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Category Archives: Educational News
Review-Pretest-Retest in Math
Saturday, October 11, 2014
Successful Developmental Math: “Review-Pretest-Retest” Model Helps Students Move Forward
from the New England Journal of Higher Education
by Richard Bisk, Mary Fowler and Eileen B. Perez
April 23, 2013
Much has been written about the failure of “developmental education” in mathematics. Failure has not been our experience at Worcester State University. In response to concerns about both the placement rate into developmental math courses and the failure rate in those courses, we made substantial changes in our placement program and in our course delivery. We have decreased by 50% the number of students placed into developmental math courses. The success rate in these courses has increased from around 30% to around 80%.
Our program is based on several key principles:
- Students can be successful in mathematics with the correct entry point. Mathematics is a cumulative subject. Because students who take courses they are not prepared for are seldom successful, we rigorously maintain the prerequisite standards for our classes. However, we do not want to place students in developmental classes when all they need is a brief review. We work to ensure that students take placement seriously and are prepared to do as well as possible when they take the placement tests.
- We provide clear, consistent standards for all students. It doesn’t help students by pretending they have competencies that they don’t. In particular, different sections of developmental math must use equivalent grading techniques. All students must pass the same final exam to pass the class.
- We provide a nurturing and supportive environment for students who have often had negative experiences in mathematics. Students need to know that their instructors are there to help them when they struggle. However, the most supportive thing we do is placing students appropriately.
- We encourage all students to enroll in required math classes as soon as possible. Math proficiency atrophies over time. This means we have to offer sufficient seats for first-year students in both developmental and introductory credit-bearing classes. We work with our advising center to place students in these courses.
Reducing need for remediation
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts Department of Higher Education mandates that all incoming students in the state’s public higher education system attain a “passing” score on the College Board’s Elementary Algebra Accuplacer exam or pass an appropriate developmental math class before enrolling in a college credit-bearing math courses. In fall 2004, 54% of our first-year students received a “failing” score.
For the class entering in fall 2005, we required students to take a mock Accuplacer exam before they could register for orientation, where the actual exam was given. This mock exam was taken at home on the student’s own computer. It was not proctored. We saw this as a consciousness-raising activity—a way to give students a sense of what to expect as well as to let them know about the importance of the exam. With this change, our “failure” rate dropped from 54% to 36%.
The following year, we made additional changes. Before a student could register for orientation, he had to achieve a “passing” score on the mock Accuplacer exam. If he didn’t get a “passing score” after two opportunities, he had to come to campus for a two-hour math review session. With this additional change, the “failure” rate dropped to 24%. Since then it has been consistently around 25%
The placement process
The initial Department of Higher Education mandate for developmental math in 1998 set a single passing score of 82 on Elementary Algebra Accuplacer for determining whether a student was ready for college-level math classes. In 2001, the department added a second cut score of 72 for courses that used minimal amounts of algebra, such as a math for liberal arts courses.
At Worcester State’s Mathematics Department, we decided we needed more detail to appropriately place students. Many students needed developmental work in arithmetic as well as algebra. And while a score of 82 on the Elementary Algebra Accuplacer might indicate readiness for a college algebra class, it told us nothing about whether a student was prepared for calculus. We want each student to begin mathematics coursework at the best entry point. As a result, all first-year students begin by taking two Accuplacer exams: Arithmetic and Elementary Algebra.
- If they need developmental math work, we use a combination of the two scores to determine whether they need to take an arithmetic course before taking a developmental algebra course.
- If they score 82 or higher on the elementary algebra Accuplacer, they then take the college-level math Accuplacer. This score is used to determine the possible starting points for the student’s college-level math classes.
Logistically, each student is assigned a placement code of 1 through 7 based upon their scores on the two or three Accuplacer exams. Mathematicians call this a function of three variables where the range is: {1,2,3,4,5,6,7}. For example, a code of 1 means a student begins with our developmental arithmetic class. A code of 7 means a student may begin with calculus. During the registration process, placement codes are examined as part of the process of checking prerequisites. A student who wishes to take calculus needs either a code of 7 or successful completion of precalculus with a grade of at least C-. (Our experience has been that a student with a D seldom passes the subsequent course.)
The Developmental Math Program: philosophy
The WSU Developmental Math Program is designed to meet the academic needs of students who scored below 82 out of 120 on the Elementary Algebra Accuplacer exam. Many of these students have negative emotions and thought patterns around mathematics that needed to shift before they would be able to learn the subject matter. Some are so used to failing math that they don’t believe that they have the ability to succeed. They would rather walk away than face the challenge, despite the fact that this would severely limit their ability to earn a bachelor’s degree. For students who had already incurred significant student loans, failure to complete their degree would leave them with increased debt and decreased income potential. This heightens the anxiety associated with learning math.
Our program strives to create a classroom environment where students believe they can succeed and know they will have the support of the instructor. In each new class, the instructor’s initial goal is to build a relationship of mutual trust and respect. When these students enter the developmental math class, many things are different from how they were in their previous math classes. Since they are in a class with students at similar skill levels, most are no longer at the bottom of their class. Furthermore, the students are older and more mature than the last time they took a math class. With a positive environment, they are more likely to persevere and succeed. We find that as student anxiety begins to subside, they relax and start learning. All these benefits are only possible because the students are placed in a class that is being taught at their current proficiency level.
Underlying the program development, we have had a commitment to maintaining consistency of standards for all students and all course sections. Lowering standards for some students is not supportive and nurturing, but propagates student beliefs that they cannot succeed at mathematics. These beliefs reinforce societal perceptions of mathematical reasoning and skills as optional and only obtainable by a select few. Sadly, many higher education administrators and policymakers encourage these negative viewpoints
Implementation and design
Our current program was developed over the past 10 years and evolved through a series of iterations from a computer-based algebra review to one where students are placed according to their arithmetic and algebra skills into one of two developmental math courses that address topics required for success in WSU’s college-level math courses.
