How far we have come! From the 1960 World Book Encyclopedia:* Mongolism is a form of mental deficiency characterized by certain bodily abnormalities. A flattened face and bolded upper eyelids give the patient an Oriental appearance. Other abnormal body features include a small, round head; short arms and legs; a large abdomen; and thick, stubby hands, with the little [...]
Archive for the ‘general’ Category
Down Syndrome circa 1960
Posted in general on December 7, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
Why Education Costs Rise, and Why We Can Afford Them
Posted in general on December 3, 2010 | 1 Comment »
Several things are clear about both education and health care costs in the United States: 1. They continually rise faster than inflation 2. Increases in cost are not matched by increases in results 3. Our costs are higher than those in other developed countries The conventional wisdom is that these costs are spiraling out of [...]
How to Write a Statement of Purpose for a Ph.D. Program
Posted in general on November 25, 2010 | 6 Comments »
Would you like to know how to write a statement of purpose (SOP) for a Ph.D. program? First piece of advice–forget everything you know about writing SOPs. That’s because SOPs for graduate research programs are fundamentally different than SOPs for undergraduate programs or for professional schools (like law or medicine). For that reason, most of [...]
New Reports on Technology in US Schools: The Changing Divide
Posted in general on October 26, 2010 | 1 Comment »
Two major new reports were issued by the National Center for Educational Statistics earlier this year. The reports are of special interest because they are based on well-designed national survey methods and thus can be presumed to be pretty accurate. In addition, since NCES has carried out similar studies over the years, they allow comparison [...]
Honoring Rigoberto Ruelas
Posted in general on September 28, 2010 | 12 Comments »
Rigoberto Ruelas, Jr. served as a dedicated teacher of low-income immigrants at Miramonte Elementary School in what was described as an “impoverished gang-ridden neighborhood” of Los Angeles for 14 years. He lived a few blocks from the school and had worked as an instructional aide there for four years before becoming a teacher. From the [...]
Enrolling my Kids in Japanese Kindergarten/Daycare (Hoikuen)
Posted in general on September 18, 2010 | 7 Comments »
My family and I moved to Japan in August for a one-year sabbatical. I wanted to share the experience of what it was like to enroll my kids in school. Since kindergarten is not mandatory here, it’s actually somewhat of a complex process, so perhaps this information will be helpful to others in similar situations. [...]
Learning, Change, and Power: Frameworks for Interpreting the Romania and N. Carolina Studies
Posted in general on July 14, 2010 | 5 Comments »
Two recent studies on the effect of home computer access on students’ academic achievement have recently gotten a lot of attention after being discussed by David Brooks and Randall Stross in the New York Times. In Romania, children of families that won a voucher to purchase a computer had lower school grades in Math, English, and Romanian after [...]
What Happened to “Hole-in-the-Wall”?
Posted in general on June 22, 2010 | 4 Comments »
Remember the Hole-in-the-Wall experiment in India? Based on the principal of “minimally-invasive pedagogy,” computers were installed in kiosk walls in Indian slums so that children could teach themselves about technology. Though the organizers of the project have published a series of very positive reviews over the years, until now I am not aware of any [...]
Does access to technology bring positive results?
Posted in general on June 21, 2010 | 1 Comment »
Well, according to this recent study, no, at least in terms of standardized math and reading outcomes. Two Duke economists use large scale data sets to investigate the impact of gaining access to computers and the Internet on children’s test scores in math and reading. For computer ownership, they use a self-reported measure by students. [...]
What Jaime Escalante Means for Educational Reform
Posted in general on March 31, 2010 | 2 Comments »
Jaime Escalante, one of the best known and most accomplished classroom teachers in the U.S. has died. What lessons can we learn from his life in pushing forward with educational reform? I think there are three — at least two of which will likely require a major restructuring of U.S. education to achieve on a [...]
