531 Response 2

Quote	What it means	Deeper Thinking
“. . . it’s your philosophy of kids that’s going to guide your beliefs and your actions in your interactions with them.”  — Ross Green	What you believe drives a child’s behavior will dictate how you respond to them. If you feel that a child is acting out because he wants attention or is trying to manipulate a situation, then you will likely have a punitive response to the child’s behavior. However, if you feel that a child is acting out in frustration, your response would be to find the source of frustration and remove it.	I agree whole-heartedly with the author of this article. Children who have behavior problems don’t want to be bad and misbehave. They do not want to be trouble-makers, but they are lacking social or thinking skills necessary to have the “correct” or accepted behavioral response. Too often adults assume these kids are “bad” and are behaving in a negative way for their own self-serving needs. When in reality, kids don’t want to behave badly, they just don’t understand the rules or don’t have the skills necessary to react in a way that adults deem “appropriate.” As teachers, it is important that we see beyond the behavior, to the real source of the problem, and work with the student to help them gain the skills necessary to work through the problem in a more appropriate way. It all comes down to whether you believe kids’ behaviors are intentional to gain attention, or if you believe their behaviors are a reaction to a deeper problem.
“Academic ability—which has really come to dominate our view of intelligence because the universities designed the system in their image. If you think of it, the whole system is a protracted process of university entrances.” — Sir Ken Robinson	The university system in both the United States and Europe has played a huge role in design of our educational system. It has consistently rewarded and required left brain, analytical thinking, and as such, our secondary school systems have designed their curriculum around those types of classes in order to meet the demands of the university systems.	I have been discussing this topic with my peers recently. As I look at the types of science classes offered at most of the high schools in this area, I have found that science offerings, like most academic offerings, in the high schools are mostly dictated by the University of California (UC) entrance requirements. The high schools structure their curriculums around the UC A-G curriculum, and if the UC system does not recognize a course as valuable for gaining entrance into the UC system, many schools will not offer the course or will offer the course as an elective with lower standards and expectations. I feel that there are so many courses that could be offered that would provide profound educational experiences for many students, but these courses are never offered because they are not deemed important by the UC system.
Creativity is as important in education as literacy, and we should treat it with the same status. — Sir Ken Robinson	Creativity is as essential a skill as reading and writing when it comes to developing an individual and preparing them for the jobs of the future.	For too many years, and even more so recently with the enactment of NCLB, we have constrained our students to desks, told them that answers are black and white, and taught them to think in certain ways. We have limited and squashed their creativity, molding them into what we feel is necessary to succeed in this country. By doing so, we have neglected a very important skill for being competitive in our society today and in the future. It is through creativity that we become innovative. We have let that creativity go over the years, and now we must find a way to bring it back into our schools.
The Conference Board also found that their survey respondents believed most recent high school graduates lacked the basic skills of reading, writing, and math that were deemed necessary by employers. Among these basic skills, employers deemed this group to be most deficient in writing. Employers judged nearly three-quarters of high school graduates as unable to write at a basic level, for which competency includes knowledge of both spelling and grammar. — Preparing the Workers of Today for the Jobs of the Future	Our students are graduating high school and college without the ability to write at the basic levels required by most jobs in the United States. We, as educators, are failing our kids when it comes to literacy.	By the time students have reached high school, basic literacy skills are no longer being taught. If the students have not acquired these skills by this point, few teachers will incorporate these skills into their instruction. Although students are required to take English classes, the limited amount of time in these classes prevents them from being able to catch them up. It is the job of every teacher, regardless of the subject they teach, to ensure that our students are gaining these skills. Literacy must be incorporated into every subject in our high schools to ensure that these students are able to graduate with the basic skills they need to compete and work in our society.
In general, the U.S. economy appears to be shifting towards jobs that require workers with greater analytical and interactive skills – skills that are typically acquired with some post-secondary education. — Preparing the Workers of Today for the Jobs of the Future	According to this 2009 study, there will be an increase in jobs in the future that will need workers with higher analytical skills that are usually acquired from some post-secondary education.	I found this quote interesting because it seems to contradict Pink’s belief that there will be a radical shift away from analytical type (or left brain) type jobs. While I agree with a great deal of Pink’s rationale, I do not see this shift as becoming as drastic as he indicates, and maybe more inline with the findings of this report. I believe we are going to see more of a balance between left and right brain type jobs, which is still a shift away from the dominate left brain requirements from previous generations. Although we will see an increase in right brain jobs, I still believe that there will be a great demand for left brain type jobs such as engineering and science, and, as this report suggests, you are going to find them in the health care industry, medical manufacturing, the environmental industry, and in specialized manufacturing like aerospace.