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| | LATEST NEWS FOR PRINCIPALS |
Education DIVE
President Barack Obama signed the bipartisan Every Student Succeeds Act in December, signaling what could mark a massive shift in the direction of the nation's biggest K-12 law, and now state and local school leaders are doing the hard work of implementation. That work includes the development of strategic visions for education, reconsidering their assessment plans, coming up with new accountability systems and deciding how to evaluate teachers.
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Disability Scoop
Officials at the U.S. Department of Education are raising concerns that school districts are inappropriately holding up or preventing evaluations of kids who may have disabilities. In a notice sent to state education leaders across the country this spring, the federal agency said that it is worried that some schools "may be using response to intervention strategies to delay or deny a timely initial evaluation for preschool children suspected of having a disability." That is problematic, the Education Department said, because the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act requires that states and school districts ensure that all children needing special education services are flagged.
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Education Week
Writing instruction may have fallen by the wayside during the No Child Left Behind Act era, as teachers zeroed in on teaching math and reading. But now, with most states using the Common Core State Standards, students are expected to write a lot more — and to write better. The standards include detailed writing expectations that go well beyond previous state requirements. Specifically, they call for proficiency in argumentative, explanatory and narrative writing that draw connections from and between texts.
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ADDitude Magazine
Great teachers know that saying the right words in the right way can turn a defeated student into a go-getter. Here are 5 communication strategies specifically scripted for students with ADHD.
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MindShift
Teachers would love to give each student individual attention whenever they need it, but packed classrooms often make that a difficult task. As a result, it's not uncommon for teachers to move on to new concepts even when some are still struggling to implement the skills that have already been covered. Educators are working to solve this problem in diverse ways, some moving to competency based learning systems that let kids move through curriculum at their own pace, and others doing the best to get students working independently part of the time while giving focused attention to others.
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By: Erick Herrmann
 In the past two decades, knowledge of how the brain functions has increased tremendously. New, less invasive technologies such as PET scans have helped scientists determine various ways people learn and how to facilitate learning through using brain-based teaching techniques. In some ways, teachers have been using strategies that are brain-based long before they were proven to be so. Teachers are astute and look for specific strategies that help their students learn.
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Edutopia
Scannable technology can totally alter the way that you think about teaching and learning in the math classroom. This powerful free and low-cost technology can support students inside and outside the classroom and change the way you think about interacting with content. QR codes and augmented reality are scannable technology tools that are perfect for K-12 math classrooms.
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Parent Herald
Student all throughout the United States are subjected to take the Common Core test, even the children who are under the special needs class. It is still an ongoing debate as most children with special needs understand things differently compared to their peers. One question is still left unanswered, Should children with special needs take the Common Core test? As of the latest update, schools from 27 states and the District of Columbia have already opted to use the alternate test design for children with special needs. The alternative test is patterned and aligned to the Common Core State standards.
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Medical News Today
Campaigns to promote physical activity and reduce obesity among children should focus more on active outdoor play, according to a study led at the University of Strathclyde. The Active Healthy Kids Scotland Report Card 2016 has found that children's physical activity levels are continuing to fall well short of recommended levels. By contrast, they are still spending far more than the recommended maximum of two hours' free time a day in front of screens. The researchers have proposed that strategies to promote physical activity and reduce screen time should place a higher emphasis on playing actively outdoors, something children could potentially do 365 days a year.
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EdTech Magazine
Calcasieu Parish Public Schools in Lake Charles, La., has been using technology in its classrooms for three decades. Two basic lessons have emerged from that long experience: support and training. "We always select technology that supports our learning goals rather than building curriculum around technology," says CTO Sheryl Abshire, whose district serves 32,600 students with 2,600 teachers in 64 schools and alternative learning sites. "And we don't put any technology in classrooms without first giving hands-on training for teachers."
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The Washington Post
One morning before math, the fourth-graders took a little vacation. To soft music, they walked through woods, climbed a mountain and lifted off with imaginary wings, flying over an ocean, a gentle breeze on their faces. One student saw a school of fish; another spotted a rainbow. "I see it!" the others piped in, their eyes squeezed tight. "I see it, too!" With the sound of a chime, they were back in their yellow-and-blue school uniforms in a classroom overlooking a blighted neighborhood that has been beset by violence this spring, including two separate slayings of teenage boys at a nearby Metro station.
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eSchool News (commentary)
Denise Jaffe, a contributor for eSchool News, writes: "I recently had the pleasure of spending a few hours in a friend's classroom where I introduced her students to technology applications that would engage them in 'showing what they know' at different points in their learning. Having worked with this teacher for many years, I had always considered her a technology pioneer. So it came as something of a surprise when, planning for our time together, she confided in me that she no longer felt empowered by technology so much as overwhelmed by it. Looking back, it's easy to see how this could have happened."
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School Library Journal
Most toddlers can swipe an iPad, tap an e-book, and call grandma on mom's phone, so you'd think that kids in upper elementary school would be seasoned digital users and experts at navigating the web. As it turns out, a new study published in the International Literacy Association's Reading Research Quarterly has found that we don't know as much as we thought about the online activities, preferences, and skills of the preadolescent set.
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| | FEDERAL ADVOCACY AND POLICY |
Education World
In the month following the Obama administration's directive on the rights of transgendered students in schools, school boards' reactions to the guidance vary. The directive does not carry the weight of law, but it for the first time interprets how Title IX law protects gender identity. Though Title IX clearly protects students from sex-based discrimination, it was formerly up to interpretation whether or not this covers transgendered students, as well. The guidance, issued by the Justice and Education Departments, has done away with case-by-case interpretation and instead mandates that each state protect students' respective gender identity or suffer the consequence of losing federal funds.
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Education Week
State K-12 leaders busily trying to transition to the Every Student Succeeds Act are beginning to worry that the U.S. Department of Education is bent on trying to enforce the previous version of the law, the No Child Left Behind Act, Chris Minnich, the executive director of the Council of Chief State School Officers said. The department, though, says that the two laws include many of the same requirements when it comes to test quality and equity.
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NAESP
School leaders are tasked with skimming the crowded waters of devices, apps, and hashtags that are available not only for ourselves, but also for what can be useful to students, teachers and parents. It truly can feel like drinking from the firehose at times, and our limited time has been spliced and re-spliced time and again. It's up to us to keep the focus on student and staff learning, and to base decisions on our populations, new and old policies, and of course the evolution of digital media.
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NAESP
ESSA made far reaching changes to federal requirements governing state accountability systems. As states work over the next 12 months to develop and implement new accountability models in anticipation of the law's full implementation by the 2017-2018 school year, principals need to develop a working understanding of ESSA's requirements related to measuring school performance, establishing ratings intervening in low performing schools, and reporting results to families and the public. This Webinar will equip participants with the information they need to work effectively with district and state leaders to address these issues, including identifying the best possible range of indicators of school performance and how schools are identified for intervention. This webinar takes place Tuesday, June 28, 4–5 p.m. ET.
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