Improving Learning

Summer school may be a requirement if your child did not pass one of his classes during the school year. It might also be a choice for a student who wants to get ahead for the upcoming academic year. No matter the reason behind the summer school choice, it can be challenging to hit the books when everyone else is enjoying vacation time. Check out these ten tips to help your child survive and succeed in his summer school efforts.

Avoid Learning Loss

Is summer school the right choice for your child, or would a break from the stress and strain of class be more beneficial? According to a 2003 study cited at GreatSchools.org, summer learning loss can concern parents of struggling students. The study found that students lost up to one month of learning by the time they returned to school in the fall. This gap may be even higher for students who traditionally struggle with academics.

This video from PBS discusses reinventing summer school to avoid learning loss.

Choose the Right Class

Some summer classes may be filled with remedial students or students with severe learning disabilities that do not serve to motivate your own students to succeed. When searching for a summer class, consider the environment your student will be working in to ensure it will breed success. The right class will be well worth the cost if

The start of a new school year is always filled with many beginnings, including the beginning of the relationship with your child’s teacher. A positive relationship can reap many benefits for you and your child, creating a constructive learning environment where your young student can thrive. Developing a good relationship begins even before the first day of school, as you prepare your child - and yourself – for what lies ahead. Here are 10 constructive ways to build a positive relationship with your child’s teacher this year.

This TED Talk focuses on the parent-teacher relationship.

Make Initial Contact

It is important to make contact with your child’s teacher either before the school year begins or shortly after it has started. Some of the issues to cover with a teacher during this initial contact include:

• Health issues
• Family issues
• Learning style
• Behavior issues

By alerting your child’s teacher to these important factors at the beginning of the year, it allows that teacher to support your child in the best way possible throughout the year.

This video gives helpful tips on how to establish a productive relationship with your child's teacher that will benefit you, the children, and the teachers.

Offer Support

Let your child’s teacher know up front that you are on her side when it comes to how she

When school gets back in session, parents go into a flurry of activity, transforming lethargic summer vacationers into study fiends that make the grade. Most parents know the basics of good study habits because these ideas have been drilled into them since they were sitting behind a desk in a classroom. Carve out a quiet place to study. Study at the same time every day. And so it goes.

However, recent research suggests that much of what we have been taught about developing good study habits may be flawed at best. In fact, some of those great tips might be downright inaccurate!

It appears that recent research published in the New York Times and from other learning experts may turn everything we know about effective studying topsy-turvy by introducing a whole new approach to making the grade.

Assumption #1: Find a Quiet Place to Study

Most students know they need to find a quiet place to study after school, whether it is a corner of the library or the desk in their bedroom. However, recent studies suggest that switching locations for your study session may help you retain your information more effectively.

According to a blog by Christine Carter on the Psychology Today website, "cognitive scientists believe that studying something in multiple environments increases the neural connections in our brains associated with what we are trying to learn." In plain language, more connections may mean more effective learning.

This concept was illustrated in

Children and adolescents arrive at today’s public schools with a wide range of special needs. Some students struggle with depression and anxiety, while others face the difficult task of living with parents who are not financially or emotionally stable. Children may be plagued by schoolyard bullies or may be upset by their parents’ divorce or remarriage.

A recently released national poll aims to examine how well public schools provide support to students with emotional, behavioral, or family problems. Recognizing that in an era of large-scale budget cuts, programs that provide emotional support to students are in danger of being cut, the University of Michigan’s C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health set out to examine how many of our nation’s public schools currently make the grade when it comes to emotionally supporting their students.

In this video, Aukeem Ballard, a teacher at Summit Preparatory Charter High School, in Redwood City, CA, discusses the power of mentors in his life and career, comparing having a mentor to standing on the shoulders of giants.

The Study’s Findings

The study asked parents of students from both primary and secondary public schools to give their students’ schools a grade of A through F on three different criteria:

• Providing a Good Education – 83% of parents of primary school students and 75% of parents of secondary school students gave their children’s schools a

Aided by technology, more students cheat in public schools than ever before. While only 20% of students in the 1940s admitted to cheating in school, this statistic has skyrocketed to 75% of today's high school student population, according to Educational Testing Service. From cell phones and text messages to emails, cheating has found technological accomplices.

Cheating Trends

According to the School Library Journal, Dr. Donald McCabe, a management and global business professor at Rutgers, has found that nearly all high school students have admitted to engaging in some form of cheating. Unbelievably, 95 percent of all of McCabe's surveyed students report that they have cheated (at some point) during their educational years! Whether the cheating involved copying homework, sharing answers on a test, or using other tactics, McCabe asserts that most teens participate in these behaviors - often without getting caught.

From surveying the cheating practices of high school students for over six years, McCabe has accumulated data from 24,000 high school students in 70,000 high schools. Based on this extensive data, McCabe found that 64 percent of the students have admitted to engaging in serious test-based cheating (including copying, helping someone during a test, and using hidden notes).

Why Students Cheat

Why do such a large majority of students cheat in school? While cheating was once stereotypically confined to struggling students, today's cheaters are often the "best" students. In fact, according to The Josephson Institute, "Cheating is higher among college-bound