The developmental courses meet three hours per week, carry three institutional credits and are taught in a more traditional face-to-face format. (Institutional credit counts toward maintaining full-time status so students are eligible to receive financial aid and live in the residence halls, but not toward graduation.) We have used feedback from assessment data as we sought effective ways to teach and support our students. As we have developed these classes, the success rates of our courses have increased from 31% in 2003 to about 80%.
To maintain consistent standards across students and sections, we use the Arithmetic or Elementary Algebra Accuplacer as the final exam for each class. Students must pass this final exam to pass the course. Since the instructors no longer decide whether a student passes, they become more like coaches, working with the student to increase skills and achieve a common goal. Instructors meet with individual student, assign extra problem sets and arrange for tutoring. While success is ultimately the student’s responsibility, we want to provide as much support as we can.
We believe our students need structure and a series of smaller goals before the final exam. Therefore, we require that all students have a 70% average in the course in order to qualify to take the final exam, the Accuplacer. This requirement is made clear on the syllabus and the instructors discuss this throughout the semester. In the last three weeks of the semester, students with averages below 70% are invited to work with tutors to address topics on which they are struggling. They are given an additional quiz that provides the opportunity to raise their average and qualify for the final. Of course, our real goal is to get them to review the material so they pass the final. It’s a learning activity. The underlying principal is that we want to promote success without lowering standards and expectations.
If students qualify to take the final exam, but do not pass it, we discuss a re-test opportunity with them. The instructor offers these students a set of review problems and gives them a limited amount of time to complete it. This is another learning activity. Once the students complete the review material, they are given a pretest to determine if they have improved their skills. Students who perform favorable on the pretest may retake the final exam. This “review–pretest–retest” process helps most of the students pass and move forward with their mathematics program.
Changing minds
Most of our students who score into the developmental math program are in majors that require only one college-level math course. Many students enter the developmental math program intending to complete their developmental math and a single college level math class; but after experiencing success, they reevaluate their options. This was the situation for Jeremy Hart, a 30-year-old military veteran who entered the developmental arithmetic class as a history major. He had many doubts about his ability to succeed at mathematics and had chosen a major with a minimal math requirement. He planned on finishing his mathematics requirement as quickly as possible by taking our most basic college-level course, called “Survey of Math.” When the arithmetic class began with fractions, Hart found the class a safe place to openly express his confusion and frustration. He became so comfortable with his ability to learn mathematics that he changed his major from history to business administration. He successfully completed many courses that required mathematical and quantitative reasoning including statistics, college algebra, mathematical economics, microeconomics and three accounting classes. He is currently employed in a managerial job that brings together the skills he developed at Worcester State and in the military. He manages a multimillion-dollar budget and performs cost and statistical analyses as he contributes to his organization’s success.
Our program works, but we are constantly looking for ways to minimize the need for remediation. We work with Massachusetts high schools through the state GEAR UP (Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs) so students can take our placement tests while still in high school. And we are currently studying how students who successfully complete our developmental courses perform in the first college-level math class.
Developmental math education does not have to be a failure, as long as we are all willing to meet the challenge.
Richard Bisk is a professor of mathematics at Worcester State University and was math department chair from 2004-2012. Mary Fowler is an associate professor and current chair of the math department at Worcester State. Eileen B. Perez is Developmental Math Program coordinator and lead instructor at Worcester State.
Related Posts:
Improving Math Success in Higher Education Institutions
Developing Story: A Forum on Improving Remedial Education
Tags: Accuplacer, developmental education, math, remedial, Worcester State University
California High School Proficiency Exam
Are you looking for school options outside of brick and mortar high schools?
Do you want to find and pursue new opportunities?
Ready to continue your education at a community college, university, or technical school?
Want to get into the work force?
The CHSPE (California High School Proficiency Exam) could open up a variety of options for you.
Educate yourself about the CHSPE and provide registration information and instructions for taking the test in your area.
Important Notice: As of April 1, 2014, the California Department of Education (CDE) has decided to postpone the scheduled change in test series for the California High School Proficiency Examination (CHSPE). This test series change is dependent on the approval of a one-year contract for the 2014-15 school year. All portions of the CHSPE that were passed since 2004 remain valid and will count toward earning a Certificate of Proficiency. The CHSPE test series will not change until after the March 21, 2015 test administration. At that time, examinees who have not yet earned a Certificate of Proficiency by May 1, 2015 may need to begin the testing process again in the new test series. Sections and subtests previously passed in the current test series may cease to be valid.
Announcements
Registration for the October 18, 2014 administration of the CHSPE is now open. The regular registration deadline for the October administration is September 19, 2014. Registration materials including printed Registration Form, proof of eligibility, and appropriate payment, must be received in the CHSPE Office by 5 p.m. on that date to avoid late registration fees.
Calendar
FRI – SEP 19 Fall 2014 Regular Registration Ends 5 p.m. Accommodations Deadline
FRI – OCT 03Fall 2014 Late Registration Ends 5 p.m. Non-emergency sites close
TUE – OCT 14Fall 2014 All Registration Closed
Introducing a new feature: Google Translate
The CHSPE Web site is currently published in English. For those who speak other languages, we’ve made it easy to use Google’s translation service to translate our information into other languages. To translate the entire CHSPE Web Site, just choose a language from the dropdown menu at the bottom left of the English pages. We hope easy access to this free service is helpful. Because Google Translate is an automated service, content may contain mistranslations of difficult or obscure words and phrases. The Sacramento County Office of Education and the California Department of Education take no responsibility for any mistranslations due to use of the third-party Google Translate function.
Helping Boys in Education!
Lessons In Manhood: A Boys’ School Turns Work Into Wonders
Listen to the Story All Things Considered
At East Bay School for Boys, sometimes the sparks of inspiration result in, well, actual sparks.
This summer, All Things Considered has been taking a look at the changing lives of men in America. And that means talking about how the country educates boys.
In Berkeley, Calif., a private, non-profit middle school called the East Bay School for Boys is trying to reimagine what it means to build confident young men. In some ways, the school’s different approach starts with directing, not stifling, boys’ frenetic energy.
