Parent Cortical Mass

Week's Top Articles on Learning & Education, for Parents

A trio of notable writers – Hanna Rosin, Danah Boyd, and Dana Goldstein—focus this week on overprotective parenting. In particular, don’t miss the fun of reading about “The Land,” an awesome new type of playground. [Free-Range Parents 1, Helicopter Parents, 0.] ● This week, in many states, new tests aligned to the common core make their trial run, fanning the flames of controversy over accountability testing and the serious flaws in the new standards. ● Other sticky topics include homework, big data in education, and student data privacy. Get informed! ● Need an alternative to candy crush? Something with a bit more learning nutrition? Check out vocabulary.com’s new app.

Parenting

The Overprotected Kid (and a New Kind of Playground) - Hanna Rosin, The Atlantic

Let Your Kids Run Wild Online - Danah Boyd, Time

Don't Help Your Kids With Their Homework - Dana Goldstein, The Atlantic

College Admissions Season: When the Answer is No - Tracy Mayor, Motherlode, NYT

Spanking Babies is Still Common, And Misguided - Rich Nauert, PhD, PsychCentral

Neuroscience 'Used and Abused' in Child Rearing Policy - ScienceDaily

Punishing Students for Gadget Use Will Make Their Tech Etiquette Worse - Leah Plunkett, Wired

What Applying to Charter Schools Showed Me About Inequality - Conor Williams, The Atlantic

Learning

Who's Afraid of Math? Study Finds Some Genetic Factors - ScienceDaily

Where Do Savant Skills Come From? - Scott Barry Kaufman, PhD, Creativity Post

What’s the ‘Sweet Spot’ of Difficulty For Learning? - Annie Murphy Paul, Mind/Shift

The Teenage Brain Explained [10 min video] - SciShow, YouTube

More Advanced Math and Reading In Kindergarten Benefits School Performance - Medical News Today

Muscle Head: Book Review of 'Smarter' by Dan Hurley - Annie Murphy Paul, New York Times

Education

Big Data Enters the Classroom - Lisa Fleisher, Wall Street Journal

Listening to the Public's Concerns About Big Data - Gov. Bob Wise, Huffington Post

Homework in America - Tom Loveless, Brookings

Study: U.S. Students Are Not Overburdened by Homework -Samantha Stainburn, Ed Week

The Never-Ending Controversy Over All-Girls Education - Christine Gross-Loh, The Atlantic

Politics, Research, School Reform: Letting Teens Sleep In - Larry Cuban, Larry Cuban Blog

Testing To, and Beyond, the Common Core - Linda Darling Hammond, Scope

The 10 Dumbest Common Core Sample Questions - Alec Torres, National Review

Best Reason to Oppose the Common Core Standards - Diane Ravitch, Washington Post

Ensuring the Common Core Debate Rests on Facts - Kathleen Porter-Magee, Ed Excellence

College Isn't for Everybody - Michael Petrilli, Slate

Los Angeles Charter Schools Post Big Learning Gains - John Fensterwald, Hechinger Report

Resources

Ditch Candy Crush for Vocabulary.com's Addictive App - Rebecca Greenfield, FastCompany

Train Your Brain with Simple New Game "Three Words" - Jonathan Wai, Psychology Today

5 Games and Apps that Build Math & English Skills - Tanner Higgin, Mind/Shift

Why a Kid-Safe YouTube is Sensible, and Innocuous - Wendy Goldman Getzler, iKids

7 Apps for Learning a Language - The Online Mom

Vote Now for 2014 Children's Choice Book Awards - BookWeekOnline

Read a few articles each week, and gain parent cortical mass! If you enjoy our weekly article roundup, please email it to a friend, or share on social media. Thank you!

Week's Top Articles on Learning & Education, for Parents

Something’s happening here. Last week new battle lines over the common core and charter schools were drawn. Randi Weingarten, head of the American Federation of Teachers, announced the union would no longer take money from the Gates Foundation on common core projects. Bill Gates countered, telling teachers to explain to parents the common core’s value. On the charter school front, Diane Ravitch said wealthy philanthropists were destroying public education with their hidden agenda to make money by privatizing education. Bloomberg News answered saying charter schools were not a Trojan horse. Confused? Articles below will get you informed on these top policies. And there’s more! Does current research debunk the 10,000 Hour Rule? Are the results of experiments about teens, sleep, and later school start time definitive? Is college worth the cost? There’s a lot to read here. Have you tried the speed reading app, Spritz? It’s a thrill to read at 600 WPM.

Parenting

Should Parents Pay for Their Children's College Education? - Journal Report, Wall Street Journal

5 Things Teachers Wish Parents Knew - Jessica Lahey, New York Times

Homework's Emotional Toll on Students and Families - KJ Dell-Antonia, New York Times

Is Audiobook Reading Really Reading? Leslie Crawford, GreatSchools

Yik Yak Shuts Off Access to US Middle and High Schoolers - Sarah Perez, TechCrunch

To Keep Teenagers Alert, Schools Let Them Sleep In - Jan Hoffman, New York Times

Can We All "Have It All"? [17 min video] - Anne-Marie Slaughter, TED Talk

5 Things You Should Know About Working Dads -Scott Behson, Time

Learning

Scientists Debunk the Myth of 10,000 Hours - Suzanne LaBarre, FastCompany

The Science of Success: Blood, or Sweat and Tears? - Michael Bond, New Scientist

What If You Stopped Sleeping? [3 min video] - AsapScience, Big Think

Do We Underestimate Our Youngest Learners? - Daniel Willingham, Real Clear Education

