based lessons. Education majors also observe and even teach in the classroom.
Sample Transfer Paths for Education
Education courses are primarily designed for elementary education (K-8) teachers. Students who are interested in teaching secondary education should follow the degree maps for the subject areas they plan on teaching.
|WRIT 101||College Writing I||3||Requires placement|
|M 121||College Algebra||3||Requires placement.|
|EDU 200||Introduction to Education||3|
|EDU 270||Instructional Technology||3|
|CAPP 131||Basic MS Office||3|
|PSCI 210||Intro to American Government||3|
|NASX 204 or 232||Native American Studies course||3|
|LIT 110||Intro to Literature||3|
|HTH 201||Health Issues for Education||3|
|Science Core||Physics or Geology||4|
|Social Science elective||PSYX 100 or SOCI 101||3|
|COMX 115||Intro to Interpersonal Communication||3|
|EDU 221||Educational Psychology||3|
|Science core||Biology or Chemistry||4|
|M 135||Math for K-8 Teachers I||4|
|PSYX 230||Developmental Psychology||3|
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|M 136||Math for K-8 Teachers II||4|


Creating and Preserving Stories in Honduran Communities
Achieving universal literacy is one of the international community’s most engaging and admirable aspirations. Although the educational and social context in Honduras presents challenges, the local community has invested considerable time and effort in successfully improving education quality for their children.
AIR implemented the USAID-funded Teacher Citizen Participation Project (2011-2018)—known as Proyecto EducAcción. This project aimed to improve child literacy rates through strengthened community participation in education, teacher professional development, and increased access to reading materials. Student performance data show that on average, the 155 municipalities where Proyecto EducAcción worked showed greater improvement in primary school student achievement in reading than in municipalities where the project did not work.
One of Proyecto EducAcción’s most notable achievements was to work with Honduran students to author and illustrate bilingual stories in Spanish and indigenous languages and compile these stories into books that were widely disseminated in the students’ communities. These books have been well-received in Honduras because they provide communities with increased access to reading materials, particularly in local languages.
Although seven percent of the Honduran population is of indigenous or Afro-Honduran origin, the majority of schools teach students to read and write in Spanish. Schools that teach their students in the local language face many challenges. There is a need to improve teachers’ own reading and writing skills in either the local language or Spanish, provide them with training on best practices for teaching early grade reading, and strengthen the system of support to transition students from a local language to Spanish. One of the biggest challenges is a lack of print materials to support literacy development in local languages.
Despite overwhelming evidence that high-quality and age-appropriate supplementary reading materials in the classroom are a major factor in developing strong readers, a survey of 143 classrooms showed that only 36% not only had, but also used supplementary reading materials. There are few data on reading practices, but they indicate that most Honduran students also have limited access to books at home. In addition, few publishers and bookstores sell children’s books, and if they do, only a few are authored by Hondurans and contain contextually and culturally relevant content. The lack of exposure to varied and interesting reading materials is a barrier to children’s literacy development. Children respond most positively to reading materials that they can relate to based on their lived experiences.
Developing Local Stories
To address this issue, the technical team at AIR Honduras worked with local Honduran school children to design, illustrate, and publish local language books. The goal was to create books that are culturally and contextually relevant to children’s lives and enable them to understand the world through their daily life at home, in the community and at school. AIR conducted workshops to train Honduran teachers, writers, and other volunteers to edit and appraise the books to ensure they were grade appropriate. Project staff also built teachers’ capacity to use the books to improve children’s reading skills. Indigenous leaders and elders from five Honduran indigenous peoples—the Lenca, Garífuna, Tolupán, Miskito, and Pesh—supported this effort. Some prominent Honduran writers also participated in this effort, and their children’s stories are included in the book collection.
This collaboration yielded 44 different titles, 10 of which are bilingual and are being used in classrooms by children aged 6 to 12 years old. Approximately 350,000 locally developed books were distributed to Honduran schools.


This thesis examines the interaction between religion and empire in Manchester between 1876 and 1899 with particular focus on the Catholic Church. The existing story of imperialism and religion in Manchester argues that by 1900 there existed a common imperial culture across all Churches. Whilst this is convincing, this thesis examines the Catholic story, which has not been substantially investigated before, and uncovers more varied reasons for imperial engagement, and differences in emphasis, than previously acknowledged.The struggle for elementary education has been seen as the dominant factor which led to a new confidence and political maturity amongst Catholics by the year 1900. This thesis shows how other decisions taken on a local level by Catholic hierarchies and laymen were also important. The thesis analyses the key role played by Bishop Vaughan of Salford and other clergy in the formation of the Manchester Geographical Society (MGS). The nature of the MGS is placed within the wider literature on geographical societies. The influence of religious figures on geographical societies and cultures of exploration in England, has been previously neglected. Vaughan's aims for involvement in the MGS were diverse, including the greater involvement of Catholics in civil society, a redefinition of the Catholic image, and a more closely defined role for Catholics in the British empire. The MGS emerges as a hybrid institution, of competing aims and values, rather than a commercial pressure group. The foundation by Bishop Vaughan of St. Bede's College in Manchester, for the Catholic middle class of the city, is then described. The technical and geographical education developed at the school, by Vaughan and Prefect of Studies Louis Charles Casartelli, was formulated to strengthen the commercial nature of the growing Catholic middle class, and in the longer term to aid both the assimilation of local Catholics into society, and to change the image of the faith to one which was engaged with aspects of the modern world and the wider empire. The museum at the school is also shown to have played a key role in redefining geography as a subject. Bishop Vaughan and Louis Charles Casartelli actively engaged with modern developments in Manchester, and aspects of contemporary society such as imperialism, exploration and commerce.No previous study has analysed St. Bede's College to any extent. This thesis uses the MGS Archive located at Greater Manchester County Record Office, many documents from which have never been analysed. Material is also used from the Church Lads' Brigade archive near Rotherham, and from St. Bede's College.


The exodus of refugees from Belgium after Germany invaded in August 1914 was the largest national group displaced during WW1, with more than 110,000 reaching Britain. Gwendoline and Margaret Davies enabled a select group of the Belgian refugees to settle in Ceredigion and Powys with the aim of raising cultural standards in the Principality. By October of that year, 91 Belgian composers, writers and artists and their families had been rescued, crossing the Channel on the ‘last but one’ boat to leave. On their arrival in Wales, the families were provided with accommodation in Aberystwyth and Cardiff, and the costs of their settlement were met by the Davies family. In due course some of the mid Wales refugees relocated to Llanidloes and stayed in houses in Garden Suburb, and here the Davies sisters continued to support them. One of these was George Minne, an internationally renowned sculptor and painter. Two of his drawings are at Gregynog.
Gwendoline and Margaret had a vision for the arts in Wales, and in 1914 Gwendoline donated £75,000 towards the founding of the Aberystwyth University School of Instrumental Music to support the development music education in mid Wales. While the conservatoire had a short existence, it was indicative of the Davies sisters’ philanthropy and their desire to use their great inherited wealth to the benefit of the people of Wales. They continued to donate large sums to the University over many years.
An exhibition of paintings produced by the artists Valerius de Saedeleer, George Minne, Edgar Gevaert and Gustave van de Woestyne was held in Cardiff and Ghent in 2002. The exhibition catalogue, Art in Exile, also alludes to ‘several well-known musicians from Brussels’ who came to Wales, but who were they and why had their narratives disappeared? This discrepancy prompted Dr Rhian Davies, Artistic Director of the Gregynog Festival, to see what she could find out and a remarkable story has emerged of the distinguished composers, singers and instrumentalists who held prominent positions at the Brussels Conservatoire, Royal Palace and Opera House (Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie) before they were displaced by the First World War.
The musicians in the Aberystwyth refugee group quickly arranged a concert at the Coliseum in that town. The performance was so successful that they took it on tour around Wales, including to venues in Mold, Trefeglwys, Newtown and Tregarron. The composer and pianist Eugène Guillaume, the violinist Nicolas Laoureux and his son Marcel, a pianist and accompanist, were based in Aberystwyth. The composer and organist Joseph Jongen spent the War in London but his piano piece Crépuscule au Lac Ogwen (Twilight at Lake Ogwen) was inspired by a holiday in Snowdonia in 1916. And David van de Woestijne -son of the artist Gustave van de Woestijne and his wife Prudence – was born in Llandinam’s Temperance Hotel (now The Lion) in February 1915 and grew up to become a leading musician of the next generation.
Rhian’s research has taken her all over the UK and to Belgium, where she found music by the composers that she was able to include in Gregynog Festival concerts in 2014. She has also spoken about the work in Cardiff, London and Brussels and people are always fascinated that a major Flemish composer should have been born in Llandinam. Music composed by David van de Woestijne and Eugène Guillaume was performed at the Gregynog Festival in 2014. Guillaume’s work ‘Fantaisie’ was in the programme for one of the Festival’s concerts in Llandinam. The work is dedicated to Gwendoline Davies.
That remarkable story of a century ago is being repeated in 2016-17 in the welcome and support that displaced Syrian families have received from the people of Newtown and Aberystwyth today.


