I hope everyone is doing fantastic. I am excited to say things are full tilt as we prepare for the 2008-2009 academic year at YPFP-C. We have added some wonderful people to the leadership staff and have been conducting interviews with some wonderful new Teacher Corps Volunteers. The responses we have had from teachers has been very strong, building on our relationships with fine schools such as Thurgood Marshall and Cesar Chavez. Our relationship with Teach For America continues to grow and we have learned a tremendous amount from them.
If you have any questions please drop a line.
Best Regards,
Justin Goldman
justin.goldman@ypfp.org
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Young & Motivated AMIGOS Head to Latin America
On Saturday, Ariana and I taught a class on
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Searching for Summer Programs
Hello! I hope everyone is doing well. It was great to get together with the YPFP-C crew earlier this month. We are in a position to finish this school year very positively and continue to build the program. It is important to keep the momentum going through the summer months. If everyone can spend a little bit of time, we can find many excellent outlets to stay involved. We want to continue to build relationships with teachers that will allow us to get off to a fast start this fall. As schools are wrapping up for the year we do have a sense of urgency. Hat tip to Meaghan for all of her efforts in this area.
In a brief brainstorming session this evening people came up with many intersting areas to look. I thought this UMD (How about those Terps, Sarah!) program looked good.
http://www.precollege.umd.edu/
I know we can find some great opportunities and build our contacts. Please pass on the details of these contacts to the leadership staff. I am sure others have better ideas about this stuff than my scatterbrained thoughts. It would be great to throw some ideas up on the blog.
Check out this article featuring a student from one of our partner schools, Thurgood Marshall Academy.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/23/AR2008042301322.html
In a brief brainstorming session this evening people came up with many intersting areas to look. I thought this UMD (How about those Terps, Sarah!) program looked good.
http://www.precollege.umd.edu/
I know we can find some great opportunities and build our contacts. Please pass on the details of these contacts to the leadership staff. I am sure others have better ideas about this stuff than my scatterbrained thoughts. It would be great to throw some ideas up on the blog.
Check out this article featuring a student from one of our partner schools, Thurgood Marshall Academy.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/23/AR2008042301322.html
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Hydropolitics and human trafficking at Thurgood Marshall
Jumaina and I taught a lesson on Monday, April 14 to Amanda Flynn's senior seminar on global issues. The six students in the class are preparing for an MUN conference that is happening later this week and will be participating in debates on freshwater resources in Qatar and Israel and human trafficking in Qatar and Kazakhstan. The class was 90 minutes long and, because there were so few students and we assumed that they would be reasonably well-informed on their own topics, Jumaina and I figured that the hard exchange of information would occur as more of a discussion than a lecture. We came in with maps, articles, handouts, notes, and a lesson map specifying how long each part of the class should take rather than a defined lesson plan.
Overall, I would say the class went ok. The students didn't know nearly as much as we thought they would, which didn't lend itself well to a free-flowing discussion. Jumaina and I had also planned to take the students on in debates of their topics, but neither of us felt that they really had enough knowledge yet to debate well. Of the five students who were there, I thought that perhaps only 2-3 of them were really engaged at any given time, although perhaps that's to be expected in April of their senior year.
On another note, maybe I was just really paranoid that I wouldn't know enough about hydropolitics because it's not one of my strong subjects, but I spent roughly 16 hours preparing for the lesson, including synthesizing what I thought was important into one-sided worksheets on the key issues that Israel and Qatar face in this field and the ways in which they have gone about dealing with them. In the future, I think I'll spend less time preparing, although have any of you gone into a classroom and felt that you weren't adequately prepared and knowledgeable about the materials you were teaching?
-- Ariana (my user name is DDFI because I run another blog at work. :)
Overall, I would say the class went ok. The students didn't know nearly as much as we thought they would, which didn't lend itself well to a free-flowing discussion. Jumaina and I had also planned to take the students on in debates of their topics, but neither of us felt that they really had enough knowledge yet to debate well. Of the five students who were there, I thought that perhaps only 2-3 of them were really engaged at any given time, although perhaps that's to be expected in April of their senior year.
On another note, maybe I was just really paranoid that I wouldn't know enough about hydropolitics because it's not one of my strong subjects, but I spent roughly 16 hours preparing for the lesson, including synthesizing what I thought was important into one-sided worksheets on the key issues that Israel and Qatar face in this field and the ways in which they have gone about dealing with them. In the future, I think I'll spend less time preparing, although have any of you gone into a classroom and felt that you weren't adequately prepared and knowledgeable about the materials you were teaching?
-- Ariana (my user name is DDFI because I run another blog at work. :)
Thursday, April 10, 2008
DC Charter Schools
After having visited Cesar Chavez and Thurgood Marshall charter schools through YPFP-C, I wanted to learn more about DC charter schools. According to this Washington Post story from April 2007, if current trends continue DC charter schools will have more enrolled students than DC public schools by 2014! As of April 2007 a quarter of DC's school children attended charter schools. A more recent Post brief confirms this trend for 2008, stating that for the first time charter school enrollment has topped 20,000 students with 5 new charter schools set to open in the fall of 2008.
The District passed legislation approving charter schools in 1996. Only New Orleans has a higher concentration of charter schools. Charter schools are funded on a per pupil basis by the city. Parents sign up for the school of their choosing, but if there is a waiting list they must enter their children's names into a lottery for each charter school they would like to attend. They are notified in the spring if their children will be able to enroll.
