the seed

don't rise to meet my expectations

go beyond them

drive past my wildest dreams and wave

don't keep looking through that window

figure out how to fly

amaze me

surprise me
teach us all

i'll be watching you carefully

Create, Learn, Grow, Discover and Bloom

Physics:Conservation of Energy Theory & #Edreform in Public Schools

My husband and I were discussing public education one day. Raul, my husband  has very different constructs than I do. He is an engineer, loves physics and can sit down and apply calculus equations to real world problems.  I admire that about him.


So one day when I was going on about public education heading in the wrong direction in regards to reform, he proposed a new way of looking for solutions using physics.


He said it's like the Conservation of Energy and went into a Thermal Dynamics Analysis.  He drew a very basic picture illustrating terms of input/ output. I don't remember much of anything about physics, but his thinking makes sense to me. Here is his original drawing and a few notes I made clarifying. 

Basically, he's saying if you fail to address a circumstance or an influence, you won't get something in the desired outcome.  (I see the desired outcome as a vision or purpose for public education.)

I welcome your thoughts!

Beginning Readers Have a 1 in 8 Chance of Reading "cat"

The math behind why Souns works…

cat

Traditionally, we teach children the alphabet first associating each symbol with the letter name.

Children first learn to recognize cat as /See/ /ay/ /tee/

Then, they learn the common phonetic sounds of the letters when they begin to learn to read.  /k/ /a/ /t/

When that child goes to read that word, she has a 1 in 8 chance of getting it right.

/see/ /ay/ /tee/

/see/ /ay/ /t/

/see/ /a/ /tee/

/see/ /a/ /t/

/k/ /ay/ /tee/

/k/ /a/ /tee/

/k/ /ay/ /t/

/k/ /a/ /t/

The solution to making literacy more attainable to every child begins with changing fundamental practice.  If we teach letter-sound association using the most commonly used sounds of each letter (hard consonant sounds and soft vowel sounds) that child has only one possible option when going to sound out the word, cat. This eliminates the unnecessary confusion caused by letter-name association. Increasing literacy and the odds that children will learn how to read is as fundamental as changing the way we teach children their abc’s .

www.souns.org