Literacy is the competency with which a person uses written language to communicate - specifically, to read and write. Along with numeracy, it is one of the important foundations in education and one of the goals of schooling. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and other international organizations consider basic literacy provisions to be a basic human right (Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights guarantees elementary and fundamental education).
While, in most Western societies, literacy is gained through pre-schooling and primary schooling, as well as from parents and others, many fall through the gap. In the United States, in 2003, the National Center for Education Statistics conducted the National Assessment of Adult Literacy which concluded that 30 million - around 14% - of the U.S. population bad "below basic" literacy skills, meaning that they are unable to read anything beyond the level of a children's picture book.
- And, more controversially, the use of information technology: the United Kingdom's "Skills for Life" policy considers ICT skills to be equivalent in importance to literacy and numeracy skills since they are all required to live and work in a technology-saturated culture.
- Overall Key Findings from the NAAL, USA Today Literacy Study: 1 in 7 U.S. adults are unable to read this story


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You may think I am crazy, but I jump right into an art project on the first day of Kindergarten art! In this video, I will tell you all about what project I do, how I accomplish it, and how I use this first art project as an important assessment tool.
Click Here to download the PDF of the shape sheet that I use for this lesson.
And, if you want to really dive into your kindergarten teaching practices, be sure to check out the AOE Course Rethinking Kindergarten! You will learn a variety of strategies, tools, and methodologies sure to support the budding artists in your classroom. Plus, you’ll get to investigate a variety of progressive philosophies, including Reggio Emilia, Montessori, and Waldorf, as well as techniques for integrating play-based learning and teaching foundational skills. Don’t miss it!
What is your first Kindergarten Art Project?
What are your tips for surviving the first day of Kindergarten Art?
The NOW Conference is the world’s largest online conference for art educators! This one-day event (join us live or watch on-demand for an entire year) features 20+ inspiring and innovative TED TALK-style presentations covering topics that are relevant right NOW in Art Ed!


The Visual Arts Department at Bishop Gorman Catholic School continues the work of the school in its mission of the ongoing formation of the Christian person. The visual arts are offered as an elective to both middle and high school students. All levels of visual arts classes meet and exceed the standards set by the Texas Education Agency, Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills, and the National Standards for Arts Education. The AP Studio Art course is also offered for advanced high school students.
Sixth-grade students begin their study of the visual arts with a six week fine arts exploratory rotation that allows the incoming students to experience a sampling of visual art experiences including drawing, painting, printmaking, and design. The elements and principles of design are introduced along with inspirational examples from a range of historical and multicultural sources. At the end of the first semester after having experience in visual arts, band, orchestra, and choir, sixth-grade students make their fine arts choice for the second semester where they continue exploring a variety of media and approaches to art including sculpture, ceramics, and mixed media works.
Seventh and eighth-grade students may choose art as their elective for the whole year. Students in these grades expand upon the art vocabulary introduced in the sixth-grade year with a great deal of emphasis on developing technical skill with a wide variety of art media.
Students in high school may choose art as their elective for one or more of their high school years. High School Art is a year-long course that is structured to be both an introduction to art for beginning students and an opportunity for the maturation of creative problem-solving skills for continuing students.
Students in high school art spend 10-12 weeks of study in each the pre-AP Studio Art portfolio options of drawing, two-dimensional design, and three-dimensional design. All students learn foundation technical skills and experience the use of a wide variety of art media such as graphite, ink, charcoal, pastel, acrylic, and watercolor paint, block printing, mono-printing, ceramics, plaster, wire, wood, mixed media, and found objects. Students view and discuss art historical influences from many different time periods and cultures. Trips to local art museums and venues are incorporated into the class curriculum. Students have opportunities for personal and meaningful visual art expression through a range of approaches to idea generation and subject matter.
The AP Studio Art Course combines the goals and objectives for all three of the Studio Art Portfolios: 2D Design, Drawing, and 3D Design in a year-long course with the goal of submitting the completed portfolio to the College Board for review and scoring. Students begin the school year developing an understanding of the goals of the course and discerning the portfolio choice they wish to pursue.
Students are then presented with creative problem-solving challenges according to their portfolio option for the breadth section of the portfolio. The area of concentration section of the portfolio is a series of artworks developed through the exploration of an idea. These artworks are created independently by the students with the guidance of the teacher.
Quality is addressed in both breadth lessons and concentration works consistently throughout the year through critiques and written reflections. Photographing, organizing, and preparing the artworks for submission to the College Board are also done as part of the class. Portfolios are sent to the College Board in May with results being returned to the students in July.
Opportunities for Extracurricular participation in art competition are available for all grade levels. At the middle school level, students may choose to try out for, and compete in, the on-site drawing category in the PSIA Competition. High School students have opportunities to submit artworks to juried contests such as the Congressional Art Contest, TAPPS District and State Art competitions, the district and state level Visual Arts Scholastic Event (VASE) sponsored by the Texas Art Education Association, and the Tyler Museum of Art’s annual High School Art exhibition.


- Qualification:Cambridge Primary
- Author(s):Cherri Moseley, Janet Rees
- Available from: March 2016
Cambridge Primary Mathematics is a flexible and engaging course written for the Cambridge Primary Maths Curriculum.
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Cambridge Primary Starters are complementary activity books which are specially designed as preparatory activity books before children embark on the Cambridge Primary curriculum at Grade 1. The Starters provide a range of activities which will help children acquire the vital numeracy skills they will need for primary school, such as numbers, counting, identifying shapes and comparing sizes and quantities. They include discreet activity guidance for teacher or parent as they support their child in completing the activities.
Specially designed preparatory activity books to prepare children for the Cambridge Primary Mathematics Curriculum in Grade 1.
A range of activities to help children acquire the vital numeracy skills they will need for primary school.
Include discreet activity guidance for the teacher or parent as they support their child in completing the activities.
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A Message of Solidarity
Education Through Music joins a chorus of voices around the world in mourning the tragic loss of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, Ahmaud Arbery, and countless other Black lives at the hands of systemic racism and violence. We stand with and acknowledge the pain of the Black and Brown students, families, principals, music teachers, staff and leadership team members, and stakeholders in our community. We care about their safety and their right to live free from injustice. We believe Black lives matter.
While we bear witness to the events unfolding across the country, we are reminded of the urgency of our work.
As a music education organization serving more than 30,000 Black and Brown children in New York City, we know that education has a vital part to play in the pursuit of social justice. Education is a civil rights issue at its very core. ETM exists because systemic racism has created inequities in access to education, and our mission was built around identifying and combating these inequities. We recognize the gaps in access faced by our partner school students are the result of generations of institutional oppression and discrimination.
ETM invests in under-resourced schools and supports local communities. We believe that providing equity and access for all students is the key to long-term, sustainable change. We recognize the important role that music has in the fight against fear and the search for understanding.
ETM does not make this statement lightly or without a tangible plan to back it up. We are proud of the work our staff has done over the past 29 years, but we know we must do more. Much more. We must listen, learn, and act. Silence is not an option, nor is maintaining the status quo.
With this in mind, ETM is committed to:
- Examining our internal diversity, equity, and inclusion policies and practices and finding ways to bring greater accountability and transparency to our work.
- Engaging in open dialogue with our partner schools to better understand and align ourselves with their needs.
- Using music to advance equity for marginalized and vulnerable students; bringing a social justice lens and a culturally responsive approach to classroom activities.
- Training music educators and staff to support the lived experiences of students in Black and Brown communities.
- Joining our peer organizations in advocating for systemic change and greater investment in education.
In the weeks, months, and years to come, ETM will remain committed to our mission. With so many of the challenges faced by our partner schools amplified by the global pandemic—which has disproportionately impacted Black communities—we know there is much to be done. We are proud to work alongside so many passionate supporters, partners, artists, and leaders to build a more equitable world through music.
In Our 2020-2021 Music Classes
Students With Access To High-Quality Music Education
To Sponsor A Student For One Year
How We Work
Education Through Music partners with under-resourced schools to provide music as a core subject for all children.Learn More
Why Music Education?
It is part of a well-rounded education, essential for students’ social and emotional well-being, and a critical tool for establishing equity and access.Learn More
How Can You Help?
Join us to ensure that every child, at every school, has access to high-quality music education.


