Review of Rosetta Stone

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Tuesday December 22, 2009 · 9:29 AM PST

2009/12/22 · 09:29

There are any number of online reviews of the popular language learning program, Rosetta Stone. Reviews are mixed. Some reviewers love the product, other loathe it. At around $500, nearly everyone complains about its high cost.

Most reviewers evaluate software as consumers, and their input is valuable. But they generally have no linguistic training or foreign language teaching experience to inform their reviews. I would like to contribute to rectifying the lack of professional review.

sgoya

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Friday December 18, 2009 · 1:11 PM PST

2009/12/18 · 13:11

Cognitive scientists* reviewed over a thousand studies, but first, they thought it necessary to give the reading public a primer on basic study design. In the abstract no less.

First, students must be divided into groups on the basis of their learning styles, and then students from each group must be randomly assigned to receive one of multiple instructional methods. Next, students must then sit for a final test that is the same for all students. Finally, in order to demonstrate that optimal learning requires that students receive instruction tailored to their putative learning style, the experiment must reveal a specific type of interaction between learning style and instructional method: Students with one learning style achieve the best educational outcome when given an instructional method that differs from the instructional method producing the best outcome for students with a different learning style. In other words, the instructional method that proves most effective for students with one learning style is not the most effective method for students with a different learning style.

sgoya

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Wednesday December 16, 2009 · 11:08 AM PST

2009/12/16 · 11:08

Schools are having trouble paying the bills. The extra pay teachers get for having a Masters degree costs schools nearly $9 billion per year. One college of education, the University of Washington, has proposed a strategy: "decoupling" extra pay for teachers who earn Master's degrees. After all, what are the schools getting for all the extra pay? By all accounts, teachers with Master's degrees do not get any more academic achievement out of their students than teachers not so well endowed.

Not surprisingly, the recommendation went over like the proverbial lead balloon.

The authors expected push back from teachers, and got it. But it was the the reaction of their colleagues from other colleges of education that seemed to take the authors by surprise.

sgoya

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Wednesday December 09, 2009 · 4:16 PM PST

2009/12/09 · 16:16

The movie, Stand and Deliver, told the inspirational story of one teacher's success in using Advanced Placement (AP) calculus with his demoralized students. The students complained, worked hard, fought back, bought in, and eventually passed the AP calculus test. Test administrators thought the students had cheated and canceled their scores. The students retook—and passed--- the test. Garfield High in Los Angeles would never be the same. Or would it?

Texas hopes to replicate Jaime Escalante's resounding success. More and more schools are offering more and more AP courses to more and more students. But Texas school officials do not like the results. At least they do not like the statistics. More and more students are failing.

But the latest data show Texas high school students fail more than half of the college-level exams, and their performance trails national averages.

School officials wring their hands and wonder what could be going wrong.

sgoya

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Thursday December 03, 2009 · 10:32 AM PST

2009/12/03 · 10:32

Back in February, a teacher in Montana made EdWeek headlines because she was teaching algebra to second graders and had been doing so for five years. Why all the oohs and aahs?

Gregorio C. Sablan, CNMI Congressional Delegate, got it right. "Pre-algebra" starts early, or should.

At Broadwater Elementary School in Helena, Montana, algebra starts in second grade, where students learn the basics behind mathematical theory and reasoning to prepare them for high-level math classes in middle and high school.

Elementary math is supposed to prepare students for high-level math classes is middle and high school. Students should not need a dedicated pre-algebra class.

sgoya

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Friday November 27, 2009 · 11:09 AM PST

2009/11/27 · 11:09

The market makers profit in any market, whether up or down. The market makers understand human psychology very well, and use it to set bid and ask prices. The bigger the news, the more they make. So yeah, today there were profit takers. Dubai was a great excuse. The market makers absolutely depend on the herd behavior of millions of small investors just trying to do their best.

This primer on market makers explains their role as both buyer and seller AT THE SAME MOMENT. When you put in an order at market price, you are agreeing to pay or receive whatever the market maker says right now. A limit order means you determine the price, but not the time of execution. A stop loss order is downright dangerous; there is substantial risk they will be executed at prices far below your stop price. Market makers have been known to drop the price just long enough to buy stock at a stop loss price, and turn around and sell at a much higher price, especially on overnight orders. On the West Coast, you can wake up to see your stock charging ahead---without you.

sgoya

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Wednesday November 25, 2009 · 1:02 PM PST

2009/11/25 · 13:02

For too long, the nation’s education system has neglected the needs of its high-potential students.

Ann Robinson, president of the National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC) is right. One indication of the neglect is the lack of monetary investment in the gifted.

The federal government’s investment in gifted and talented learners now stands at 2 cents of every $100 education dollars...

Another indication is the test scores of gifted students.

Over the past decade, despite impressive gains by students at the low end of the performance spectrum, the scores of students in the top 10 percent have remained largely flat.