“I think boy energy has been misunderstood,” says Lisa Hayle, a language arts teacher at the East Bay School. “Instead of squelching their enthusiasm for things, at our school we channel it and work with it.”
The East Bay School is not a traditional boys school, aimed at reinforcing typical ideas of what it means to “be a man.” The school’s director, Jason Baeten, says that the goal is instead to create an educational space where boys can make mistakes, be vulnerable and learn to be self-reliant.
Baeten says, “We all came together and decided what we wanted our graduates to look like, what qualities we wanted them to have. So, things like: respects women, flexible, resilient — all of these.”
One of the ways that the school is trying to upend tradition is by re-inventing shop class for the 21st century. In fact, they don’t even call it “shop.” At the East Bay School for Boys, it goes by a different name: “work.”
David Clifford, the school’s director of innovation, explains why: “We moved away from the language of shop because it has a history behind it, where for decades now, shop has been considered second or third tier in education, where first tier is academics.”
Shop classes have dropped off the curriculum at high schools nationwide. In Los Angeles, for instance, around 90 percent of traditional shop classes have been eliminated.
Now, something called “career and technical education” still exists. In fact, this week President Obama signed a law encouraging the expansion of such programs. But the most popular classes nationwide are health science, information technology and business — not vocational, blue-collar training like carpentry or auto shop.
At East Bay, “work” is one of the six main classes all boys take, right alongside math and language arts. Boys build their own cubbies, desks and benches. One student, Jaden Yu, is building a massive metal hammer as part of a larger project in which boys imagine themselves as superheroes.
Yu says that his superhero mission is to fight poverty, and the hammer is his weapon. “What this is for is destroying old buildings so that new ones can be rebuilt. Old buildings that aren’t being used, so that new ones can be built for homeless people, people who need it.”
And they tie this work into a larger curriculum, too. In one instance, boys built replica Civil War officers’ chairs which were paired with biographies of the officers who sat in them.
Clifford says teaching these kinds of hard skills is vital, for boys and girls. Not only do they graduate knowing how to use a table saw and welder, but Baeten says the work fosters creativity and resilience.
Those tools are sometimes dismissed as “soft skills” by educators pushing a greater emphasis on hard academics. But Baeten says those kinds of skills, including empathy, are central to the school’s mission. “The real important part about being a man is taking accountability for your actions, living your life really fully in a really present way and loving people fully.”
As a private school in the Bay Area, though, East Bay is not cheap. Families pay more than $21,000 a year to send their sons here. But they’ve also made an effort to make sure their vision of masculinity isn’t just for the privileged. More than half of students here get some type of tuition assistance. More than 70 percent come here from public schools. And nearly half of the boys here identify as non-white or mixed race.
The East Bay School’s program is new, having only opened classes in the fall of 2010. The school’s holistic view of boyhood — spanning academic to social development — is still evolving.
The big question is: Can aspects of East Bay’s more holistic approach to educating boys work elsewhere, especially in America’s public middle schools? The statistics can be sobering for a boy in public school. Boys drop out of school and get suspended at much higher rates than their female counterparts. Federal statistics show that among those who are suspended multiple times and expelled, 75 percent are boys.
The Russian Educational System
A Visit to a Russian School
Amongst the many views of extravagant buildings, crisp landscapes, lovely waterways, systems of locks and dams, clean cities, twenty-hour days and gorgeous sunsets, we were allowed to spend a few moments at the sweetest little school in a quiet quaint town in Russia. In a simple building, a day of summer school was adjourning. I was so excited to meet the Russian children. I couldn’t wait to find out how this meek little school ticked. The group of 30 tourists were lead into a classroom where a lovely Russian teenage girl read her practiced speech in English. The room was small but fit all of us in the seats quite nicely and we listened intently. Many questions followed about the daily regime of the children as well as their parents. Everyone was interested in education as we are all a part of it.
After we left the classroom, we were shown to the even more minute multipurpose room to watch a skit and learn about the arts that children of this school learn. The art teacher spoke in Russian so an interpreter was needed. Children are learning to make items from their rich history to continue traditions. The school is located in Kirillov where one of the oldest museums of Russia exists. Visitors were allowed to purchase the art of students. We purchased a green and white lace piece created by a young boy in the school.
What did I learn about the Russian Educational System? The system is set up by the state and is free to everyone. Private schools have been established in the last few years. Compulsory education begins at age 6 in kindergarten, then primary school for four years, general education for five years and then secondary education for two to three years. Russian general education is aimed at the moral, emotional, intellectual and physical development of the student. Students are in school about 34 weeks with breaks similar to the American School System. School is in session from September 1 to beginning of June. The system aims to develop abilities that will help students make good life decisions. There is a state test in June after general education is completed to determine whether the student will be admitted to secondary general education, vocational education or to non-university level higher education. Students have access to iPads daily at all levels.
Students that make the best grades in secondary education get to continue into college for free and it continues to be free while their grades stay good!
Kirillov, City in Russia
The Kirillo-Belozersky Museum of History, Archi- tecture & Fine Arts (31735; Sobornaya pl 1; admission R50; 9am-5pm Tue-Sun), occupying a nonworking 14th-century monastery of the same name, is the reason to visit the small town of Kirillov, 130km northwest of Vologda. Legend has it that the monastery’s founder, Kirill, was living at Moscow’s Simonovsky monastery when he had a vision of the Virgin Mary showing him the towers of a new monastery. One of Kirillov’s many marvellous icons depicts this vision. Massive walls surround four main areas: the large Assumption Monastery, the small Ivanov Monastery, the Stockaded Town and the New Town. The regular admission ticket includes the churches and cathedrals and exhibits on regional history and the history of the monastery. In the tranquil village of Ferapontovo, 20km northeast of Kirillov, is another well-preserved monastery(49161; admission R60; 9.30am-5pm). The great Dionysius came here in 1502 to paint frescoes on the church’s interior (he did it in an amazing 34 days) and Ivan the Terrible is said to have frequented and enjoyed this church. The frescoes are a highpoint of Russian mural art and were the main reason Ferapontovo received World Heritage listing in 2000. Don’t come on wet or very humid days as the museum may be closed to protect the artworks.