Use this highly structured reading program to develop emerging readers. Many struggling students find reading success with a process that teaches a word, introduces its meaning, provides comprehension practice, and uses the word in the story context.
Read:OutLoud 6 can help provide access to the new electronic books required in IDEA, and the included web browser makes the internet fully accessible. Read:OutLoud provides accessibility supports like text-to-speech and study tools that help you read with comprehension. Read:OutLoud 6 includes an improved accessible web browser that is now compatible on Mac and Windows. Includes support for NIMAS and DAISY files as well as one-click access to Bookshare.
The ReadingPen®2 is designed specifically to help readers improve their reading skills. This fully portable scanning device helps with reading fluency and comprehension by providing immediate definitions for scanned text. Scanned text and definitions can be read aloud, allowing readers to maintain their reading flow, even when encountering unfamiliar words.
System 44 was designed for struggling readers in Grades 3–12. System 44 helps students understand that the English language is a finite system of 44 sounds and 26 letters that can be mastered. Teacher tools include: * Validated assessment for screening and placement * Research-based phonics instruction * Highly motivating and age-appropriate adaptive technology Reading
VocabGrabber analyzes any text you're interested in, generating lists of the most useful vocabulary words and showing you how those words are used in context. Just copy text from a document and paste it into the box, and then click on the "Grab Vocabulary!" button. VocabGrabber will automatically create a list of vocabulary from your text, which you can then sort, filter, and save. Select any word on the list and you'll see a snapshot of the Visual Thesaurus map and definitions for that word, along with examples of the word in your text.
The Read Naturally Software Edition features the same reading strategy and stories used in the Masters Edition, while taking advantage of the benefits and functionality of the computer. The Software Edition automates the placement process, assigns an appropriate reading goal, and allows you to customize the program by accelerating or skipping steps for advanced readers. It also creates detailed reports that track student progress and indicate areas that need additional coaching.
The pen is a pocket scanner with text-to-speech for reading single words and lines of text aloud. Embedded dictionary and thesaurus can be turned on or off (for testing mode). Weighs 3 ounces.
Classworks is a web-based instructional software that provides interactive lessons, customized learning and assessment in K-12 Math, Reading, and Language Arts. Elementary Science lessons are also available. Classworks units are based on state standards and offer interactive instruction through a multi-sensory approach that includes voice, pop-up text, audio support, video, photographs, artist drawings, and animated clips. The multiple modalities may be helpful for those with limited English proficiency or learning disabilities, or as a Response to Intervention.
My Reading Coach is consistent with the Orton-Gillingham approach to reading. It is a structured, flexible, mastery-based, multi-sensory educational software program that provides a virtual reading specialist and speech pathologist to every student. Embedded Teacher Intelligence™ individualizes instruction to help each student reach grade level in the skill areas of phonemic awareness, phonics sounds and rules, vocabulary, word Structure, syntactic processing and reading comprehension.
MindPlay Reading Fluency is a reading fluency tool that has been designed to systematically increase reading speed while ensuring proficient reading comprehension.


TPE 4: Making Content Accessible
Students all learn through different modalities and as teachers it is important to allow the students get the various inputs they need to learn. While it may seem very difficult, the teacher who puts in the effort will find that the extra time makes learning fun and accessible for all the students and not just a small fraction of students.
In my teaching lesson about decimals, we see that students of all learning type will learn how decimals and place values work through different thinking process and sorting. Some students are readily able to computationally and abstractly understand that decimals are representation of numbers that signifies a part of a whole. Those students who prefer to see visuals will understand how decimals are important through visual demonstrations, while the student who loves to move will need physical activity and movement to understand how decimals work and how they can manipulate the numbers.
The easiest way for a teacher to test if they are reaching at least three different learning types is to ask one if the following three things has been satisfied: (1) Did I provide something for the visual learner to see, (2) did I provide something for the auditory learner to hear, and (3) did I provide the kinesthetic learner something to do? While a teacher may not be able to target every student for every lesson, they are able to at least provide at the minimum these three learning stimulus.
|CA- CCTC: TPE's (Teaching Performance Expectations)|
|Standard : A. Making Subject Matter Comprehensible to Students|
| TPE : TPE
1: Specific Pedagogical Skills for Subject Matter Instruction
TPE 1 is divided into two categories intended to take into account the differentiated teaching
assignments of multiple subject and single subject teachers. Multiple subject credential holders
work in self-contained classrooms and are responsible for instruction in several subject areas;
single subject teachers work in departmentalized settings and have more specialized assignments.
These categories are Subject-Specific Pedagogical Skills for Multiple Subject Teaching
Assignments (1-A), and Subject-Specific Pedagogical Skills for Single Subject Teaching
|Component : TPE 1A: Subject-Specific Pedagogical Skills for Multiple Subject Teaching Assignments|
Standard Area : Teaching
Reading-Language Arts in a Multiple Subject Assignment
Candidates for a Multiple Subject Teaching Credential demonstrate the ability to teach the state-adopted
academic content standards for students in English-Language Arts (K-8). They understand how to deliver
a comprehensive program of systematic instruction in word analysis, fluency, and systematic vocabulary
development; reading comprehension; literary response and analysis; writing strategies and applications; written
and oral English Language conventions; and listening and speaking strategies and applications. They know how
to strategically plan and schedule instruction to ensure that students meet or exceed the standards. Candidates
create a classroom environment where students learn to read and write, comprehend and compose, appreciate
and analyze, and perform and enjoy the language arts. They understand how to make language (e.g., vocabulary,
forms, uses) comprehensible to students and the need for students to master foundational skills as a gateway to
using all forms of language as tools for thinking, learning, and communicating. They understand how to use
instructional materials that include a range of textual, functional and recreational texts and how to teach high quality
literature and expository text. They understand that the advanced skills of comprehending narrative and informational
texts and literary response and analysis, and the creation of eloquent prose, all depend on a foundation of solid
vocabulary, decoding, and word-recognition skills.
Candidates teach students how to use visual structures such as graphic organizers or outlines to comprehend or
produce text, how to comprehend or produce narrative, expository, persuasive and descriptive texts, how to comprehend
or produce the complexity of writing forms, purposes, and organizational patterns, and how to have a command of written
and oral English-language conventions. They know how to determine the skill level of students through the use of
meaningful indicators of reading and language arts proficiency prior to instruction, how to determine whether students are
making adequate progress on skills and concepts taught directly, and how to determine the effectiveness of instruction and
students’ proficiency after instruction.
1. Math - 5th - Decimal


Personal design experience continuously attained through the curriculum and the scientific analysis of art, culture, the media and pedagogy combine to help students acquire skills that enable them to plan and organise art education in schools.
Both the training curriculum and later professional practice should assign a central role to the principle of holistic learning and the perception of the world with all senses. University and school education are thus called upon to focus on individuals and the promotion and enhancement of their social, professional and self-competence.
The Art Education programme operates with an open concept of art, culture and pedagogy. Against the historical background of regional and international artistic and visual cultural phenomena but also in view of the constant evolution and modification of earlier educational models, students need to develop competencies that enable them, through their educational input, to support children, adolescents and adults in the active shaping of a socially competent, self-determined and culture-oriented life.
Another purpose of the curriculum lies in teaching scientific techniques for the continuous honing of work objectives, subjects and methods that enable students to act and react effectively in future, as yet unforeseeable situations.
The film course “Einstieg in die Filmpraxis” is a cooperation of the public music school in Puchenau and the The University of Arts and Industrial Design Linz. The course exists since 2007. The course administrator are alumni of arteducation degree.
The students from Art Education and Media Design can profit and use this class as "researchfor the lesson practice in teaching film".