Forget the test scores. Some of these students are already bumping their heads against the ceiling and ceilings tend to be flat.

Please join me at School Crossing for the rest.

Don't Blame the Schools of Education.

sgoya

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Friday November 20, 2009 · 1:52 PM PST

2009/11/20 · 13:52

They are just doing the best they can with what they've got, says Pedro Noguera. First he grants the schools of education deserve some criticism.

It’s true that many schools of education don’t recruit the best students into the profession... and that too often the research produced in schools of education is of little use to public schools...As is true for American universities generally, there is considerable variability in quality among the nation’s schools of education.

Many graduates of even the best schools of education lack effectiveness in the classroom.

Graduates of teacher-credential programs at my university, for example, and at Teachers College, Columbia University, are highly sought after, even at a time when teaching jobs are scarce. Does this mean that they are highly effective when they enter schools? In many cases, they are not.

The game is rigged against these promising graduates.

Please follow me to School Crossing for more.

Selling Grades

sgoya

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Tuesday November 17, 2009 · 3:58 PM PST

2009/11/17 · 15:58

Chocolate didn't work. Presumably gift wrap, cookie dough, flower bulbs, toffee peanuts didn't work either. I wouldn't be surprised. It seemed like for a while there, almost every day somebody's child knocked at my door selling something. Sooner or later the neighborhood had to be saturated.

According to a November 10, 2009 article in The News and Observer, one school decided to get creative.

A $20 donation to Rosewood Middle School will get a student 20 test points — 10 extra points on two tests of the student's choosing. That could raise a B to an A, or a failing grade to a D.

...snip...

Shepherd, the Rosewood principal, said her school needs more technology. She said any money raised would help buy digital cameras for the school's computer lab and a high-tech blackboard.

sgoya

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Friday November 06, 2009 · 4:55 PM PST

2009/11/06 · 16:55

Good teachers matter. The data on that are clear. If we want more talented people in the classroom, a first step toward encouraging them would be to stop discouraging them.

I did not expect to see a piece about education under Yahoo Personal Finance, but there it was. What would an economist, Charles Wheelan PhD, say about education? Usually it's educators (like me) who write about education. The fact he is not an educator may be a point in his favor. At least he won't have an educator's biases. On the other hand, not being an educator, he may not understand the shortcomings of applying a business model to schools.

He implies that "alternative league" players become teachers, and because they are "alternative league" players, they naturally resist the threat that merit pay proposals represent.

sgoya

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Sunday October 18, 2009 · 10:17 AM PDT

2009/10/18 · 10:17

Have you ever noticed that it seems the harder you push back against difficult students, the more resolute they become? As strange as it may seem, resisting difficult students strengthens their behavior. Any first year teacher knows that no amount of scolding, detentions, whatever, work? It's like they get on a destructive path and their egos become committed to seeing it through, sometimes to the point of expulsion from school. Even then, they will say the teacher or the principal had it in for them.

They complain to family and friends that their teacher doesn't like them. It may even be true. I had teachers who did not like me. It did not stop me from getting a begrudging A in their class anyway. Now we all know we cannot change anybody. We can only change ourselves. We know this, but somehow it doesn't stop us from trying anyway.

A strange thing about human behavior is that the more we try to change a person, the more set in their ways the difficult person becomes. So give it up. Someone said the definition of insanity is continuing to do the same things that never work.

sgoya

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Monday October 12, 2009 · 6:57 PM PDT

2009/10/12 · 18:57

If you are an American overseas with a family, apart from homeschooling, there are generally three ways you can see to your kids' education. One, The Department of Defense Dependent Schools (DODDS) on a military base, but maybe you are not active-duty military and you cannot afford the $17,000 (last I heard) annual tuition. Two, the local schools which may or may not be free, but your kids may not speak the local language. Three, an English-language international school. The tuition will be much more reasonable than DODDS, but the quality varies widely.

I was once a DODDS teacher, but I left when I found out that even though I was a teacher, I would be required to pay the exorbitant tuition. I left DODDS and went to work for a local international school for less pay, but then again, since tuition for faculty children was free, I had more take-home pay than with DODDS. Problem was the school had a reputation for being a low achieving school. When I left DODDS, my principal berated me for going to work for that "rinky-dinky school."

Teachers and students alike muffled their answer when asked what school they taught at/went to.

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Review of Rosetta Stone

No Evidence for Learning Style Optimization. Educational Apocalypse?

Teachers with Masters Degrees Not Worth Their Pay?

Stand and Deliver? No, Sit Down and Shut Up

Algebra in 2nd Grade?

Up or Down, the Market Makers Profit

Dissing the Gifted

Don't Blame the Schools of Education.

Selling Grades

Confounding Teacher Recruitment by Discouraging the Best

4 Difficult Students and How to Handle Them

Closing the Achievement Gap: One Modest Story