Teaching Digital Natives!
Ed Tech Is Poised to Go Mainstream
By Sari Factor
Six hours a day. That’s how much time the average teenager spends online, according to a June 2013 study by McAfee. These are “digital natives,” a generation that has grown up online and connected.
Just think about it: students born in 2007, the year the iPhone was launched, are already in first grade. Students born during the dot-com boom of the late ’90s are in high school. These students have never known a world without the Internet. They’re communicating 140 characters at a time, establishing completely new ways of consuming news and information.
Clearly, dictating to digital natives that they “power down” in school is a huge turn-off. Yet many adults express concern that students won’t be able to learn as effectively in classrooms that are fundamentally different from their own experiences. Educators are increasingly breaking through that resistance to create a learning experience using technology to engage today’s learners and improve outcomes, with benefits that include:
Personalizing the learning experience – Digital natives have grown up surrounded and stimulated by media, and they consume information very differently from the previous generation of students. Netflix NFLX -0.05%, playlists and DVRs have fueled their personalized entertainment, and technology makes personalized learning possible too. Any teacher can tell you how difficult it is to customize instruction for every student. Inevitably, they end up “teaching to the middle,” leaving some learners behind and failing to challenge those who have already mastered a concept. Technology allows teachers to tailor instruction to meet individual student needs, making learning more accessible and enabling all students to maximize their potential.
Learning how to learn – Being a lifelong learner is the most important attribute for success, and will grow in importance in our dynamic and competitive world. Today’s students will change careers multiple times throughout their lives – many studies suggest Americans will hold between fifteen and twenty jobs over the course of their careers – and the jobs these graduates will hold may not even exist yet. Knowing one’s own learning style and developing the self-discipline and grit to grasp new skills throughout a lifetime will be critical for digital natives – especially in the fast-paced, distracting information landscape that is their natural habitat. Using technology to conduct research and acquire new skills can help these students develop the most essential capability in the information economy: how to learn.
Putting students in charge –Technology-based platforms and tools can provide students constant feedback so they understand how they’re progressing relative to their own goals, their peers, and their teachers’ and parents’ expectations. A clear road map of progress can be motivating for the student and immensely valuable for the teacher, who can intervene early or help a student advance more quickly. By empowering students and making them directly responsible for their progress, online learning encourages habits of resourcefulness that will serve students well once they leave the classroom.
Helping students disconnect from the Twitter-verse and spend more time on task – The more time students spend focused on their course work, the better their academic performance. With online learning, no one can hide in the back of the classroom, so every student is accountable. Rich multimedia content and interactive activities in many of today’s technology-based curricula offer familiar, friendly terrain for digital natives and can keep students more engaged and focused on their work. Over time, students get better at shutting out distractions and staying on task, even when they’re not in school – an extremely valuable skill in this media-saturated age.
Encouraging constructive communication – Digital natives are growing up in a social media landscape where multi-directional dialogue is commonplace. Yet the classroom too often remains a one-way street where the teacher imparts knowledge and students are expected to absorb it. Technology can help broaden the discussion by connecting students and teachers, and by opening the doors to outside voices that can lend additional knowledge and expertise to the classroom.
The Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation forecasts that 50% of high school classes will be online by 2019. For some, this may sound worrisome, but resistance to education technology will begin to break down as people see how eagerly today’s digital natives embrace learning online. The use of technology presents an undeniably radical shift in the business of education, but skeptical and concerned adults alike should take comfort in the fact that in many ways, ed tech also embodies a return to the basics. The skills that technology-based instruction can impart to today’s digital natives – self-reliance, perseverance and resourcefulness among them – have a distinctly retro feel. In an increasingly distracted, text and tweet-addled, short attention span world, these skills will be indispensable for the students of today and tomorrow.
Sari Factor is CEO of Edgenuity, an online and blended learning company based in Scottsdale, Ariz., currently used by nine of the 15 largest school districts in the U.S. Follow on Twitter @Edgenuityinc
First Total Lunar Eclipse of 2014: MORE TO COME!
First Total Lunar Eclipse of 2014: The Complete Skywatcher’s Guide
By Joe Rao, Space.com Skywatching Columnist | April 14, 2014 05:00pm ET
Editor’s Update for 6 am ET, April 15: The peak of the first total lunar eclipse of 2014 has ended. For our latest story and the amazing
photos of the lunar eclipse, read: Under a Blood Moon: 1st Total Lunar Eclipse or 2014 Wows Stargazers: Photos
No enthusiastic skywatcher misses a total eclipse of the moon, and if weather permits tonight, neither should you.
The phases of the April 14-15 total lunar eclipse are shown with GMT timestamps in this NASA image from a video guide. The total lunar eclipse will affect two NASA spacecraft orbiting the moon since theyrely on sunlight for power.Credit: NASA
The spectacle is often more beautiful and interesting than one would think. During the time that the moon is entering into and later emerging from out of the Earth’s shadow, secondary phenomena may be overlooked. You can alsowatch the eclipse live on Space.com, courtesy of NASA, the Slooh community telescope and theVirtual Telescope Project.
Observers that know what to look for have a better chance of seeing the stunning eclipse, weather permitting. This first total lunar eclipse of 2014 is set to begin tonight (April 14) into the wee hours of Tuesday morning (April 15). The lunar eclipse is set to begin at about 2 a.m. EDT (0600 GMT), and it should last about 3.5 hours. The eclipse should be visible, weather permitting, through most of North America and part of South America. [Total Lunar Eclipse of April 15: Visibility Maps (Gallery)]
This NASA graphic shows where the total lunar eclipse of April 14-15, 2014 will be visible from. The lunar eclipse coincides with April’s full moon and is the first of four total lunar eclipes (a tetrad) between April 2014 and September 2015.Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Here is Space.com’s full guide for what to expect during all stages of the eclipse:
A series of four total lunar eclipses in a row is called a tetrad. See how four blood moons of a total lunar eclipse tetrad work in this Space.com infographic.