The IPSA-T (Irish Primary Science Achievement Tests) is designed to assess pupils’ scientific knowledge and skills across the strands and strand units of the primary school curriculum. The three levels of the IPSA-T make it possible to assess science achievement at the end of Second Class, the end of Fourth Class and the end of Sixth Class. Using a mixture of Multiple Choice and Short Answer items, pupils just need to tick boxes, circle items and/or write a short sentence to respond to the questions. Information from the IPSA-T can be used to guide teaching and learning in Science at the class or whole school levels and as a basis for reporting pupil progress to parents. Given that the IPSA-T has been trialled with over 2000 pupils in a range of Irish primary schools, teachers can use data on the performance of these pupils as a benchmark for making judgements about how their own pupils did in the tests.
The Teacher’s Manual provides directions on how to administer and score the tests. It also includes information on how to interpret the results, a class record sheet and advice about reporting to parents. All Test Booklets use full colour photographs, drawings and illustrations, and are attractively laid out to appeal to pupils in the primary school.


Teaching Assistant Level 3 Essay - 4104 Words.
Essay on Ta Level 3 Ncfe Course. Assignment 7 Q1: Explain 5 strategies that a teaching assistant might use to support literacy development. The teaching assistant could read to the pupils on a daily basis, this will help pupils learn how fluent reading sounds and this will help them understand how sentences and text can make sense, and will learn when to pause for full stops, question marks.
A new level 3 apprenticeship for teaching assistants was approved in 2018. Find out more details about the apprenticeship on the Institute for Apprenticeships website. You can also find out more general information and look for apprenticeships on the Government website (England).
A Teaching Assistant course at Level 3 is the ideal route into employment working in a support role in school and results in Level 3 certification from one of the most recognised awarding bodies for the care and education sector- Cache.
Teaching assistant Alternative titles for this job include Classroom assistant, learning support assistant. Teaching assistants support teachers and help children with reading, writing and learning activities.
Hi, in the level 3 teaching assistant course i'm working on assignment 9 and i've noticed that question 3e says Assignment in brackets and none of the other questions say assignment or practical in brackets. Does that mean that all questions apart from 3e need to be done practically and that they need to be signed off from the school?
Teaching Assistant: Specialist Support for Teaching and Learning in Schools (RQF) Level 3 This nationally-recognised Level 3 teaching support qualification is the perfect way to demonstrate to employers that you are the ideal candidate for a teaching assistant job.
Develop your knowledge of the role of a teaching assistant with this Level 3 course! Explore the role of teaching assistants in schools and how they support teaching and learning activities. Study how to support pupils with particular needs.


Developed by: Phyllis Brown, retired art educator, art education blogger at plbrown.blogspot.com (There’s a Dragon in my Art Room)
Lesson Plan Ideas
Students will create a simple but complicated looking woven carpet following simple steps. Through this hands-on experience, they will learn the basic concepts of weaving and understand the meaning of words like weaving, warp, weft, pattern, opposite and repeat.
Common Core Standards for Grades 2-5
Measure the length of an object by selecting and using appropriate tools such as rulers, yardsticks, meter sticks, and measuring tapes.
Generate a number or shape pattern that follows a given rule. Identify apparent features of the pattern that were not explicit in the rule itself.
Partition a rectangle into rows and columns of same-size squares and count to find the total number of them.
Recall information from experiences or gather information from provided sources to answer a question.
Ask and answer questions about what a speaker says in order to clarify comprehension, gather additional information, or deepen understanding of a topic or issue.
To create the warp: Take one piece of 9”x12” Black Drawing Paper. Holding the paper vertically, mark 1” from the top on each side. Lay the ruler across the width of the paper connecting the dots and draw a line with pencil. Write your name above the line! This is the back of your paper. Fold the paper in half with the line and your name showing on the OUTSIDE of the folded paper.
On your pencil line, use a ruler to mark off 1” intervals going across the paper. When done, you should have made eight pencil marks. Use the ruler again to mark the same intervals on the folded edge of the paper.
Connect these pencil marks, and cut these eight lines, beginning at the fold and ending on the top pencil line. Unfold the cut paper and fold backwards a little to flatten out the fold. Place the paper with the pencil lines on the BACK. We will be decorating the FRONT.
Select two colors of Tru-Ray® Construction Paper. Cut into narrow 1/2” x 12” strips to decorate the carpet. Glue them vertically on to the paper as per the photo. Glue between the vertical cuts, do NOT glue over them!
Decorate the glued strips with repeating patterns, using gel pens and metallic markers.
For your weft, select another color of Tru-Ray® Construction Paper that is a different color from your warp paper. Cut four 1” x 12” strips from this color of construction paper and cut five 1” x 12” strips from the Pacon® Black Drawing Paper. Use an alternating pattern of black and colored construction paper to weave across the warp paper. Remember, when weaving, each strip is opposite the one before it; in other words, if the prior strip went over, the next strip must go under. If you make a mistake, pull it out and try again! It will fall apart if it isn’t weaved correctly! Students who grasp this process quickly can help guide students who are struggling. The weft strips should stick out more than an inch on each side.
Snuggle the strips close together when weaving, so there are no spaces. You should be able to fit in a total of nine pieces of weft paper.
When weaving is complete, glue underneath the strips that stick out at the ends. Do not fold them under; simply lift them up, and put a dot of glue underneath. Turn the paper over and glue the ends on the back, too. Use a scissors to cut fringe on the strips that stick out on either side.
Use the gel pens and metallic markers to decorate the weft strips where visible, with repeating patterns.
- What can you do with them when they’re done? Perhaps display on a bulletin board decorated with clouds and sky. Or, create something to ride on your flying carpet!
- Sakura® Gelly Roll Moonlight & Metallic Pens work excellent on our Black Art Papers.


Emiliana Vegas surveys strategies used by the world's developing countries to fill their classrooms with qualified teachers. With their low quality of education and wide gaps in student outcomes, schools in developing countries strongly resemble hard-to-staff urban U.S. schools. Their experience with reform may thus provide insights for U.S. policymakers.
Severe budget constraints and a lack of teacher training capacity have pushed developing nations to try a wide variety of reforms, including using part-time or assistant teachers, experimenting with pay incentives, and using school-based management.
The strategy of hiring teachers with less than full credentials has had mixed results. One successful program in India hired young women who lacked teaching certificates to teach basic literacy and numeracy skills to children whose skills were seriously lagging. After two years, student learning increased, with the highest gains among the least able students.
As in the United States, says Vegas, teaching quality and student achievement in the developing world are sensitive to teacher compensation. As average teacher salaries in Chile more than doubled over the past decade, higher-quality students entered teacher education programs. And when Brazil increased educational funding and distributed resources more equitably, school enrollment increased and the gap in student test scores narrowed. Experiments with performance-based pay have had mixed results. In Bolivia a bonus for teaching in rural areas failed to produce higher-quality teachers. And in Mexico a system to reward teachers for improved student outcomes failed to change teacher performance. But Vegas explains that the design of teacher incentives is critical. Effective incentive schemes must be tightly coupled with desired behaviors and generous enough to give teachers a reason to make the extra effort.
School-based management reforms give decisionmaking authority to the schools. Such reforms in Central America have reduced teacher absenteeism, increased teacher work hours, increased homework assignments, and improved parent-teacher relationships. These changes, says Vegas, are especially promising in schools where educational quality is low.


