Legislative updates:
 


 
 CAPE OUTLOOK
 
Have you seen the February issue of Outlook? Find out how the newest U.S. senator may help change the school choice landscape. Download Outlook here.
 
 EDUCATION IN THE NEWS
 
For adolescent literacy, look to first-grade neighborhoods
A new study from the University of British Columbia (UBC) finds that children who live in neighborhoods with higher rates of poverty show reduced scores on standardized tests seven years later, regardless of the child's place of residence in Grade 7. Science Daily reports that the study is the first of its kind to compare the relative effects of neighborhood poverty at early childhood and early adolescence. "Our findings suggest that it's not necessarily where children live later in life that matters for understanding literacy in early adolescence -- it's where they lived years earlier," says lead researcher Jennifer Lloyd of UBC's Human Early Learning Partnership (HELP). "Children's reading comprehension may be set on a negative course early in life if children and their families are living in resource-deprived places." The researchers say it's possible that the socioeconomic conditions of children's early residential neighborhoods exert a strong effect later because acquiring reading skills involves the collective efforts of parents, educators, family friends, and community members, as well as access to good schools, libraries, after-school programs, and bookstores. "Sadly, our findings demonstrate the lasting effect of neighborhood poverty on children's reading comprehension -- highlighting that children's literacy is not simply an important issue for parents, but also for community leaders and policymakers alike," Lloyd says.
Read more: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100114143330.htm
 
 Play, eat lunch
At the advice of experts, some schools are sending students out to play before they sit down for lunch, which appears to have led to positive changes in both cafeteria and classroom.
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/01/25/play-then-eat-shift-may-bring-gains-at-school/?8dpc
 
 Siemens/NSTA: We Can Change the World Challenge
In the Siemens We Can Change the World Challenge, teachers, mentors or other adults work with and supervise teams of eligible students in the creation of a contest entry identifying an issue in the community that needs to "go green" and providing a plan to positively impact that issue and further "green living" in their community. Each team's entry should include the following steps: choosing a topic, writing a problem statement, doing background research, writing a hypothesis, developing a plan, collecting data, drawing a conclusion, reporting the results and explaining how to replicate this project. Maximum award: (students) a $10,000 Savings Bond, appearance on Planet Green, a Discovery trip, a pocket video camera, and a Siemens We Can Change the World Challenge green prize pack; (teachers/mentors) a Discovery trip, free registration to the next NSTA National (or Area) Conference; hotel accommodations for three nights at the conference; a pocket video camera; a one-year membership to NSTA; a 12-month subscription to Discovery Education Science; and a Siemens We Can Change the World Challenge green prize pack. Eligibility: Teams may be made up of two, three, or four students who have been approved and recommended by a teacher/mentor, each of whom is a legal U.S. resident enrolled in kindergarten through 5th grade at a public, private, parochial, or home school located in the United States at the time of entry. Deadline: March 15, 2010.
http://wecanchange.com
 
 The math anxiety contagion
First- and second-graders whose female teachers were anxious about mathematics were more likely to believe that boys are hard-wired for math and that girls are better at reading, according to a new study reported in The Los Angeles Times. The study also found that girls who believed this scored significantly lower on math tests than their peers who didn't. The gap in test scores was not apparent in the fall when kids were first tested, but emerged after spending a school year in the classrooms of teachers with math anxiety. "Teachers who are anxious about their own math abilities are translating some of that to their kids," said University of Chicago psychologist Sian Beilock, who led the study. Beilock and her colleagues recruited seven female teachers from a Midwestern school district and assessed their level of math anxiety -- a condition in which the prospect of doing math evokes unpleasant physiological and emotional responses. They then tested their students over the course of a year. The study is the first both to examine math attitudes of teachers and to show that those feelings can spread to students and undermine their performance, said co-author Susan C. Levine, also a psychologist at the University of Chicago.
Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/education/la-sci-math26-2010jan26,0,2370924.story?track=rss&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+latimes%2Fnews%2Feducation+%28L.A.+Times+-+Education%29