Credit: By Karl Tate, Infographics Artist
Credit: By Karl Tate, Infographics Artist
Stage 1 @ 12:53 a.m. EDT: moon enters penumbra — The shadow cone of Earth has two parts: a dark, inner umbra, surrounding by a lighter penumbra. The penumbra is the pale outer portion of Earth’s shadow. Although the eclipse begins officially at this moment, this is in essence an academic event. You won’t see anything unusual happening to the moon — at least not just yet.
Earth’s penumbral shadow is so faint that it remains invisible until the moon is deeply immersed in it. We must wait until the penumbra has reached roughly 70 percent across the moon’s disk. For about the next 45 minutes the full moon will continue to appear to shine normally although with each passing minute it is progressing ever deeper into Earth’s outer shadow.
Stage 2 @ 1:39 a.m. EDT: Penumbral shadow begins to appear — Now the moon has progressed far enough into the penumbra so that the shadow should be evident on its disk. Start looking for a very subtle light shading to appear on the moon’s left portion. This will become increasingly more and more evident as the minutes pass; the shading appearing to spread and deepen. Just before the moon begins to enter Earth’s dark umbral shadow the penumbra should appear as an obvious smudge or tarnishing of the moon’s left portion.
Stage 3 @ 1:58 a.m. EDT: Moon enters umbra — The moon now crosses into Earth’s dark central shadow, called the umbra. A small dark scallop will begin to appear on the moon’s left-hand (eastern) limb. The partial phases of the eclipse begins, the pace quickens and the change is dramatic. The umbra is much darker than the penumbra and fairly sharp-edged.
As the minutes pass, the dark shadow appears to slowly creep across the moon’s face. At first, the moon’s limb may seem to vanish completely inside of the umbra, but much later, as it moves in deeper you’ll probably notice it glowing dimly orange, red or brown. Notice also that the edge of Earth’s shadow projected on the moon is curved. Here is visible evidence that the Earth is a sphere, as deduced by Aristotle from Iunar eclipses he observed in the 4th century BC. It’s at this point that deep shadows of a brilliant moonlit night begin to fade away. [‘Blood Moons’ Explained: What Causes a Lunar Eclipse Tetrad? (Infographic)]
Timetable for the 12 stages of the eclipse: AKDT = Alaskan Daylight Time. HAST = Hawaiian-Aleutian Standard Time. (Arizona does not observe daylight time, so use PDT). An asterisk (*) indicates p.m. on April 14, but all other times are a.m. on April 15. Dashes means that the moon has set below the horizon.Credit: Joe Rao/Space.com
Stage 4 @ 2:49 a.m. EDT: 75 percent coverage — With three-quarters of the moon’s disk now eclipsed, that part of it that is immersed in shadow should begin to very faintly light up, similar to a piece of iron heated to the point where it just begins to glow. It will become obvious that the umbral shadow is not complete darkness. Using binoculars or a telescope, its outer part is usually light enough to reveal lunar seas and craters, but the central part is much darker, and sometimes no surface features are recognizable. Colors in the umbra vary greatly from one eclipse to the next, Reds and grays usually dominate, but sometimes browns, blues and other colors can be spotted.
Stage 5 @ 3:01 a.m. EDT: Less than five minutes to totality — Several minutes before (and after) totality, the contrast between the remaining pale-yellow sliver and the ruddy-brown coloration spread over the rest of the moon’s disk. This may produce a beautiful phenomenon known to some as the “Japanese lantern effect.”
Stage 6 @ 3:06 a.m. EDT: Total eclipse begins — When the last of the moon enters the umbra, the total eclipse begins. No one knows how the moon will appear during totality. Some eclipses are such a dark gray-black that the moon nearly vanishes from view. The moon can glow a bright orange during other eclipses.
The reason the moon can be seen at all when totally eclipsed is that sunlight is scattered and refracted around the edge of Earth by the planet’s atmosphere. To an astronaut standing on the moon during totality, the sun would be hidden behind a dark earth outlined by a brilliant red ring consisting of all the world’s sunrises and sunsets. The brightness of this ring around Earth depends on global weather conditions and the amount of dust suspended in the air. A clear atmosphere on Earth means a bright lunar eclipse. If a major volcanic eruption has injected particles into the stratosphere, the eclipse is very dark.
Moon Master: An Easy Quiz for Lunatics
For most of human history, the moon was largely a mystery. It spawned awe and fear and to this day is the source of myth and legend. But today we know a lot about our favorite natural satellite. Do you?
0 of 10 questions complete
Stage 7 @ 3:46 a.m. EDT: Middle of totality — The moon will shine anywhere from 10,000 to 100,000 times fainter than it did just a couple of hours ago. Since the moon is moving to the north of the center of Earth’s umbra, the gradation of color and brightness across the lunar disk should be such that its lower portion should appear darkest, with hues of deep copper or chocolate brown. Meanwhile, its upper portion should appear brightest, with hues of reds, oranges and even perhaps a soft bluish-white. [10 Surprising Lunar Facts]
Observers away from bright city lights will notice a much greater number of stars than were visible earlier in the night. During totality, the moon will be seen just a couple of degrees away from the star Spica in the constellation Virgo. Although Spica is one of the 21 brightest stars in the sky, before the eclipse begins the moon will almost seem to overwhelm the star with its light. But during totality, Spica will become much more conspicuous and its bluish color will contrast strikingly with the eerie, ruddy moon.
The darkness of the sky could be impressive. The surrounding landscape may take on a somber hue. Before the eclipse, the full moon looked flat and one-dimensional. During totality, however, it will look smaller and three-dimensional — like some weirdly illuminated ball suspended in space.