The Washington Educator Skills Tests (WEST) is in place to assess the skills and knowledge of prospective teachers in the state of Washington (not Washington, D.C.). All persons who wish to obtain a teaching certificate in the state of Washington must pass the Washington Educator Skills Test-Basic (WEST-B) examination. Students must also obtain one or more of the Washington Educator Skills Test-Endorsement (WEST-E) examinations, depending on the subject and/or the grade level the applicant wishes to teach.
The WEST-B measures proficiency in reading, mathematics, and writing. A solid understanding and mastery of all three is essential for success in teaching at any level. The three subtests are outlined below for reference:
1. The reading subtest contains 60 multiple-choice questions that test the applicant’s ability to comprehend written text.
2. The mathematics subtest, also comprised of 60 multiple-choice questions, is designed to analyze a prospective teacher’s ability to understand and apply mathematical concepts and principles.
3. The writing subtest is divided into two parts: the first part is comprised of 50 multiple-choice questions, and the second part is comprised of two writing prompts. The writing subtest is designed to assess a candidate’s ability to write clearly in plain and understandable English.
The WEST-E examinations measure a teaching candidate’s knowledge and proficiency in a particular subject. WEST-E examinations are available for the following subjects:
- Agriculture education
- Bilingual education
- Business and marketing education
- Deaf education
- Designated world languages
- Designated world languages: Latin
- Earth and space science
- Early childhood education
- Early childhood special education
- Elementary education
- English language arts
- English language learners
- Family and consumer sciences education
- Health and fitness
- Library media
- Middle level humanities
- Middle level mathematics
- Middle level science
- Music: choral
- Music: general
- Music: instrumental
- Social studies
- Special education
- Technology education
- Theater arts
- Traffic safety
- Visual arts
Most WEST-E examinations are comprised of 110 multiple-choice questions; however, this is not always the case:
- Elementary education and middle level humanities examinations are comprised of two subtests, each with 55 multiple-choice questions.
- Designated world languages examination has 55 multiple-choice questions.
- Designated world languages: Latin examination is comprised of 70 multiple-choice questions, a translation piece, and an oral reading assignment.
All WEST examinations have a scoring scale of 100 to 300, with 240 being the minimum passing score for every subtest. There is also a minimum passing score requirement of 240 for the total sum of the candidate’s WEST examinations.
Examination check-in procedures vary, depending on whether the examination is hand-written or computer-based. Both examinations require current, signed, government-issue photograph identification; it must be printed in English, and have the same name as the student’s examination registration. The computer-based testing will take a digital signature; a palm scan and/or a digital photograph may also be taken. A WEST examination applicant without proper identification will not be permitted to take the examination, and may not receive a refund or credit for any previously submitted payment. The hand-written examination requires the applicant to bring several sharpened #2 pencils with erasers; pens and mechanical pencils are not permitted.


Functional Skills Maths – Entry Level 3
- Type: Up-skill Your Workforce | English, Maths & ESOL | Employers | Bright Futures Training Centre
- Level: Entry Level 3
- Attendance: Part-time
- Start Date: Variable
- Time: 1 lesson per week (3 hours)
- Duration: 13 weeks
About the Course
Functional Skills qualifications are designed to support you as you seek to improve your numeracy skills and provide you with the fundamental knowledge required for everyday life. Achieving a maths qualification will increase your confidence and motivation and the skills gained will aid you in the workplace or any further learning.
How much does it cost?
FREE (subject to eligibility criteria)
Functional Skills involves studying contextualised and relevant scenarios to learn problem solving skills. You will study a range of topics that are designed to help you analyse and interpret information. These include:
- Understanding practical problems
- Identify and obtain necessary information to tackle a problem
- Apply mathematics in an organised way to find a solution
- Interpret and communicate solution to practical problems
You will develop and refine problem solving strategies, building the confidence and skills required to tackle unfamiliar challenges. You will gain mathematical skills that are transferable to everyday contexts and the world of work.
This qualification is suitable for anyone who wishes to improve on their existing skills or progress their career.
You will attend weekly classes where you will complete activities and exercises to support your learning.
This course is funded* and provides you with a good foundation to progress onto higher level maths qualification, for example, GCSE.
The course is fully funded subject to eligibility criteria.
Where will this course take me?
Functional Skills Maths Level 1
How will I be assessed?
Ongoing feedback will be provided within the classroom lessons both from your tutor and peers. The final assessment is via an exam at the end of the course.
Will I have to provide anything?
All course materials are provided, however, it is advised that you bring a mobile device to class.
I'm interested. What should I do now?
Call 01279 868100 and talk to an Admissions Adviser
Ask Us a question about this course


The passing of Bill 22 under the leadership of the Bourassa government, in 1974, became an important issue during the Quebec elections of November 1976. The bill had come under attack from the anglophone community and from those, in the francophone community, who thought that the bill did not go far enough. Once in power, the new government of the Parti Québécois, led by René Levesque, first issued a white paper on language, then introduced Bill 1, and later a revised version of it, Bill 101, titled Charte de la langue française. The bill, as it was passed in the summer of 1977, proclaimed French as the official language in Quebec for just about every facet of life in the province: government, judicial system, education, advertising, business, contracts, etc. For example, the bill required that all advertising on billboards be done in French only and that all commercial signs in business establishments be in French alone. All public administrations and businesses had to address their employees in French. All government agencies were directed to use the Official language in their dealings with corporations and other governments in Canada. Government Ministries and Agencies, as well as professional associations in Quebec, were to be known by their French name. The laws of the province were to be enacted in French although an English translation might also be made (and indeed continued to be made after bill 101). English education was to be restricted mostly to those already in the system, their siblings, those temporarily posted in Quebec or whose parents had themselves received an English elementary education in the province. While the bill was very prescriptive in several respects, it showed considerable flexibility in connection to businesses, especially head offices of international and national corporations centred in Quebec. While francization programmes were instituted for businesses, they were limited to businesses of more than 50 employees.
The debates around bill 101 have only abetted recently. These debates were endless and sometimes lacking in civility. Rarely did those who argued seem to understand, or appreciate, the opponent's point of view. The law has received very bad press outside of Quebec and anglophone Quebecers have been very slow in accepting it. They believed, incorrectly, that the bill was designed essentially to eradicate English from the face of the province. They argued that many of its provisions were unduly harsh, unfair, and in violation of basic human rights. They rejected the view that French was a threatened language and that it required strong legislative protection. They demanded that their language be considered equal and be allowed full visibility. Their perception of the bill was sharpened by sometimes plainly petty application of it by overzealous bureaucrats, called, in some anglophone circles, “the language police”.
Over the decades, a number of changes have been effected to the bill. Some were made because provisions of the law have been found to have violated articles of the Constitution Act (1867) or, after 1982, the new Canadian Charter of Rights. Other changes were made willingly by the majority in an attempt to resolve issues as they arose and to show good faith. The most significant of the changes have dealt with the language of legislation (now issued in both English and French), access to English schools (enlarged to guarantee access to English school to all those that have received their education in English in Canada), and with the language of signs (where English is now acceptable provided that French be given priority). Some of these changes were incorporated in a bill issued in 1993 by the Liberal government of Robert Bourassa (Bill 86). Another bill (Bill 42) guaranteed to anglophones health and social services in their language. Some of that has gone a long way to lessen tension on the linguistic front.


