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The Partnership Help Desk
Volume 3, No. 11                     26 December, 2003

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Readings on Education

As is traditional for the late December issue of The Partnership Help Desk, we have located and included some general readings on educational policy and practice. These readings were extracted from a variety of resources, including...

  • The online professional journals, some of which were included in our last issue,
  • John Norton's Of Particular Interest - a free newsletter from MiddleWeb,
  • WWWEDU and EDTECH, two of the premiere educational technology LISTSERVs, and
  • Open searches on the Internet.

Our "General Topics" area include readings on school community, and connecting with parents and others outside the school.
General Topics  PrincipalDeveloping Successful Partnership Programs

http://www.naesp.org/ContentLoad.do?contentId=1121

Here's an article on the importance of embedding schools within a partnership with families and school community. The feature article for the January/February 2004 edition of NAESP's Principal Magazine, authors Joyce L. Epstein and Natalie Rodriguez Jansorn describe a researched-based "program of partnership" which can develop such connections.
Discipline ZingersDiscipline Zingers

http://www.nea.org/neatoday/0401/cover.html

The cover story from this month's NEA Today has vignettes of potentially explosive discipline scenarios, and how best to resolve them. The story is timely, and there are ideas on how to head off potential problems through class and activity structure.
Family and CommunityFamily & Community

http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/pa0cont.htm

The North Central Regional Educational Laboratory brings this wonderful resource, one of many offered through their web portal. Included on this site is a survey tool an individual or school as a group can use to assess how well family and community access and collaboration is being addressed. There are readings on several focus areas, including implications from No Child Left Behind, as well as articles on safe schools and confidentiality in reporting. See Science below for another resource from NCREL.
Content Area Topics
Practical Living

JCPSWhat is Practical Living?

http://www.jefferson.k12.ky.us/Departments/Gheens/PracticalLiving.html.html

From Jefferson County Public School's Gheens Professional Development Academy comes this excellent article about the place of Practical Living in the curriculum. Included are the associated academic expectations, as well as related activities, and links to the relevant Kentucky Department of Education resources.
Language Arts

NCTE Learning through Language

http://www.ncte.org/about/over/positions/level/gen/107630.htm

This article, from the National Council of Teachers of English Guideline series, advocates a language-intensive approach to all disciplines, since "...No matter what the subject, the people who read it, write it, and talk it are the ones who learn it best." This research-based advocacy article describes what a language-intensive classroom and instructional practice would look like. This article was located through the English Journal On the Web.
Mathematics

Curriculum UpdateUnlocking Mathematics for Minority Students

http://www.ascd.org/publications/curr_update/2003fall/franklin.html

This article is from the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development's online newsletter Curriculum Update for Fall, 2003. It focuses on what is required to get minority students to "tune back in" to higher level math classes by "...changing the way parents view education, the way teachers view their students, and—above all—the way students view themselves." 
Science Critical Issue Library, NCRELLearning Experiences in Science

http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/content/cntareas/science/sc500.htm

NCREL (see "Family and Community" in General Resources above) provides this great reading on the use of "Hands-On, Minds-On, and Authentic Learning Experiences in Science." The article includes audio, slide shows, and other multimedia contributed by science education professionals and classroom teachers, illustrating and supporting a shift in how science is delivered and encouraged in the classroom. 
Social Studies Education worldWhy Teach Current Events?

http://www.education-world.com/a_curr/curr084.shtml

Gary Hopkins, editor in chief of Education World, provides this nice article about the importance of current events in social studies education. There are citations of research bases, as well as links to teaching resources within EW's own pages and external to the site.

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