Another intresting article about federal stimulus money and school reform, I guess SC is out of the conversation on this one! According to the new Education Secretary, we should extend the amount of time our student's spend in the classroom. He proposes a longer school day, and even a six or seven day school week. Do you think expanding the school day/week would improve student performance?
http://www.usnews.com/blogs/on-education/2009/4/9/will-stimulus-money-lead-to-actual-education-reform.html?s_cid=rss:on-education:will-stimulus-money-lead-to-actual-education-reform
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I do not think that students would do better by attending school 6 or 7 days a week. As a parent of young children, I can tell you that children need some "off time" to be kids. I believe that learning is important, but so is free time and play. Like Dr. Ferguson tells us, children can learn through play. I personally believe that it is crazy to expect children to attend school 6 or 7 days a week. What about family time, sports, church, or any other interest they may have?
I do not think that having a longer school day, week or year will improve the public education system in our country. It has much more to do with the quality of instruction received as opposed to the number of hours or minutes spent in a classroom. If a student does not participate or show effort in a class, having them in there for a longer period of time will not make a difference in their performance. What will make a difference is the teacher's instructional strategies and interaction with the student. The point might be that if we had school constantly there would be more time for this sort of effective teaching to take place. As far as I'm concerned, a longer school day/week/year is not the answer, but thoughtful, dedicated, progressive teachers are.
It sounds from this article that some of the stimulus money will be tied to federal government "reforms" if the money is accepted by the states. As the parent of a 5th and 7th grader, I could not image what their lives would be like if the school day, week, or year was extended. They rarely have time during the week after school to do anything other than homework. Weekends are a critical time for resting and recharging for the next week. I do believe the article was correct in pointing out that some form of teacher evalution needs to be implemented in areas where poor teaching is accepted and students are not meeting minimal achievement levels.
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