Before the moon entered the earth’s shadow, the temperature at the lunar equator on its sunlit surface hovered at 260 degrees Fahrenheit (127 degrees Celsius). Since the moon lacks an atmosphere, there is no way that this heat could be retained from escaping into space as the shadow sweeps by. When in shadow, the temperature on the moon plummets to about minus 280 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 173 degrees Celsius), which equates to a drop of more than 500 degrees Fahrenheit (300 degrees Celsius) in only about two hours.
Stage 8 @ 4:24 a.m. EDT: Total eclipse ends —The emergence of the moon from the shadow begins. The first small segment of the moon begins to reappear, followed again for the next several minutes by the “Japanese lantern effect.”
Stage 9 @ 4:41 a.m. EDT: 75 percent coverage—Any vestiges of coloration within the umbra should be disappearing now. From here on, as the dark shadow methodically creeps off the moon’s disk it should appear black and featureless.
Stage 10 @ 5:33 a.m. EDT: Moon leaves umbra—The dark central shadow clears the moon’s upper right hand (northwestern) limb.
Stage 11 @ 5:53 a.m. EDT: Penumbra shadow fades away —As the last, faint shading vanishes off the moon’s upper right portion, the visual show comes to an end.
Stage 12: Moon leaves penumbra —The eclipse “officially” ends, as the moon is completely free of the penumbral shadow.
Editor’s Note: If you snap an amazing picture of the April 15 total lunar eclipse, you can send photos, comments and your name and location to managing editor Tariq Malik at spacephotos@space.com.
Joe Rao serves as an instructor and guest lecturer at New York’s Hayden Planetarium. He writes about astronomy for Natural History magazine, the Farmer’s Almanac and other publications, and he is also an on-camera meteorologist for News 12 Westchester, N.Y. Follow us @Spacedotcom,Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.
Exciting News about SAT and KHAN ACADEMY!
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Common Core Overview of Different Views
This is one of the best overviews I have seen that covers the multifaceted views on Common Core. I believe that the purpose of the commonality of standards is fantastic but the implementation has created unease amongst parents and a failure to convince the public that it is for the good of kids! Once again and/or still, it is up to individual teachers to be the one difference for children’s educational success. ~Sandy
Education experts debate Common Core’s value
- Sandhya Kambhampati, Scripps National Desk
- Posted April 5, 2014 at 11:56 a.m.
On any given day, Rian Meadows is up checking emails, texts, and grading assignments, and answering her “lifeline,” the phone, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Meadows is a government and economics teacher at Florida Virtual School, where students work at their own pace and join her class through live lessons through Adobe Connect or Blackboard. In Florida, the State Board of Education adopted changes to customize Common Core and create their own standards.
“I think everyone has growing pains — new things can be scary and outside of a comfort zone,” she said. “I’ve been in education for going on 14 years and good teaching practices have always been around. These standards are things I’ve been doing all along.”
In Florida, graduating high school students in 2015 must take one online course. Meadows said these online courses are ready made for individualized education plans, as they allow the student to have mastery of content. Under the standards, Meadows teaches economics with financial literacy to her 12th-grade students.
This mastery of skills that will allow students to be college and career ready is what the Common Core aims to build.
The Common Core State Standards Initiative was developed by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers, whose members are state education officials, in 48 states to identify and develop a common set of college and career ready standards for K-12 in mathematics and English language arts in 2009.
The standards were pushed by growing concern that a large number of high school graduates need remedial college help. In order to motivate education reform, President Obama and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan signaled to states that they should embrace these standards or similar if they hoped to win a grant through the Race to the Top program in 2009.
Currently, 44 states have adopted and are implementing the standards. Minnesota has adopted the English Language Arts standards, but not the mathematics standards. Texas, Alaska, Nebraska are among those who did not adopt the standards.
How Common Core standards were implemented
The implementation of how Common Core standards are taught, the materials and curriculum development is led by the state and local levels. According to the Common Core official website, the standards don’t dictate how teachers should teach but rather establish what skills students need to learn.
Teachers will create their own lesson plans and curriculum and tailor their teaching to meet the needs of individuals and meet the standards. The standards look to build English and math skills as those areas are used to build skill sets for other subjects.
Public schools have begun administering Common Core tests to students of all ages, but Common Core officials say the test scores won’t be counted. The tests will allow education officials to judge the quality of the test questions and technical administering capabilities of the schools.
In most states, state law gives the state boards of education the authority to establish or adopt the academic standards. Certain states, such as Nevada, Maine and Texas and Vermont, require legislative action.
Some have chosen to implement the Common Core standards, but under another name and other states have repealed the standards.
For example, Arizona’s is called, “Arizona’s College and Career Ready Standards.”
INTERACTIVE: Click here for a closer look at each state’s implementation.
MAP: Each state’s implementation of Common Core
Adopting the standards
Kentucky was the first state to adopt the standards, pulling in representatives from each of the school districts in the state, along with higher education specialists.
Karen Kidwell, director, division of program standards at the Kentucky Department of Education said the teachers have been supportive and enjoyed that they’ve been able to work and share across network lines for the first time.
More than 90 percent of school boards support Common Core, according to a poll by the Kentucky School Boards Association in Nov. 2013. The results also showed 97 percent of teachers are teaching curriculum aligned with Common Core.
During the first year, test scores dropped because of higher demands of the students, said Kidwell.
“We know that its a challenge, but our educators have been very committed to the process,” she said. “They are leading the way in terms of working together and seeking out really excellent resources and building their own resources to ensure that students stay in the center. We constantly ask the question, ‘Is what we’re designing really going to be better for kids?’”
It is estimated that Kentucky would need a minimum of $35 million to create and fully implement new standards, according the state’s department of education.
Changing standards
While some state have chosen to continue using the Common Core standards, others have repealed the standards and replaced them with their own standards.
On March 24, Indiana became the first state to withdraw out of the controversial grades K-12 guidelines.
While it was one of the first states to adopt the standards in 2010, opposition to the guidelines has been growing since Governor Mike Pence took office in 2012. The state began to move away from the standards last year.
