From Brain Mysteries 4-20-12: “We’re seeing that there are a lot of effects of social status on genes, including our own, but we are also seeing that many of the changes aren’t permanent …” Tung said [ lead author Jenny Tung, a visiting assistant professor in Duke University’s evolutionary anthropology department]. This study is “just the tip of […]
Re: Word-spotting baboons leave scientists spellbound: Reading baboons may shed light on human learning This kind of article can be, like the ‘cna yuo raed tihs’ simplification, can lead the general population into a dangerously trivialized view of reading.” There is an incomparable difference between the way hearing able children learn to read (alphabetic writing systems in […]
Re: Man vs. Computer: Who Wins the Essay-Scoring Challenge? From Education Week: Curriculum Matters 4-13-2012 “The results demonstrated that overall, automated essay scoring was capable of producing scores similar to human scores for extended-response writing items with equal performance for both source-based and traditional writing genre,” says the study. This is fascinating. Artificial intelligence has already […]
We are releasing our page “What is Reading?” today. It is the first of a series of pages and posts that will summarize and expand the work of the work of the Children of the Code Project. Please visit the page and share your comments: https://www.learningstewards.org/what-is-reading/
Re: Wired Science 4-11-2012 DNA Ain’t Destiny. No Kidding “you are — a constant conversation between your genes and the environment, which includes both you and the surrounding world” Yes, it can’t be said enough that genes do not programmatically determine who we become. And, the way you put it is a big improvement over the old dichotomy of nature v nurture […]
Re: Getting Our Kids Ready for the Competition – the Great Conversations and the 32,000,000 Missing Words! by Dick Jacobs Your piece creates a great framework for conversation but one point needs clarification: “Cognitive science tells us that if learning our reading fundamentals doesn’t start very early and the skills aren’t in place by age nine or ten, […]
From Science 2.0: Of 3,500 college applicants, more than a third couldn’t report their weight accurately. The heavier they were, the less accurate their estimates. “This misperception is important because the first step in dealing with a weight problem is knowing that you have one,” said Margarita Teran-Garcia, a University of Illinois professor of food science […]
What happens to you when you become confused? How do you feel? Most of our children are growing up in environments (families, schools, peer groups…) that insidiously (mostly unintentionally but nevertheless pervasively) teach them to blame themselves for feeling confused. Children who blame themselves for feeling confused feel shame when they feel confused. Naturally, subconsciously-automatically, children […]
The other night I received a call from the cable company. The voice explained that it was calling about an appointment I had scheduled and asked whether I wanted to keep the appointment, cancel, or reschedule it. After saying I wanted to keep it, the voice asked me if I or someone over 18 would […]
Re: the Chronicle of Higher Education’s Article: “We Can’t Teach Students to Love Reading” by Alan Jacobs, professor of English at Wheaton College. An important missing distinction: Most of the people who ‘love’ reading began loving it when they were children. In the past few decades there has been an unprecedented decline in how lovable reading is for most children […]