Gesturing Deepens Kids' Grasp of Math - Traci Pedersen, PsychCentral

The "Brain App" That's Better Than Spritz - Annie Murphy Paul, Time

Education

The Truth About Charter Schools - Joshua Greenman, New York Daily News

Diane Ravitch: Say Goodbye to Public Schools - Josh Eidelson, Salon

Charter Schools Are Under Attack - The Editors, Bloomberg View

Big Business Targets Common Core's Band of Mothers - Joy Pullmann, The Federalist

In Defense of Common Core -Editorial Board, Los Angeles Times

Randi Weingarten: AFT Will No Longer Accept Gates Funding - Stephen Sawchuk, Education Week

Bill Gates Calls on Teachers to Defend the Common Core - Lindsey Layton, Washington Post

Letter Grades Deserve and 'F' - Jessica Lahey, The Atlantic

Rewarding and Employing Teachers Based on Their Value-Added - Caroline Hoxby, EducationNext

Google Under Fire for Data-Mining Student Email Messages - Benjamin Herold, Education Week

How Big Data Will Haunt You Forever: High School Transcripts - Schonberger & Cukier, Quartz

Google's Eric Schmidt: Critics Are Wrong. Go to College! - Gregory Ferenstein, TechCrunch

Resources

Spritz: The Science Behind the Speed Reading App - Spritz

3 Things Kids Need to Know About Yik Yak - Diana Graber, Huffington Post

Protecting Your Child's Privacy Online - Federal Trade Commission

Tynker: Learn Programming with Visual Code Blocks! - Best Apps for Kids

How Science Can Help You Find a 4-Leaf Clover [3 min video] - Scientific American

Read a few articles each week, and gain parent cortical mass! If you enjoy our weekly article roundup, please email it to a friend, or share on social media. Thank you!

Week's Top Articles on Learning & Education, for Parents

Can you believe how much news coverage the changes to SAT got? Major media gave it top billing. It's valuable when education grabs the public mind, even for a day. ● For weeks we’ve heard about the opt out movement. But, this week Lisa T. McElroy’s, “I Opted My Kids Out. My Schools Freaked Out. Now I Know Why,” has spread far and wide. It’s worth the read. ● Chester Finn, a long time edu-influencer, wrote a clarifying article on the 10 “philosophical tug-o-wars” in education today. You will be smarter. He references Diane Ravitch and E.D. Hirsch Jr., and refers to background knowledge, common core, accountability, and value-add teacher evaluations. ● Have you heard there’s a sequel to Carl Sagan’s PBS series, Cosmos? The new program starts this month, on Fox, and stars Neil deGrasse Tyson. Will Neil be tempted to refer to the quantity of stars as “beellions and beellions”? I couldn’t resist in a...

Parenting

I Opted My Kids Out. The Schools Freaked Out. Now I Know Why. - Lisa T. McElroy, Slate

Debunking Myths About Parent Involvement in Middle School - Katie Wester-Neal, MiddleWeb

Don't Stalk Your Kid Online - Emily Bazelon, Slate

10 Things You Should Never Say to Your Kids Michelle Crouch, Parents

Redshirting: Good or Bad? New Research Adds to the Debate - Annie Murphy Paul, Brilliant Blog

Success and Character and Parenting - Richard Rende, Parenting

Learning

Most Preschoolers Are Capable of Algebra - Traci Pedersen, PsychCentral

Playtime is Learning Time - Too Small to Fail

Infants Use Known Verbs to Learn New Nouns - Northwestern University, PsyPost

What People Know About the cost of Multitasking - Daniel Willingham, Science and Education Blog

What Do IQ Tests Test? - Scott Barry Kaufman, Creativity Post

5 Year Olds Can Learn Calculus - Luba Vangelova, The Atlantic

Is Learning a Foreign Language Worth It? - Suzie Lechtenberg, Freakonomics

Education

This is What the New SAT Will Be Like - Julia Ryan, The Atlantic

A New SAT Aims to Realign with Schoolwork - Tamar Lewin, New York Times

Why the SAT Needs to Be Harder - Jonathan Wai, Psychology Today

10 Education Dichotomies We Quarrel About - Chester Finn, Education Next

US Needs to Add Student Online Privacy Rules -Editorial Board, Los Angeles Times

The Common Core Teaches Kids to Be Good Citizens - Ross Wiener, The Atlantic

2 Flash Points in the Curriculum Wars - Tom Loveless, Education Next

Finland's Novel Approach to Recess - Samantha Stainburn

How Does PISA Put the World at Risk - Yong Zhao, Zhao Learning

Resources

Illustrated Field Guide to Mythic Monsters - Maria Popova, Brain Pickings

Neil deGrasse Tyson: Why Cosmos Will Be Better Than Ever - Rachel Edidin, Wired

Project Spark Arrives on Xbox One - Tom Warren, The Verge

Parents Warned About Yik Yak, a Controversial Social App - Rajwani and Rodriguez, Chicago Tribune

11 Tips for Students to Manage Their Digital Footprints - TeachThought

Read a few articles each week, and gain parent cortical mass! If you enjoy our weekly article roundup, please email it to a friend, or share on social media. Thank you!