DC charter schools have had mixed success with meeting national standards. Some within the local charter school community would like to create a standardized measure of performance.
Want to learn more? Here are some links:
DC Association of Charter Schools
DC Public Charter School Board
The District passed legislation approving charter schools in 1996. Only New Orleans has a higher concentration of charter schools. Charter schools are funded on a per pupil basis by the city. Parents sign up for the school of their choosing, but if there is a waiting list they must enter their children's names into a lottery for each charter school they would like to attend. They are notified in the spring if their children will be able to enroll.
DC charter schools have had mixed success with meeting national standards. Some within the local charter school community would like to create a standardized measure of performance.
Want to learn more? Here are some links:
DC Association of Charter Schools
DC Public Charter School Board
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
US Immigration Policies
Today I went to Cesar Chavez to teach a lesson about US immigration. This is not an area of significant expertise for me, but Wamiq and Mara and I put together a solid lesson. (They taught the same lesson earlier in the day.) Class started a little late and the end of the day announcements began early so it was challenging to pack in everything I had planned, but I did cover much of the lesson and most students were engaged. They had a number of questions about US immigration policy and were responsive to questions. One of the students is writing her thesis on this topic so I gave her my email in case she wanted help with some sources.
This lesson reiterated to me that I should focus on one or two key points and not try to pack too many different points into the lesson. While teaching I feel like I want to expose them to as many ideas and facts as possible, but this desire needs to be stifled sometimes. Twice I have had the afternoon bell ring while still trying to finish, which makes closing the lesson difficult.
I stayed and spoke with the teacher after school. She mentioned that the students are 3-5 years behind grade level. This was not especially obvious in the class, because the students get things quickly and easily analyze concepts, but she said it is evident in their writing. It struck me when she said that another teacher had made an allusion to the Scarlett Letter and the students did not know what she was talking about. In fact, they have not been exposed to to many of the books most of us read in high school.
This lesson reiterated to me that I should focus on one or two key points and not try to pack too many different points into the lesson. While teaching I feel like I want to expose them to as many ideas and facts as possible, but this desire needs to be stifled sometimes. Twice I have had the afternoon bell ring while still trying to finish, which makes closing the lesson difficult.
I stayed and spoke with the teacher after school. She mentioned that the students are 3-5 years behind grade level. This was not especially obvious in the class, because the students get things quickly and easily analyze concepts, but she said it is evident in their writing. It struck me when she said that another teacher had made an allusion to the Scarlett Letter and the students did not know what she was talking about. In fact, they have not been exposed to to many of the books most of us read in high school.
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Inconvenient Truths and Other Fun Topics
Because I felt the need to shore up on my knowledge of carbon footprints and other related issues, I was excited to teach a lesson to sixth graders on global warming at Paul Public Charter School with my partner, Ioannis Saratsis. While I do love the opportunity to teach lessons on topics I'm very familiar with, the fact that I am not an expert on global warming actually helped me approach the issue with all the questions in mind that somebody else who might not be an expert on global warming—such as a sixth grader—might be quick to ask. And these questions helped guide my preparation. Additionally, it was also helpful to have a lesson plan that outlined, in a systematic way, a plan of action for teaching and interacting with the students.
The lesson went very smoothly. After a short quiz, we went through our mini-lessons, which highlighted both public policies and scientific findings related to global warming. I didn't just read from our prepared lesson plan, but also tried to incorporate the students' questions, drawing on both my lesson plan and facts that I probably learned in my own middle school science courses. At one point, in response to a random question about ice ages, I was surprised to remember that the gravitational pull of other planets helps prevent large asteroids from hitting earth (right?). Anyway, at least in that instance, I was able to allay some fears about the future of earth. Our interactive activity involved breaking the students up into groups that represented the various bodies that are very active in environmental debates, such as legislators and activists. We asked the students to provide recommendations based on the priorities of their real-life counterparts. The very enterprising "U.S. Senators" quickly used the opportunity to draft legislation on the U.S. role in dealing with the problems plaguing the environment.
At the end of the lesson, one very eager, intellectually curious student recommended I watch the interesting PBS special on global warming that she had just seen. In so many ways, actually, I do feel like both the students and I learned a great deal from this lesson.
Written by Jorge
The lesson went very smoothly. After a short quiz, we went through our mini-lessons, which highlighted both public policies and scientific findings related to global warming. I didn't just read from our prepared lesson plan, but also tried to incorporate the students' questions, drawing on both my lesson plan and facts that I probably learned in my own middle school science courses. At one point, in response to a random question about ice ages, I was surprised to remember that the gravitational pull of other planets helps prevent large asteroids from hitting earth (right?). Anyway, at least in that instance, I was able to allay some fears about the future of earth. Our interactive activity involved breaking the students up into groups that represented the various bodies that are very active in environmental debates, such as legislators and activists. We asked the students to provide recommendations based on the priorities of their real-life counterparts. The very enterprising "U.S. Senators" quickly used the opportunity to draft legislation on the U.S. role in dealing with the problems plaguing the environment.
At the end of the lesson, one very eager, intellectually curious student recommended I watch the interesting PBS special on global warming that she had just seen. In so many ways, actually, I do feel like both the students and I learned a great deal from this lesson.
Written by Jorge
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