As parents, we know how important it is to read to our children. Many families include this as a regular part of the bedtime routine.
While we feel confident this is contributing to our child’s literacy development,
new research shows that this nightly routine could also be used to help improve maths skills.
How reading can help your child learn maths
The study by researchers in the US gave 587 students in year 1 (between 6 and 7 years old) tablets featuring an app with short passages to read with their parents.
Parents would read these passages with their child and then answer questions based on the text. Families used the app on average 4 times a week between the Autumn and Spring of 2013-14.
One group read stories which contained a mathematical focus, which allowed children and their parents to discuss maths in a natural way and complete simple problems together.
Each passage came with five questions ranging in difficulty from preschool to fifth-grade level and covered topics including counting and arithmetic, fractions, geometry and probability.
There was also an additional bank of questions for families who wished to explore the passage further. Families could complete as many questions as they were comfortable with after reading the story.
A second, comparison group read the same passage with the specific maths content removed and answered questions which focused on recalling facts, inferring information and spelling.
The results were overwhelming.
The students were tested before and at the end of the study and those who read the maths stories, adapted from the Bedtime Math app, showed significant improvement in their overall mathematics learning during the year.
When comparing the children in each group who used the app most frequently, the study saw a three month advancement in maths achievement for those who read the maths-focused stories.
Helping parents boost their confidence in maths
Research shows that parents tend to place more importance on language learning than on mathematical development when their children are young. A reason for this could be that parents don’t feel as comfortable with teaching maths, compared to literacy.
But research shows that when parents are stressed about maths, their children learn less mathematics over the school year and can also develop the same negative feelings towards the subject.
Children who feel anxious about maths are also less likely to engage in the classroom and will avoid mathematical tasks.
This avoidance leads to missed learning opportunities and a greater sense of potential failure.
Once the cycle has begun, it can be hard to redirect this momentum.
While the research focused on stories designed for an electronic device, the findings highlight some key points for parents.
Sharing stories with a mathematical focus, and the discussions which are then created, can contribute to an increase in achievement at school.
For parents who are struggling with their own mathematical anxieties, this comes as welcome news. The study goes on to suggest that this sharing of stories and discussing maths with our children, can help parents become less anxious in this space.
The federal Government recently committed $6.4m to support the development of maths resources for students. This forms a part of the government’s agenda to improve the teaching of science, technology, engineering and maths subjects in our schools.
So how can parents use books to help improve their child’s maths skills? Here are some suggestions:
Reading tips for parents
Read books with mathematical concepts to your children.
In some books the content is obvious – we are all familiar with Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar.
Try reading these as well:
- 365 Penguins by Jean-Luc Fromental
- Leaping lizards by Stuart Murphy
- Math for all seasons: Mind-stretching Maths Riddles by Greg Tang
- My Grandmother’s Clock by Geraldine McCaughrean
Consider asking your local librarian for some other ideas. Look for books with amusing pictures and colourful illustrations – we know how this attracts children to read.
Talk about the book with your child, as you would with any other story.
The mathematical elements will naturally come into the conversation and should be encouraged – this will help children to see maths as part of everyday life.
By simply including books which include mathematical concepts in nighttime routines, parents can feel more confident that they are contributing to the mathematical development of their child outside the classroom at the same time as creating a less stressful environment for discussing mathematics.
Kylie will be taking part in an Ask An Expert Q&A on Twitter from noon to 1pm on Thursday, November. Head over to Twitter and post your questions about learning and teaching maths using #AskAnExpert.


To teach young children and promote a belief in themselves as learners in a play based learning environment. We provide teaching and learning experiences that promote child engagement, wellbeing, positive relationships, confidence, literacy, numeracy, physical skills, healthy eating, active physical activity, fitness, thinking skills and creativity.
‘Our image of the child is rich in potential, strong, powerful, competent and most of all connected to adults and other children.’ (Malaguzzi)
Values and Principles
The framework is purposefully used to develop learning programs that are responsive to the learning needs of the children and develop the children’s life skills. Through the framework, staff will assist children to develop:
- A strong sense of their identity
- Connections with their world
- A strong sense of wellbeing
- Confidence and involvement in their learning
- Effective communication skills
We believe education is a life-long process and involves parents and educators working together in partnership.
At Adelaide Miethke Kindergarten we:
- Respect each child as a unique individual, and work to develop each child’s confidence, competence, wellbeing and positive self concept.
- Value what is important to children and build on their interests to support more meaningful learning.
- Recognise the importance of an environment that values and supports the child’s social and cultural context.
- Facilitate the development of language, literacy and numeracy skills.


What Is Music Workshop?
- Music Workshop is a non-profit organization who provides an innovative, turnkey and free music program (open education resource) to elementary and middle schools
- Participating schools receive access to numerous courses through their own login portal
- Each course features a genre or instrument/instrument grouping, presenting facts and examples of music history, music appreciation and teaches the students how to use music in their everyday lives to enrich themselves
- Each course is a combination of a video and interaction with a teacher. The teacher works through Q&A sessions and fun activities with the students
- In addition to our school programming, Music Workshop also provides an additional online learning platform for students and their families so that students can continue to explore the world of music and families can seek local music resources for instruments, lessons and family fun concerts http://www.maestrosmovements.org
What Makes Music Workshop Different Than Other Supplemental Music Education Programs?
- Music Workshop is simple and easy to execute
- It is free to all participating schools, students and their families
- Each course is presented during school hours, resulting in an equal educational opportunity for all students
- The program is delivered through an online portal, providing easy access for schools to obtain the program and allowing them to work through the program at their own pace
- Any volunteer or staff member can facilitate the program – no knowledge of music or prior education experience is needed
- The program collaborates and partners with other local music organizations, musicians and educators to extend music education beyond the classroom
- Music Workshop will supplement as well as complement existing school music programs


By: Clare Bruce
When Levi McGrath and Andrew Hornerman heard about the rising levels of youth suicide in Australia’s remote indigenous communities, their hearts broke—and they knew they had to take action.
Levi, a singer-songwriter, and Andrew, his bandmate, have long been advocates for social justice causes in many parts of the world – so it was a natural progression to use their musical talents to try and make a difference in their homeland, too.
That’s how ‘Instruments for the Outback’ was born: a program helping indigenous kids in remote parts of Australia to learn to play and record music.
Levi said it was developed in response to a government call for community initiatives that could make a difference.
“In remote areas of Australia, young people have taken their lives out of boredom, feelings of hopelessness, and some have been through some pretty horrific abuse,” Levi said. “This is just getting to epidemic levels where the government was trying to step in, trying to find programs to keep young people alive.
“We’d started to get really passionate about the issues in Australia [where we can use] music. While we’re not aid workers, or development workers, we just wanted to get involved.”
An Exchange of Cultures
Every year, the pair take a team of professional Christian musicians to some remote communities in the Northern Territory, where there is normally no access to musical instruments and music education. There they spend time exchanging the knowledge and skills of their two different cultures.
“We take these professional musicians as a way of inspiring kids to learn music… but at the same time we’re soaking up so much culture,” he said. “We’re learning traditional methods of spear-making, of playing the didgeridoo, of going hunting and fishing for mud crabs on the beach. It’s an incredible experience that’s really opened the eyes of the professionals that we take on these trips.
“It also has really been a wonderful positive thing for the communities. They’re starting to make their own music videos now, do their own recordings in language of gospel songs and songs about their own islands and culture and where they’re from.
“It’s a really beautiful experience.”
Adapting to Social Distancing
Sadly COVID-19 restrictions prevented this year’s NT trips from going ahead – but instead Instruments for the Outback adapted, collaborating with their team of musicians to create an online program children and their schools can access.
“We’ve built an online database of music tutorials and workshops including bass guitar, drums, ukulele, even tips for making music videos and producing digital music,” Levi said. “On top of this we’ve also provided extra recording equipment such as laptops and musical instruments. It’s been a major collaborative effort.”
Music is A Gift For Life
Levi said the program is not so much about teaching a vocation as it is about having a skill for life – because, as all musicians know, once you’ve learnt to play, it’s a gift that never leaves you.
“It’s something that they can fall back on as a possible professional career in the future,” Levi said, “but to make music in general just brings so much happiness, so much joy to these kids. They’re playing in bands together, they’re starting to record and write their own songs, and it’s so powerful to see that.
“And [music has] power to bring about change. It’s even [increased] the number of kids coming to school, because they want to play these new instruments… it’s really cool to see.”
Article supplied with thanks to Hope Media.
About the Author: Clare is a digital journalist for the Broadcast Industry.


Numeracy tests are increasingly a part of the recruitment process, but taking numeracy tests is something most of us dread, let alone practise.
Brilliant Numeracy Tests will give you all the practise you need. You’ll gain experience with realistic practice questions and answers, become familiar with all the common tests, both general and organization-specific, and feel comfortable with a range of difficulty levels.
Written by an experienced psychologist who has designed and administered numeracy tests, you’ll find a variety of effective strategies, tactics and tips to achieve peak performance.
Companion website: www.pearson-books.com/numeracyandverbaltests
PART 1 Getting to grips with your test
CHAPTER 1 What are numeracy tests?
CHAPTER 2 Getting started
CHAPTER 3 Brush up your maths skills
CHAPTER 4 - Test-taking tactics
CHAPTER 5 What else is useful to know in advance?
PART 2 Time to Practise
CHAPTER 6 The Armed Forces
CHAPTER 7 QTS Numeracy Skills Test
CHAPTER 8 UKCAT
CHAPTER 9 Graduate Level Numeracy Tests
CHAPTER 10 Senior-managerial level numeracy tests


