There’s a new trend in learning aids, and this one may be able to raise your IQ. “Brain training” facilities claim they can improve both IQ and cognitive skills through a regimen of games aimed at promoting brain elasticity and fluid intelligence. Though there are many companies specializing in brain training, the most notable is LearningRx, the only brick-and-mortar brain trainer, numbering 83 [...]
You could say that his literary presence is as resilient as the One Ring’s will to conquer Middle-earth. More than 40 years after his death, J.R.R. Tolkien’s unfinished manuscripts are still being discovered and dusted off for public consumption. Last year, in an article entitled “An Unexpected Journey: Hobbits in the Heartland,” New York Times reporter Lawrence Downes let everyone in on the secret that [...]
The book, “The Cat in The Hat,” by Dr. Seuss, sits on a book shelf at West Elementary School during a National Read Across America Day event Mar. 2, 2017 at Yokota Air Base, Japan. National Read Across America Day is a holiday to share the fun of reading with children of all ages, and is celebrated on Dr. Seuss’ birthday. (U.S. [...]
by Catherine Martin As long as money exists, people will continue to have problems with it. And as long as people continue to have problems with money, publishers of educational material will continue to try to help kids learn about being smart with it. As The Wall Street Journal mentioned back in 2008, publishers like Kidnexions and Educational Learning Games have tried to make financial responsibility fun by [...]
If you asked me a week ago what I thought about when I heard the word comics, I would have mentioned the colored “funnies” in the Sunday newspaper, or the brightly illustrated magazines featuring superheroes rescuing their damsels in distress. Not anymore! Today, the art medium that uniquely uses both text and imagery is being woven into education to promote literacy and hands-on interaction [...]
I’m not a poet, and I certainly do know it. But long before the times when I was asked to analyze the symbolism of “The Raven,” back when I was an eager pupil who thought “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” was about Santa Claus, poetry was fun. Part of what made it fun was the activities my teachers would assign. From [...]
Won’t Back Down is a 2012 drama starring Maggie Gyllenhaal as a single mom to a dyslexic daughter, Viola Davis as a teacher at a failing inner-city elementary school and Holly Hunter as a teacher’s union representative. In the movie, Gyllenhaal’s and Davis’s characters use a fail-safe law to take over the underperforming school. The film plays out in typical Hollywood fashion with plucky [...]
High schools are always changing. During my time in high school, I was a member of the unlucky class required to take standardized testing junior year, and then again senior year when the state decided to change the grade level being tested. Washington State students, however, aren’t just presented with the inconvenience of extra testing, but with the added pressure of another course. [...]
As a person a little scared to so much as add without the help of a calculator, I understand why STEM has a menacing reputation among high school students. The STEM skills—that is, science, technology, engineering and math—are often considered complicated and unnecessary lessons to students who don’t want to be scientists, technicians, engineers or mathematicians. Many students assume they’re better off avoiding [...]
With answers becoming so accessible that students can find them with just a click of the mouse, it’s understandable that some may worry that technology is becoming more of a hindrance and less of an improvement to education. For students who saved their summer reading until the last minute, finding detailed book summaries has become relatively easy. With the variety of online games [...]