“I believe our students are best served when decisions about education are made at the state and local level,” said Gov. Pence in a statement. “By signing this legislation, Indiana has taken an important step forward in developing academic standards that are written by Hoosiers, for Hoosiers, and are uncommonly high, and I commend members of the General Assembly for their support.”
According to the Associated Press, retired University of Arkansas professor Sandra Stotsky released an internal Indiana Department of Education report which found more than 70 percent of the standards for 6th through 12th grade are directly from Common Core. Stotsky was hired by Pence to assess the new program.
“Because we are trying to teach the same vocal and grammar and phonics skills, it isn’t terribly shocking that there’s an overlap,” said Timothy Shanahan, distinguished professor emeritus, University of Illinois at Chicago, who helped draft the standards and served on the advisory board for the English language arts part. “In fact, it would be shocking if there wasn’t an overlap. It’s a bit of nonsense on her part.”
On his website, Shanahan wrote, “I support the CCSS standards because they are the best reading standards I’ve ever seen (and, yes, I am aware of their limitations and flaws). But if anyone comes up with better standards, I’d gladly support those, too (no matter how uncommonly high the Hoosiers might have been who wrote them).”
The State Board of Education is scheduled to vote on the proposal on April 28.
“Hopefully we will be more growth-based, instead of measuring exam scores,” said David Galvin, executive director of communications at the Indiana Department of Education.
People behind the scenes
Jason Zimba, a lead writer of the Common Core standards for mathematics, said Common Core is allowing teachers across the country to collaborate and share lessons in ways they have never before. With this in mind, however, he said, there is no single “right” way to teach these standards.
“In both ELA and Mathematics, having more focused, higher standards will allow teachers to focus on critical knowledge, concepts and skills that will provide a stronger foundation for more advanced work and eventually for college and careers,” he said.
Business Roundtable and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce are among the strong supporters of the standards. On March 16, advertisements ran on FOX News and right-of-center news outlets showcasing the support from the business community and outspoken conservatives.
Patricia Levesque, CEO of the Foundation for Excellence of Education, which supports the standards said the foundation believes “if you expect more, you get more.”
The key point in Common Core, she said, is that these standards are the expectations to be met by the end of year and that the end goal, ultimately, is preparing these students for college.
Under the new standards, in Florida for example, kindergarten students should be able to count to 100, count by tens to 100 and count from 36 to zero backwards, she said. Under the old standards, kindergarteners were required to count up to 20.
According to the ACT, who helped in the process of establishing the standards to make students college and career ready, data has shown that many students are graduating from high school without the skills they need to succeed at the next level.
In the 2012 U.S. grad class, 1.66 million students took the ACT, earning an average composite score of 21.1 (on the 1 to 36 score scale). In the 2013 U.S. grad class, 1.8 million students took the exam, earning an average composite score of 20.9.
“The ACT is and has been curriculum based,” said Paul Weeks, vice president for customer engagement. “Our involvement was providing the research and evidence to be college and career ready.”
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Among students in last year’s ACT-tested U.S. high school graduating class (1.8 million students), 39 percent met three or four of the four benchmarks, while 47 percent met one or none of the benchmarks, according to ACT officials.
Growing controversy
Shanahan, who currently trains teachers around the country on the English standards, said that even if states aren’t participating in the standards, if they end up standards just as high it might be okay. But pushback from people who say the same skills aren’t need across the board is difficult to understand, he said.
“The notion that the kid in Arkansas doesn’t need the same skills as some kid in New York doesn’t make much sense,” he said. “Common Core allows textbook companies to stop trying to meet requirements of dozens of states, but rather focus on quality. As a result, tests are more reflective of that. It’s the first time that we’re telling the truth for parents.”
Because Common Core would result in national consistency in standards, this would be the first time that students of military families wouldn’t have the same learning “dislocation” that they had before, he said.
In his training, Shanahan said that some teachers have fears about not being prepared to implement these skills. On any given day, he trains teachers for a day or a half-day, which he says is not enough time. He suggests schools use ongoing training to implement the new standards into their curriculum.
“I think its interesting that so much of the controversy around it has nothing to do with Common Core,” Shanahan said. “Many of the complaints — how it was adopted or who adopted it or the testing or scheme for collecting data for schools — are somehow linked to Common Core – and yet people aren’t looking at the standards and saying it’s a bad standard. The arguments are more about process, but not about what kids need to learn which is what’s really important.”
A peer-reviewed study by a researcher found that states whose previous standards more closely matched the Common Core tended to have higher National Assessment of Educational Progress scores. The study also found that Common Core agrees with high performing countries better than any previous state standards.
It’s these skills that link them to appeal to supporters such as former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.
“Let me tell you something. In Asia today, they don’t care about children’s self esteem. They care about math, whether they can read — in English — whether they understand why science is important, whether they have the grit and determination to be successful,” he told the Miami Herald.
Levesque agrees with Bush, as she said her son and daughter aren’t just competing with Fla. or Ga. kids, but are competing internationally for jobs in the future. She said too many parents seem to be concerned about the self-esteem of their children and aren’t thinking about the future of his/her education.
“In America, we tend to be more concerned how little Johnny is feeling,instead of how we are providing him with the education so that he can be a competent grade level reader,” she said.
A tempest brews on the standards
Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, has said that implementation of Common Core is “far worse” than Obamacare.
But what concerns her most is that implementation has been messed up and there is fixation to test, instead of teaching.
“Not everything is frozen in the process of education through this transition,” she said. “I don’t know any other business or endeavor which is so, so important that we don’t allow a transition and that’s why there’s so much agida.”
As a result, she said there is a great distrust in the standards.
Donna Harris-Aikens, director of the education policy and practice department at the National Education Association said educators need to pay attention to transition time and realign their standards to make sure that support for students is there, as they are going through this transition along with the teachers.
Those against Common Core believe it’s a federal takeover of local education and some believe it’s a way for the government to get more data. As a result, disputes are spreading across the country. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, more than 200 bills on the national standards were introduced this year and around half would either stop or slow implementation.
Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Kentucky, all have measures in their state legislators to halt and if possible, abolish the standards.
In Ohio, homemaker Mary Capella got involved with Ohioans Against Common Core because she felt the government is data mining her children.
She said some parents are in the dark for what their kids are doing in school.
Some who oppose the standards take issue with the tests and how the results will be used as the tests are designed to replace the annual state assessments.
Christina Brown, senior director for instruction and assessment at the Center for Collaborative Education, said that Common Core can change the way we think about the role of students and teachers in assessment practices and move towards more open-ended assessments.
According to the Washington Post, Education Secretary Arne Duncan told a group of state school superintendents said he found it “fascinating” that some opposition to the standards has come from “white suburban moms who — all of a sudden — their child isn’t as brilliant as they thought they were, and their school isn’t quite as good as they thought they were.”
Anthony Cody, a former teacher and co-founder of the Network of Public Education who identifies himself as a progressive, said there’s a “grain of truth” to Duncan’s statement, as the tests are “stigmatizing high poverty schools, but also suburban schools.”
In his mind, the most fundamental problem with the standards is that they are designed to rank.
“I have lost my capacity for good will for the people who are running the education reform in this country, after seeing No Child Left Behind,” he said. “If three-fourths of the students are failing, I would see this as a disaster and a catastrophe. They are perfectly happy to see public schools fail and are exploiting this disaster to promote changes.”
Share the Beauty of Mathematics!
How our 1,000-year-old math curriculum cheats America’s kids
By hiding math’s great masterpieces from students’ view, we deny them the beauty of the subject
By Edward FrenkelMarch 2, 2014
Imagine you had to take an art class in which you were taught how to paint a fence or a wall, but you were never shown the paintings of the great masters, and you weren’t even told that such paintings existed. Pretty soon you’d be asking, why study art?
That’s absurd, of course, but it’s surprisingly close to the way we teach children mathematics. In elementary and middle school and even into high school, we hide math’s great masterpieces from students’ view. The arithmetic, algebraic equations and geometric proofs we do teach are important, but they are to mathematics what whitewashing a fence is to Picasso — so reductive it’s almost a lie.
Most of us never get to see the real mathematics because our current math curriculum is more than 1,000 years old. For example, the formula for solutions of quadratic equations was in al-Khwarizmi’s book published in 830, and Euclid laid the foundations of Euclidean geometry around 300 BC. If the same time warp were true in physics or biology, we wouldn’t know about the solar system, the atom and DNA. This creates an extraordinary educational gap for our kids, schools and society.
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If we are to give students the right tools to navigate an increasingly math-driven world, we must teach them early on that mathematics is not just about numbers and how to solve equations but about concepts and ideas.
It’s about things like symmetry groups, which physicists have used to predict subatomic particles — from quarks to theHiggs boson — and describe their interactions. Or Riemannian geometry, which goes far beyond the familiar Euclidean geometry, and which enabled Einstein to realize that the space we inhabit is curved. Or clock arithmetic — in which adding four hours to 10 a.m. does not get you to 14 but to 2 p.m. — which forms the basis of modern cryptography, protects our privacy in the digital world and, as we’ve learned, can be easily abused by the powers that be.
We also need to convey to students that mathematical truths are objective, persistent and timeless. They are not subject to changing authority, fads or fashion. A mathematical statement is either true or false; it’s something we all agree on. To paraphrase William Blake, mathematics “cleanses the doors of perception.”
What distinguishes us from cavemen is the level of abstraction we can reach. Abstraction enabled humans to move from barter to money, and from gold coins to plastic cards. These days, what’s left of “money” is often just an account record we read on a computer screen, and soon it could just be a line of code in a bitcoin ledger.
Today, abstraction is all around us — and math is the language of abstraction. In the words of the great mathematician Henri Poincare, mathematics is valuable because “in binding together elements long-known but heretofore scattered and appearing unrelated to one another, it suddenly brings order where there reigned apparent chaos.”
For the next generation to operate effectively, they must gain proficiency with abstraction, and that means mathematical knowledge plus conceptual thinking times logical reasoning — all things that a wider view of math would bring to the math classes at our schools.
I recently visited students in fourth, fifth and sixth grades at a school in New York to talk about the ideas of modern math, ideas they had never heard of before. They were young enough that no one had told them yet that math was impenetrable, that they wouldn’t get it. Their minds were still uncluttered with misconceptions and prejudice. They hadn’t yet been humiliated by poorly trained math teachers for making mistakes in front of their peers. Every question I asked them was met with a forest of hands.
I used a Rubik’s Cube to explain symmetry groups: Every rotation of the cube is a “symmetry,” and these combine into what mathematicians call a group. I saw students’ eyes light up when they realized that when they were solving the puzzle, they were simply discerning the structure of this group.
We next studied the majestic harmony of Platonic solids using dice. And I told the kids about the curved shapes (such as Riemann surfaces) and the three-dimensional sphere that give us glimpses into the fabric of our universe.
Of course, we still need to teach students multiplication tables, fractions and Euclidean geometry. But what if we spent just 20% of class time opening students’ eyes to the power and exquisite harmony of modern math? What if we showed them how these fascinating concepts apply to the real world, how the abstract meets the concrete? This would feed their natural curiosity, motivate them to study more and inspire them to engage math beyond the basic requirements — surely a more efficient way to spend class time than mindless memorization in preparation for standardized tests.
In my experience, kids are ready for this. It’s the adults that are hesitant. It’s not their fault — our math education is broken. But we have to take charge and finally break this vicious circle. With help from professional mathematicians, all of us should make an effort to learn something about the true masterpieces of mathematics, to be able to see big-picture math, the way we see art, literature and other sciences. We owe this to the next generations.
If we succeed, we will stop treating this crucial subject as if it were the equivalent of painting a fence, and we will do away with the question, why study math?
Edward Frenkel is a mathematics professor at UC Berkeley and the author of “Love and Math: The Heart of Hidden Reality.”