We know that first graders are egocentric and rule-based. They have boundless energy; may be oppositional, silly, and unfiltered; are attached to their teacher and peers; thrive in a structured environment; are working on being flexible; and still seek out creative play.
We help our first graders learn and practice: sympathy and empathy for others; recognizing their own feelings; communicating verbally in a conflict; managing relationships independently; building awareness of and self-regulating their energy; working together effectively; compromising; becoming aware of their own personal space; and respecting the personal boundaries of others.
Our Goals for First Graders
Build comfort with structured and unstructured writing, learn to generate ideas and use writing strategies, and develop spelling skills.
Through the study of our neighborhoods and their people, students investigate topics like identity, difference and fairness.
Build number sense, utilize basic computational skills to demonstrate conceptual understanding and connect math to our daily lives.
Build phonetic skills and the foundational skills for decoding, fluency, and comprehension.
Connect ideas, record observations, and analyze data, while building communication skills. Students begin to make basic predictions, and start to engage in the engineering design process.
Begin to develop phonemic awareness; convey information through gestures, words, and short sentences; connect phonics with written letters; and sharpen listening comprehension.
Gain exposure to a diverse range of literature, advance independent reading based on interest and ability, develop active participation skills and an understanding of the library as a community resource.
Further develop locomotor skills, coordination, endurance and learn the importance of fitness, fair play and teamwork through cooperative games and activities.
Learn to keep a steady beat with pitched and unpitched percussion instruments, and sing songs that help match pitch and expand their vocal range.
Broaden art vocabulary and increase complexity and the number of steps and techniques in play during art projects.
Begin to engage in production-based activities that support homeroom curriculum themes and use the lab to solve problems and share what they know.


PK/TK Resources for Visual & Performing Arts
These resources are wonderful ways to give your child a break daily!
- Choose a game from New York Philharmonic Game Zone
- Make a rhythm wand to twirl while you are listening to your favorite music.
- Make musical instruments with simple materials from your home: cardboard, rice, etc.
- National Association for Music Education
- Music and Songs has multilingual options
- Make instruments
- Try making Homemade clay (Spanish option)
- 10 Creative Clay Craft Ideas for Kids.
- Try following this art lesson for drawing a Rainbow lollipop.
- Go Noodle
- Do the Freeze Dance
- Check out: Ms Mitchell’s Dance Channel Be sure to try the “Brain Dance” you find there!
- Indoor Recess
- Act out your favorite part of one of the stories you read or listened to today with someone who’s home with you.
- Select and activity from Drama Kids to play together.


Learning music not only helps a child’s imagination, creativity, emotional wellbeing, but by through learning and playing a musical instrument, they will see a positive impact on other areas of their learning too.
Many studies show a correlation between musical training and academic success in children and adults. Learning to play an instrument stimulates the brain, improving functions like reasoning skills and memory, which are important for subjects like science and maths.
A Bradford primary school decided to give all its pupils up to six hours of music a week in their learning, and by doing so it dramatically improved its Sats success. They decided the improvement in their results was not down to extra maths but lots and lots of music! (you can read the full article in the Guardian here).
Can learning music help develop language skills?
Research has shown that musically educated children find it easier to process sounds and language; by understanding sound they are able to detect small differences in word syllables, making a new language easier to learn.
Musical training helps the brain work more efficiently in distinguishing split-second differences between rapidly changing sounds that are essential to processing language. It also helps people perceive sound pitches more effectively and increases their verbal memory.
Therefore, children who learn music can develop larger vocabularies, a better understanding of grammar and pick up new languages – plus they are learning the universal language of music!
Can music help with maths?
Research has shown that music activates the same areas of the brain that are used by subjects that use reasoning, such as maths. (for a great video on how music benefits the brain see here).
What music and maths do have in common is patterns - music is full of maths when you think about it. By learning about rhythm, you are exploring the way different numbers interact - musical pieces from symphonies to pop songs are built from recurring mathematical patterns and sequences.
It is the understanding of these patterns that can help children’s learning. It allows them to notice and understand links between different sequences, challenges their thought processes and increases their capacity to learn and predict.
If maths is the science of pattern, and music training increases cognitive function, the answer is yes, music can help with maths! While not everyone can agree exactly how this works, plenty of studies do show a correlation between music and improvements in mathematical abilities. Exactly how much students benefit may depend on the type of music they listen to and whether they choose to learn how to play instruments.
Read on schoolmum.net how Learning a Musical Instrument can benefit your child
Read here ‘The importance of Music Education’.
Read more about the Benefits of Music here.
Read how the introduction of music to children helped with their concentration levels in the blog from Back Chat Brass


Our class will be taking the English Language Arts MAPS assessment on Monday morning and the Math MAPS on Tuesday afternoon. (Monday volunteers- our schedule will be a bit different because of testing, but you are absolutely welcome to come at your regular time and help us with writing.) We want the students to do their best, but this is not something I want to create stress about. Standardized assessments provide valuable information for driving instruction, but we also have to keep in mind the mode of assessment and that this is only one source of information about how your child is growing and learning. As a school, we are working to encourage all of the students to put forth their best effort when taking these tests. Each student in our kinder classrooms will have the chance to earn an ice cream sundae by showing that they took their time and did their best effort. This is an incentive and must be earned. We will enjoy our earned sundaes on Tuesday the 21st.
This week we will be reading a nonfiction book about polar bears. We will also be reading another book by our focus author, Jan Brett-The Three Snow Bears. This is a version of the familiar 3 Bears story that is set in the Arctic. We will continue practicing making connections and comparisons between texts.
This week, our nonfiction writing expands to include more specific details as we gather and sort facts by subgroups. This is helping lay the foundation for understanding “main idea”.
In math, we revisit comparing amounts of 0-10.
We are expanding our Habits of Discussion to include a focus on really building on what others are saying. Here are some sentence starters that you can model using and encourage your child to use:
* I agree…
* I disagree…
* That makes me think about…
* I wonder…
* Tell me more about…
We will soon be beginning our Desert Animal Research Project which involves the students making a diorama in addition to a written report. Each child will need a small/regular shoe box (please no extra large/boot type). If you have an extra you don’t mind sending in, it is always appreciated as not everyone is able to send a shoe box in. We will also need sandpaper, fake leafy plants (the smaller the leaves the better), and rocks.
10 minutes each night.
Reading should include a variety of the following activities
– reading stories (your child should at times be the reader and at other times be the listener)
– reading the poems in the binder
– working on alphabet sounds and letter names (students have mastered sounds and names should be shifting this practice time to noticing these within their own reading and writing)
– sight word games/practice.
10 minutes each night.
This week, any objectives in the G section would be great ones to spend time on.
Your child can explore any other objectives they are interested in. Reviewing and increasing fluency in Section C skills is also a good use of their time. Remember, real world practice of these skills is also great for building up their foundational skills.


We are now using a new Junior Kindergarten curriculum. The curriculum is called the Fire Flies and it's from the Funshine Express Company Funshineexpress.com. Alhamdulillah the curriculum covers many areas in the children’s overall development.
Below are the program’s guiding principles and goals taken from the curriculum guide book:
Program’s Guiding Principles:
Research shows that children learn by doing and they need many opportunities to explore and grow. This curriculum activities foster creativity and promote emotional, cognitive, social, language and physical development. Appropriate activities build self-esteem and enthusiasm for learning.
- The curriculum will be based on current research and sound educational theories of early childhood learning and development.
- We will provide a wide range of hands-on, interactive materials allowing children to experiment and explore their surroundings.
- The activity and project suggestions provided in our kits are aligned with specific learning goals and objectives.
- The program will encourage involvement of family members in each child’s learning.


Children’s ability to follow a beat may impact reading, language skills
New research is shedding light on how music education may help improve children’s reading and language skills.
In a study from Northwestern University, researchers demonstrated that children with a better sense of rhythm were able to more clearly process sound in their brains – a trait that has been linked to stronger reading and language proficiency.
For the study, researchers tested the rhythmic abilities of 124 Chicago high school students. Each student used a special tapping pad to measure how well they were able to tap their finger along to the beat of a metronome.
Next, students were fitted with electrodes in order to measure the way their brains responded to repeated sounds.
“As people hear sound the neurons in the brain give off electricity and we are able to capture that with scalp electrodes,” lead study author Nina Kraus told FoxNews.com.
After comparing results of the two tests, Kraus and her team concluded that students with the best rhythmic abilities also had the clearest neural responses to sound, which researchers believe enhances their language and reading abilities.
“Sound is bound to meaning, you’re always making sound-to-meaning connections,” Kraus, director of Northwestern’s Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory, said. “Learning to read, you’re learning to match what you hear to what (the word) looks like on the page.”
A child’s ability to clearly link the sound of a word to the way it appears on a page plays a crucial role in the process of learning how to read. Previous studies have demonstrated that children who experience neural “jitter”, or fuzziness in their neural responses to sound, have more difficulty with language and reading skills and may even be more prone to conditions like dyslexia.
Additionally, Kraus points out that the ability to clearly process sound is connected to the ability to accurately hear in a crowd – a helpful skill in busy classroom learning environments.
“Children in classrooms, there’s traffic outside, chairs scraping, you need to be able to quickly and easily pull out the teachers voice, the meaningful signal,” Kraus said.
Though more research needs to be done, Kraus noted that previous studies have indicated that toddlers who participated in just a year of music training – with activities such as simple as mom-and-tot music classes – showed better neural responses to sound compared to toddlers who did not receive music training.
As a result, Kraus is hopeful that this research could lead to a greater emphasis on the benefits of music education for children.
“The hypothesis is that music education can help language skills, can strengthen skills such as reading, hearing and hearing speech in noise, as well as skills like memory and attention to sound,” Kraus said.
For more information, visit www.brainvolts.northwestern.edu


Did you know that music is a crucial part of what makes us human? We are all born musical. We are wired that way. Music is embedded within us and somehow it gets "taught out of us" throughout our early years and our schooling years. Some children grow up without opportunities to nurture their musical intelligence. This is devastating to me...
Here are a few articles and videos that I have found useful when researching about how music impacts brain development in the early years and beyond.
Music and Movement for Infants and Toddlers: Naturally Wonder-full
By Dr John Feierabend
MMADD about the Arts: An introduction to primary arts education
By D. Russell-Bowie (2014)
I get asked this so often! When I meet someone for the first time and it gets to the questions about my profession, the first myth I come across is that learning music = learning an instrument so therefore teaching music = teaching an instrument. So when I tell people I teach babies (and preschool aged children) there is a lot of confusion about how you teach music to babies. I like to refer to it as how you 'do music' with babies and young children. So here's what we do...
I was recently reading an article by the National Association for Music Education. Click here to read it yourself. They list beliefs about young children and musically appropriate musical experiences and I'd like to explore some of them here.
"All children have musical potential. Every child has the potential for successful, meaningful interactions with music."
I've commented on this before, but I definitely believe that all children are wired to love and enjoy music and all children have musical potential. I have had the privilege of being part of the musical journey of many families and never ceases to bring warmth to my heart when I see children's response to classical music. They just love it!
This article also lists some qualities of the adults in charge of providing these musical experiences to young children. "These persons should:
Research shows that ALL children are born with musical aptitude, and following that thought, everyone has the potential to achieve in music. It's time to dispel the myth that you've either got it or you don't. Today, I'm going to help you with what to do from here: how can we as parents and carers of children nurture their musical development and help them make their own music (or make music their own)?


Children learn best when they are interested and engaged in activtities. Young children thrive on active, hands-on experiences. We believe in child-centered and play-based learning. We encourage children to explore by using their senses and imaginations. Children learn by "doing" in a safe and developmentally appropriate enviornment. Many opportunities, including a healthy balance of teacher-directed and child-lead activties, allow for the development of social, emotional, cognitive, language, creative, science, sensory, and motor skills. We believe in authentic learning experiences, taking advantage of "teachable moments."
RCW preschool offers a developmentally appropriate learning experiences that fosters the skills children will need in kindergarten, including social and emotional skills, cognitive, language and literacy, math and science, fine motor and gross motor skills and many other exciting experiences. Because play is a young child's "work", play and many other hands-on experiences are an important part of your child's day. During play with other students, children learn problem solving skills, sharing, creativity, imagination, development of relationships, and much more. We offer a fun, safe, and caring learning enviornment that seeks to meet the needs of every child, enriching their days with endless learning opportunties.
Preschool students in Skills for School will be learning from World of Wonder curriculum. World of Wonder curriculum has comprehensive lessons and high-interest activties that engage children and meets developmentally learning goals. The curriculum places emphasis on a set of foundational skills that predict sucess in kindergarten. Children will be assessed using the Early Growth Indicators Bechmark Assessment and Works Sampling Asessment.
Also, the Early Learning Second Step Curriculum is taught throughout the school year. It's knowing how to learn and get along with others. The Second Step program teaches skills in the following areas: Skills for Learning, Empathy, Emotion Management, Friendship Skills and Problem Solving.


Learn piano in a fun social group atmosphere! Group piano class provides students with an excellent introduction to the keyboard and prepares them for more serious private study as well as playing in a band/ensemble. Most importantly, students will begin to develop the skill of playing music with their peers which provides a lifelong benefit.
B2R takes a modern approach to keyboard education and students will benefit from our carefully thought-out curriculum that incorporates all of the latest software and music technology. Using digital keyboards, students will be able to simulate a wide variety of musical instruments and styles (rock, orchestral, etc.). They also will gain exposure to modern music-making techniques using programs such as Reason and ProTools.
B2R teachers will focus on developing the students’ core keyboard skills: hand position, note-reading, chord vocabulary, rhythm, and theory while rehearsing a repertoire of rock and pop and classical songs.
Each class will give a performance upon completion.
- A well-balanced music education consists of Music Theory, Technique and Repertoire.
- Students learn faster playing music they like.
- Simplified versions of modern songs allow students to see results more quickly.
- Audio recordings of each simplified arrangement are available to students. This allows them to hear how their part should sound.
- Lessons are catered to the needs of each student's learning style.


Occupational therapy may be the missing link to catapult your child’s speech development, let me explain. When parents bring their child in for an initial speech evaluation, the first question I always ask is what they hope their child will achieve in therapy. The answer may vary from client to client, but the most common and expected response is, “I want my child to be able to communicate successfully.” My priority as an SLP is to teach my clients the skills to accomplish just that–strong communication, but there is SO much more below the surface of “communication,” beyond what words may come out of a child’s mouth that we must consider.
I take a holistic approach when performing a speech evaluation and throughout therapy sessions— not only do I listen to the words the child produces, I look at their eyes, their movements and posture, I watch their hands and how they use them— I observe the child’s body completely. As an SLP, I remain aware of these areas, but my focus is on speech and language acquisition. When I notice an area that may need observation beyond my scope, I open a line of communication with the parents to discuss my concerns and I provide a referral to a specialist that supports that area. Many times I will refer to an Occupational Therapist (OT). An OT is a licensed specialist who assists individuals in learning the skills needed to participate in everyday activities.
My favorite metaphor to use is “a child is like an iceberg”— at the tip, we have communication, what they say, how they say it, and what it sounds like. Beneath the surface, we find all the foundational skills that make communication possible: self-regulation, visual attention, posture and core control, and sensory processing. An occupational therapist will provide the specialized guidance needed to build strong foundational skills.
You might ask, “how do these foundational skills affect communication?”, great question! When our bodies feel regulated, calm, and ready we have the capacity to learn MORE. If we are focused and our eyes are able to look at our teacher/therapist/family member/friend, we have more successful communication exchanges. Maintaining good posture and core control allows our bodies to sit in a chair and engage in a speech or language activity. Finally, when we avoid sensory activities, we miss out on valuable social experiences with family and friends. By addressing any irregularities in these skills, we are able to create engaging, meaningful, and connected communication in the long run.
When we pair occupational therapy and speech therapy, we have found a greater capacity for learning in all areas of our clients’ development. As a speech therapist at LKS & Associates, I will often pull our occupational therapist, Taryn Erickson, into the treatment room with my client for immediate observations and recommendations. She is able to quickly provide supplemental tips to help realign a client who might be experiencing difficulties. For example, one of my clients was having difficulties staying engaged throughout a language assessment, his body was laying on the table, his eyes were focused up at the ceiling, and his responses had nothing to do with what I was asking. Taryn, who is familiar with the child, was able to provide skill modifications (e.g. posture and visual attention) which allowed the client to attend and complete the assessment with appropriate answers and feel good about what they had accomplished.
When we provide children with the knowledge and tools to understand their bodies, we will see an increase in the child’s awareness of what they need to successfully participate in any activity, not just speech and language.